American Politics

[QUOTE=Tiny12;2743827]Fair enough. You had both people and utilities with bills they couldn't pay, for electricity and natural gas respectively. In situations like that, I don't know what the solution is. It's above my paygrade.

I do know what caused the problem though. This is something I posted on another hooker board contemporaneously. It was later backed up by reporting in the Wall Street Journal. You can blame the situation on the bureaucrats and directors at ERCOT, which is like the air traffic control system for the electric grid in Texas. During the early stages of the freeze, they gave priority to residences and the like over oil and gas wells and gas plants. And that was a very bad decision:[/QUOTE]That's why? So Texas' "screw you" separation from the Eastern and Western Interconnections had nothing to do with it?

It is an easily observable reality that border states benefit economically disproportionately due to their immediate proximity to foreign countries with which we have ongoing trade deals.

Shipping logistics, terminals, warehousing, commercial traffic in and out, it goes on and on. Imagine the greater wasteland Texas border towns (if there would be any at all) and districts would be if that power grid-challenged state was located in the middle of the country far, far away from the border of Mexico.

Therefore, in exchange for that benefit, it is only fair that border states disproportionately pay for and deal with the relatively minor downsides to being right on the border as well.

LOL. Crybaby, deadbeat Red state governors are always looking for a free lunch.

Oh, and a gentle reminder on a different issue; the USA government concept of "Divided Government" has nothing whatsoever to do with political party majorities in the House vs the party in the White House vs the majority in the Senate, etc.

Just sayin'.

Bonus info:

[B]CBO Estimates TCJA Extensions Could Cost Up to $2.7 Trillion.
JUN 28, 2022 TAXES[/B]

[URL]https://www.crfb.org/blogs/cbo-estimates-tcja-extensions-could-cost-27-trillion[/URL]

[QUOTE=PVMonger;2743823]According to virtually all Repubs, a foetus has rights but a mother doesn't. [/QUOTE]Thanks for standing in for Scat Man, but you didn't answer my Q either. I am not asking about what the law is, nor the difference in red or blue states. I am asking Mr Scat his opinion on the moral rissue egarding foetuses created during rape. Why does he think their rights should be different to the right of foetuses not created under rape.

[QUOTE=Canada;2743820]I remember and I hope you remember that the solar and windmills were a major factor in the fiasco. It never happened before when everything was gas or coal fired because gas and coal don't freeze up.[/QUOTE]That's what FUX Snooze and all of the rightwingnut media said, but nothing could have been further from the truth. If you stopped believing all of the BS from those sites, you might learn something.

[URL]https://www.texastribune.org/2022/02/15/texas-power-grid-winter-storm-2021/[/URL]

[URL]https://cz.boell.org/en/2021/03/19/texas-power-grid-failure-causes-lessons-learned-and-implications-eu-energy-market[/URL]

[URL]https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-factcheck-texas-wind-turbines-explain-idUSKBN2AJ2EI[/URL]

But sure, keep on living in fantasy world aka Donnie the Dumbass' Mar-a-Lago Putt-Putt and McDonalds Emporium.

[QUOTE=PVMonger;2743878]It seems like supporters of Donnie the Dumbass are continually blaming President Biden for inflation. It reminds me of a 60-year-old quote from Abraham Maslow "If the only tool you have is a hammer, it is tempting to treat everything as if it were a nail". That's supporters of Donnie the Dumbass all right. Everything is "fake news" unless it comes from some bogus rightwingnut source. Then, of course, it has to be "real". Yep, to them, "the election was stolen", "Chinese thermostats changed votes". Or was it Italian satellites? They probably even believe that Jewish Space Lasers cause forest fires. Sheesh.

What these folks forget is [B]virtually every country in the world[/B] is suffering from inflation. Gasoline prices are up worldwide. Food prices are up worldwide. Commodities are up. Manufactured goods are up. Now, even the dumbest person in the world ought to be able to see that something else is at work here. "All these countries have one thing in common: they're all struggling to recover from a once-in-a-lifetime pandemic that continues to disrupt the supply side of the economy, hampering the ability of businesses, workers, and the global supply chain to operate at full capacity and satisfy boomeranging consumer demand. Rather than putting a Biden "I did that" sticker on products with skyrocketing prices, it's probably more accurate to say "COVID did that. " [URL]https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2022/01/18/1073053108/the-movement-to-stick-inflation-blame-on-biden[/URL].

But the one thing that no self-respecting supporter of the one-term, twice-impeached, commander-in-chief of the Mar-a-Lago Putt-Putt and McDonalds Emporium would [B]ever do[/B] is admit that COVID is probably the main driver of inflation. Because to do so would mean that they would have to acknowledge that we'd have inflation even if Donnie the Dumbass was president*.

After all, even if Donnie the Dumbass was president*, we'd still have surging consumer demand because of the lifting of many of the COVID restrictions. We'd still have labor shortages as US workers say "Screw it, I'm not going to work for some moron who pays peanuts any more". We'd still have global supply chain problems. None of these things would have gone away if Donnie the Dumbass were president*. Unless, of course, "If the only tool you have is a hammer, it is tempting to treat everything as if it were a nail".

So, sorry folks, but Donnie the Dumbass couldn't have fixed this problem either. Just like he made COVID worse by lying to the American public, he'd have done the same thing here. He'd have simply declared the pandemic over and opened up everything. He'd have killed millions more with this strategy [B]plus[/B] kickstarted inflation even higher. [URL]https://businessinsider.mx/causes-of-inflation/?r=US&IR=T[/URL].[/QUOTE]It is almost all of Americans that blame Biden for inflation because he is the person that caused it. Yes even democrats blame Biden. Is is just the far left socialist idiots who blame Trump for inflation. There was no inflation during Trump presidency just prosperity. Yes idiots will continue to blame Trump for everything Biden does badly. They blame Trump for everything the incompetent Biden does. Biden has no clue on what to do. He thinks installing thousands of EV chargers across USA will get rid of inflation. The people that Biden has driven into poverty are not going to be able to afford a EV. They can't pay their power bills or put food on the table. We are almost 2 years in a failed presidency and dumb ass leftists are still blaming Trump. Can anyone name one thing that Biden has done that improves the economy or Americans lives? Giving away billions for green energy and billions to democrat states that are failing does not help the average American. How dumb does a person have to be to not blame Biden for inflation?

[QUOTE=JustTK;2741869] ... I am attacking your message. Which was to call me a QaNon supporter bcos of your binary (your either with us or against us) view of the world ...[/QUOTE]Binary thinking? Don't be absurd! No, absolutely not!

[U]Here let me give you an example:[/U]

I think the disillusioned Repubs voters the "status quo new order QAnon/Repubs/bothsideists", should be ecstatic after reading your "bothsidesism", and positive views on the Green party/Independent.

So now I am thinking, the disillusioned Repub voters have 3 choices. Same-ole-same-ole status quo, don't vote or the new option with Green Party/Independent. Not binary all!

There are those rare moments, when I do genuinely wish the best for Repubs, thanks to your "bothsidesism".

[QUOTE=Spidy;2744104]

[U]Here let me give you an example:[/U]

I think the disillusioned Repubs voters the "status quo new order QAnon/Repubs/bothsideists", should be ecstatic after reading your "bothsidesism", and positive views on the Green party/independent[/QUOTE]Well its great that you should finally attempt to defend your position. But I have 2 issues ATM:

1. What does this have to do w your claim that I share same policy views as reps / qanon?

2. I have no idea what you mean above. Please can you try again?

[QUOTE=EihTooms;2743932]It is an easily observable reality that border states benefit economically disproportionately due to their immediate proximity to foreign countries with which we have ongoing trade deals.

Shipping logistics, terminals, warehousing, commercial traffic in and out, it goes on and on. Imagine the greater wasteland Texas border towns (if there would be any at all) and districts would be if that power grid-challenged state was located in the middle of the country far, far away from the border of Mexico.

Therefore, in exchange for that benefit, it is only fair that border states disproportionately pay for and deal with the relatively minor downsides to being right on the border as well.

LOL. Crybaby, deadbeat Red state governors are always looking for a free lunch.

Oh, and a gentle reminder on a different issue; the USA government concept of "Divided Government" has nothing whatsoever to do with political party majorities in the House vs the party in the White House vs the majority in the Senate, etc.

Just sayin'.

Bonus info:

[B]CBO Estimates TCJA Extensions Could Cost Up to $2.7 Trillion.
JUN 28, 2022 TAXES[/B]

[URL]https://www.crfb.org/blogs/cbo-estimates-tcja-extensions-could-cost-27-trillion[/URL][/QUOTE]Yes imagine a Martha's Vineyard on the Mexico border. They are complaining about 50 illegals dropped off there and it is an emergency. Can you imagine Obama and Hillary allowing millions of illegals into Martha's Vineyard if it was on Mexico border. Biden would have had the military in war against Mexico.

[QUOTE=JustTK;2744013]Thanks for standing in for Scat Man, but you didn't answer my Q either.[/QUOTE]

[QUOTE=JustTK;2743753]...I asked you a question. You can refuse to answer it if you like, .......You shared your opinion, and I asked you a question on it.....[/QUOTE]

[QUOTE=JustTK;2743493]Yes, I know. But you didn't answer my Q.[/QUOTE]

[QUOTE=JustTK;2742364]......I am still here waiting for you to address the subject I raised,......[/QUOTE]You have this fantasy that you are [B]entitled to answers[/B] sounds like a line from Tom Cruise in "A Few Good Men". You're not a US citizen. You have never voted in our elections. You neither understand or appreciate how the US political system works (or doesn't work). You come from some other part of the world. You don't know the history of the last 120 years. The US has been the major force for decency in the world and you want to rewrite the histories of the 2 great world wars. You can't even begin to understand how many countries the US has helped during the last century.

Why should anyone bother answering any of your questions? This is an American Politics Forum not a "I hate the US forum".

[QUOTE=Xpartan;2743912]That's why? So Texas' "screw you" separation from the Eastern and Western Interconnections had nothing to do with it?[/QUOTE]Texas dwarfs other states in terms of hydrocarbon and wind resources, so that's probably a good part of the reason why it has continued to go it alone. Yes, it would have been advantageous to have been a part of an interstate grid in February, 2021.

But I don't think this is going to happen again. ERCOT would have to have some real dumb asses to make the same mistake twice. I say that with a bit of trepidation though, as something similar happened in 2011, only not nearly as severe as 2021. Anyway I don't think Texas will have ongoing problems like California.

[QUOTE=Canada;2743820]I remember and I hope you remember that the solar and windmills were a major factor in the fiasco. It never happened before when everything was gas or coal fired because gas and coal don't freeze up.[/QUOTE]I attended a presentation by an ERCOT engineer some years ago. It was fascinating. ERCOT acts like an air traffic control system for the electricity grid in Texas. Electric rates are set by supply and demand, and variations in price can be extreme. There are old, inefficient gas fired plants that stay idling all the time. But they only go into power production mode when the electricity price shoots sky high. They can make enough money in a matter of weeks to pay for all that idling the rest of the year. Unfortunately, that only works however if the plants have natural gas. And if some dumb ass at ERCOT shuts off electricity to the gas and oil wells and the gas plants, so that gas production goes off stream, then those gas fired plants won't have fuel. Not just the ones that are idling, but those gas fired power plants that operate year round and provide base load electricity too. And that's unfortunately what happened. So I don't think I'd necessarily blame it on solar and windmills. I read an editorial in the Wall Street Journal though that agreed with your view. They pointed out that wind and solar had crowded out nuclear and coal plants, which are more reliable in cold weather than the gas fired plants. Also, I drove from Dallas to Amarillo in the middle of that cold spell, right through one of the densest accumulations of windmills in the state. And the wind wasn't blowing that day.

One other takeaway from the ERCOT presentation, wind power producers on many days would actually pay money to keep operating. When the Texas grid has too much supply, you'd think people would just shut down or throttle back power generation, to avoid operating costs and wear and tear on their equipment. And so the price per kilowatt hour (kwh) would just go down to, say $. 02 or $. 03/ kwh. And that's the way it should work. But the owners of the windmills on some windy days were paying $. 02/ kwh to be allowed to add electricity to the grid! Why? Because the federal government was giving them a subsidy of $. 04/ kwh. So they were coming out ahead! Crazy! Another example of how our federal tax dollars are flushed down the toilet.

[QUOTE=EihTooms;2743932]It is an easily observable reality that border states benefit economically disproportionately due to their immediate proximity to foreign countries with which we have ongoing trade deals.

Shipping logistics, terminals, warehousing, commercial traffic in and out, it goes on and on. Imagine the greater wasteland Texas border towns (if there would be any at all) and districts would be if that power grid-challenged state was located in the middle of the country far, far away from the border of Mexico.

Therefore, in exchange for that benefit, it is only fair that border states disproportionately pay for and deal with the relatively minor downsides to being right on the border as well.

LOL. Crybaby, deadbeat Red state governors are always looking for a free lunch.

Oh, and a gentle reminder on a different issue; the USA government concept of "Divided Government" has nothing whatsoever to do with political party majorities in the House vs the party in the White House vs the majority in the Senate, etc.

Just sayin'.

Bonus info:

[B]CBO Estimates TCJA Extensions Could Cost Up to $2.7 Trillion.
JUN 28, 2022 TAXES[/B]

[URL]https://www.crfb.org/blogs/cbo-estimates-tcja-extensions-could-cost-27-trillion[/URL][/QUOTE]They don't even want them back, they call deportees yesterdays trash.

[URL]https://www.surfrider.org/coastal-blog/entry/tijuana-river-the-largest-sewage-spill-weve-ever-seen[/URL]

What would America do all that Fentanyl they bring in via CCPland?

[URL]https://www.surfrider.org/coastal-blog/entry/tijuana-river-the-largest-sewage-spill-weve-ever-seen[/URL]

[QUOTE=EihTooms;2743769][B]Biden Signs Chips Bill, Unleashing Funding for US Production.[/B]

[URL]https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-08-09/biden-set-to-sign-chips-bill-as-us-makers-unveil-new-investments[/URL]

[B]Congress Passes Investments in Domestic Semiconductor Manufacturing, Research & Design[/B]

[URL]https://www.semiconductors.org/chips/[/URL][/QUOTE]Part of the problem was the 35% federal corporate tax rate, the highest in the developed world. Compare to some Asian countries. When a company sets up a new manufacturing facility, for chips or whatever, that's going to export, it pays no income tax for some period of time, and then at half the normal rate for some years afterwards. In your country of residence, Thailand, these are called BOI privileges. Before 2017, if an American company were going to start producing chips, it would be better off building a factory in Thailand than building one in the USA.

The 2017 Ryan / McConnell / Trump TCJA (tax cuts act) changed all this. The corporate rate was lowered to 21%. And USA Corporations were made to pay tax on their income from Thailand and other countries, regardless of whether they repatriated the profits to the USA. I greatly prefer these changes in the tax code to the corporate welfare in Biden's chips bill.

[QUOTE=EihTooms;2743932]
[B]CBO Estimates TCJA Extensions Could Cost Up to $2.7 Trillion.
JUN 28, 2022 TAXES[/B]

[URL]https://www.crfb.org/blogs/cbo-estimates-tcja-extensions-could-cost-27-trillion[/URL][/QUOTE]Yeah, but will the provisions be extended? It's very unlikely they all will be unless Republicans control the House, Senate and Presidency. Look at what happened with the Bush tax cuts. They expired. Obama and the Democratic controlled Senate and House could have done away with them in 2009 or 2010, but didn't. I don't think the corporate tax rate will be jacked back up to 35% again though. Both Obama and Biden wanted to bring it down to 28% but never did.

Obama I think was a good bit wiser than Biden. He figured that raising taxes while we were recovering from a recession was a bad idea, so that's why he allowed Bush's tax cuts to expire on their own. Biden on the other hand, through his proposed Build Back Better bill, was looking to raise taxes a lot.

Oil and gas is another example. Obama bragged about how oil and gas production increased during his administration. Biden on the other hand keeps trying to kneecap the USA Oil and gas producers. During the first 19 months of his administration, only about 130,000 acres of federal leases have been issued, compared to 7 million acres during Obama's first 19 months. Furthermore, he's subjecting leases issued in 2018,2019 and 2020 to environmental review by the EPA. One of the criteria the EPA will be looking at is additional carbon emissions from any production discovered on the leases. Biden actually promised during his campaign to stop issuing federal leases and drilling permits on federal lands and the federal offshore. He had to back track because of the courts and because of political expedience, I. E. High gas prices and the upcoming mid terms. But he's apparently looking for a backdoor way to fulfill his promises. Hasn't he learned anything from what's going on in Europe right now? The Europeans may be freezing their asses off this winter, because they're depending on foreign sources of fuel.

I think Biden's just being jerked around by the Progressives. That's not good. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders may be a lot more articulate than Lauren Boebert and Marjorie Taylor Greene, but they're just about as nutty.

[QUOTE=PVMonger;2743878]It seems like supporters of Donnie the Dumbass are continually blaming President Biden for inflation. It reminds me of a 60-year-old quote from Abraham Maslow "If the only tool you have is a hammer, it is tempting to treat everything as if it were a nail". That's supporters of Donnie the Dumbass all right. Everything is "fake news" unless it comes from some bogus rightwingnut source. Then, of course, it has to be "real". Yep, to them, "the election was stolen", "Chinese thermostats changed votes". Or was it Italian satellites? They probably even believe that Jewish Space Lasers cause forest fires. Sheesh.

What these folks forget is [B]virtually every country in the world[/B] is suffering from inflation. Gasoline prices are up worldwide. Food prices are up worldwide. Commodities are up. Manufactured goods are up. Now, even the dumbest person in the world ought to be able to see that something else is at work here. "All these countries have one thing in common: they're all struggling to recover from a once-in-a-lifetime pandemic that continues to disrupt the supply side of the economy, hampering the ability of businesses, workers, and the global supply chain to operate at full capacity and satisfy boomeranging consumer demand. Rather than putting a Biden "I did that" sticker on products with skyrocketing prices, it's probably more accurate to say "COVID did that. " [URL]https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2022/01/18/1073053108/the-movement-to-stick-inflation-blame-on-biden[/URL].

But the one thing that no self-respecting supporter of the one-term, twice-impeached, commander-in-chief of the Mar-a-Lago Putt-Putt and McDonalds Emporium would [B]ever do[/B] is admit that COVID is probably the main driver of inflation. Because to do so would mean that they would have to acknowledge that we'd have inflation even if Donnie the Dumbass was president*.

After all, even if Donnie the Dumbass was president*, we'd still have surging consumer demand because of the lifting of many of the COVID restrictions. We'd still have labor shortages as US workers say "Screw it, I'm not going to work for some moron who pays peanuts any more". We'd still have global supply chain problems. None of these things would have gone away if Donnie the Dumbass were president*. Unless, of course, "If the only tool you have is a hammer, it is tempting to treat everything as if it were a nail".

So, sorry folks, but Donnie the Dumbass couldn't have fixed this problem either. Just like he made COVID worse by lying to the American public, he'd have done the same thing here. He'd have simply declared the pandemic over and opened up everything. He'd have killed millions more with this strategy [B]plus[/B] kickstarted inflation even higher. [URL]https://businessinsider.mx/causes-of-inflation/?r=US&IR=T[/URL].[/QUOTE]Nobody sane is arguing that supply chain problems and higher worldwide commodity prices didn't have an unfavorable effect on inflation. But the American Rescue Plan did too. Larry Summers, the most influential Democratic Party economist of the last 30 years, did his damnedest to keep the bill from being passed, but Biden, Pelosi, Schumer et al wouldn't listen. This article is from February 5, 2021, over a month before the bill was passed:

"Larry Summers, the top economic adviser to former President Obama, warned in an op-ed on Friday that President Biden's proposed COVID-19 relief package is too big and could overheat the economy.

Summers, the Treasury secretary under former President Clinton, wrote in The Washington Post that the proposed $1. 9 trillion stimulus could ignite inflationary pressures "of a kind we have not seen in a generation. ".

He said the risk of inflation could have "consequences for the dollar and financial stability. ".

"Stimulus measures of the magnitude contemplated are steps into the unknown," Summers wrote. ".

[URL]https://thehill.com/policy/finance/537521-key-ex-obama-adviser-says-biden-stimulus-is-too-big/[/URL]

Here's CPI inflation before and after the American Rescue Plan (ARP) was passed:

2/2021:1.7% (month before ARP was passed).

3/2021:2.6% (Bill was passed on March 11, and checks were being direct deposited to some Americans' accounts within 24 hours).

4/2021:4.2% (Disbursement of funds from ARP continued).

1/2022:7.5% (This was a month before the Russian invasion of Ukraine).

As to your belief that every other country experienced the same kind of inflation, here's YoY CPI inflation for various countries on 4/2021, after the ARP checks had hit. Australia is 3/2021, because it reports quarterly.

USA 4.2%.

Australia 1.1%.

Japan -1.1%.

Switzerland 0.3%.

Singapore 2.1%.

Hong Kong 0.8%.

UK 0.7%.

EU 1.6%.

I put Switzerland, Hong Kong and Singapore in there because, like the USA, they have smaller government spending as a % of GDP than other developed countries. I have no idea what kind of money they spent on COVID stimulus but figure it was probably less than, say, the EU and UK.

Migrants Decline Newsom's Offer Of Asylum In CA Since They Just Came From A Collapsing Communist Hellhole With Sporadic Electricity.

MARTHA'S VINEYARD, MA — This week, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis flew 50 migrants to an affluent island in Massachusetts to highlight the struggles of border states whose resources are buckling amid soaring numbers of undocumented immigrants. Progressives have labeled the action as "cruel" and "heartless," but when California governor Gavin Newsom volunteered asylum for the migrants in his own state, they declined the offer since they had only recently escaped a collapsing communist state without electricity.

"I don't like bullies, and Florida governor Ron DeSantis is bullying these migrants by not welcoming them! We in California believe a nation of immigrants draws its strength from more immigrants – come to the sunshine state and we will house you, clothe you, and feed you. " Newsom spoke out in a video message from his home after the events of the week, pledging that there was "no limit" to how high he would tax other people to pay for the migrants' livelihoods but also clarifying that he would not be able to help personally.

While the migrants have heard the message, they have already voiced their intent to avoid California to reporters, speaking out about the harrowing circumstances they had escaped: skyrocketing inflation, a demolished economy, and obvious corruption at the highest levels of government. The migrants say that California's trash-littered sidewalks, water shortages, and electrical outages bear too much resemblance to the Venezuela they left behind for it to be a desirable destination.

One of Governor Newsom's PACs, Robbing California Citizens To Fund Our Voter Base, has posted a press release condemning the migrants for the comparison. "To compare California to Venezuela is disingenuous, and these narrow-minded migrants should be ashamed. They come from a nation where business is stifled by overregulation and state interference, a one-party system has ruled for decades with a compliant state media to tout its success while cities burn, and citizens struggling to pay for gas, food, and other necessities – this is nothing like California. For this disrespect, we call for their immediate deportation to the 'greener pastures' of Florida that they seek so much, with plans for them to be re-imported for votes during election seasons. ".

At publishing time, Newsom had reiterated his offer in a video at his $5 million home, gesturing to the plentiful electricity around him, but migrants have said that this reminds them too much of the opulent lifestyle enjoyed by top politicians Chavez and then Maduro while they wreaked havoc on the nation. . .