Prelude to the Apocalypse

[BulletMagnet]

The total cost, per American, of the following 17 programs said to be on the chopping block is $22.36 - of which more than a third comes from a single clean-energy program. By contrast, housing subsidies, like the mortgage interest deduction, which are disproportionately used by the wealthy, cost $296.29 per American.

Some hard numbers on precisely how much will be saved, pure baseline dollar-figure-wise, without attempting to extrapolate indirect effects, if/when Trump's current round of budget meat-axing goes through.

[rancor]

The total cost, per American, of the following 17 programs said to be on the chopping block is $22.36

Already some funny math involved in the very first line. I find this figure hard to believe when ~35% of Americans receive some form of government assistance. It's the same as the "one download = one lost sale" pitch the record and movie companies make. How can you lose money that you never had? Also the fact that I have 3 kids and a wife that doesn't work means my burden would actually be $111.80.

[quash]

I have no idea what the point of that comic is

It's quite simple really: leftist moralizers push too hard and galvanize reactionaries, those with no perspective gawk at how broken the system is, and those who prefer to admire their gun collection are forced to pick a side.

The lesson here is to refrain from calling someone a bad dog until you actually have a reason to. Even then, be careful who you call a bad dog, because for all you know, they could be a good dog that would have otherwise joined you.

[GaijinPunch]

I have no idea what the point of that comic is

It's quite simple really: leftist moralizers push too hard and galvanize reactionaries, those with no perspective gawk at how broken the system is, and those who prefer to admire their gun collection are forced to pick a side.

The lesson here is to refrain from calling someone a bad dog until you actually have a reason to. Even then, be careful who you call a bad dog, because for all you know, they could be a good dog that would have otherwise joined you.

Oh, that's what it meant...

[Xyga]

What perfect example of psychopatic mental vomit, working only by omitting entirely the dreadful things that get you to be called bad dogs to begin, and with gangster/criminal threat logic: 'you should either shut up or agree with the bad dogs, because if you don't you provoke them which is enough reason to justify killing you'.
Basically it's "you give us no choice but to become violent fascists!" coming from people who've always been fascists to the core anyway, so add to this the fucking hypocrisy and that's just perfect.
Denial, insensitiveness to the other = total incapacity and unwillingness to understand the criticism, threat, absurdly disproportioned violent reaction, coercicion/subversion, absolute hypocrisy playing the victim, it's all there and it's no allegory, you're in the minds of TrumPutin/alt-right and all the fascist sick fucks who follow/admire them, this is how twisted their perverse-narcissistic understanding of reality is. edit: well, 'alt-reality' lol
Mix absurd religious batshitfuckery with it and you've got the recipe of the fucking madness that'll plunge our world into another slaughtering frenzy and a new dark ages.

[Durandal]

Wouldn't it be cheaper to lay a minefield on the Mexican border than to build a wall?

[BulletMagnet]

I find this figure hard to believe when ~35% of Americans receive some form of government assistance.

The thing is, the article is only talking about the discretionary programs, listed within, that Trump has explicitly said he intends to deep-six; he's claimed that he won't touch the military or any of the major entitlements (though his GOP cadre has already made preparations for doing explicitly that). The point being that even if he completely eliminates everything on his wish list it's basically another Carrier deal - it lets him beat his chest about how "tough on waste" he is, but the end result costs taxpayers more than it'll ever save them and does next to nothing to address the problem it's supposed to address (and opens the door to "well gee, now we have to kill Social Security" walkbacks).

EDIT: And the beat goes on...

[BryanM]

A possibly relevant election coming up for the house of cards that is neoliberalism this weekend. If we have any frenchies here they might correct any inaccuracies, but my basic understanding is thus:

France has a socialist party that isn't socialist - it's been run by garbage people like the Clintons and Blairs of the world. Hollande has an approval rating of something like 9% - only a little less than the popularity of AIDs.

They're having the final round of their primary this weekend: hope and change guy Hamon versus let's lose to the fascists guy Valls. Since this is France, Hamon would be considered a moonbeam child here in the US - he's actually concerned about the things people under 40 worry about. Valls has a carbon copy of the bad faith arguments neoliberal garbage always gives for their wicked naughty ways: vote for me or we'll lose to the crazies. When the polls say there's a 100% chance of Valls losing the election.

Even if Hamon pulls through, his party is deeply, deeply unpopular and he really might have no chance of winning. But who knows.

But what we all know is everyone is tired of eating the shit sandwich of Austerity, and Le Pen is real.

_____


And at a mention of the age gap, I'm always amazed by the things I see on TV whenever I get stuck in a hospital waiting room. The phony insincere enthusiasm about nothing of the morning shows, the song "Hit Me Baby One More Time" getting played - anyone who watches this shit really IS stuck 20 years in the past.

No wonder they voted for Clinton in the primary - they're very lost and confused and they think it's still ~1998.

[Lyv]

France has a socialist party that isn't socialist

Pretty much.

The two candidates for this primary are not really that different though.
The main point on which they disagree is that Hamon wants to set up a "universal allocation" (something like 750€/month given to everyone regardless of resources) to ensure that everyone can live decently and to accommodate for future structural changes on work distribution and availability. Problems include "where does the money come from?", "how will it affect the national debt?" and "how hard do we want to flip the finger at the european regulations on national deficit?". Economists are divided on the feasibility of the plan, even with a progressive implementation.

Even if Hamon pulls through, his party is deeply, deeply unpopular and he really might have no chance of winning. But who knows.

Mostly because the party is surrounded on their right by some center-left-right dude whose program is basically "I'm not in the socialist party lol vote for me" (who has astounding poll results doing so) and on their left by a true socialist/communist party with a steady voters base.

They are all way too divided on major economic/social issues, and none seems to want to compromise with the others at this point.

[Xyga]

@BryanM: What, as usual when I criticize the stupid shit on the other side of the Atlantic the first thing you guys come up with is try and make me mad over my own country, wich 9/10 of the times misses because none of you would manage to find enough reliable info on it in the English-speaking web anyway...you see there isn't much published, it's not a very important country anymore, Germany has become the leading force, and the situation with the UK makes the headlines anyway.

The general election in France will be played between the right and the far-right, few people give a fuck about the socialists because they've indeed betrayed most of their voters expectations, which were way too 'leftist' for most muricans to even begin to comprehend (raging and going full retard just at the mention of the word) since on some crucial social and economic points we're significantly different from the Brits or the Germans whom cultures and systems you can more relate to.

Basically Hollande and his socialists didn't destroy our system, but they didn't help getting it out of the crisis its in as well, things slowly but surely got worse, plus they've conceded the dominant European right some laws and reforms we're many to think are BS that'll make it even worse, and those slow cringeworthy 5 years were perceived as giving up on the left and letting the European right and Merkel at its top dictate the policy (well they have the majority in parliament anyway).

Basically both favourites on the right (Fillon) and far-right (Le Pen) are Putin cocksuckers, and at least Le Pen (who's directly sponsored by Putin btw) like the other fascist fucktards in Europe, would gladly give Trump a BJ (if only he cared).
Fillon is pro-EU by principle of his party, but it's very likely that he's already fucked his chances after a recent scandal uncovering his wife's fictional work/salary.
Our right-wing party (called 'The Republicans' lol) having embraced many of the ideas of the far-right by electoral greed is in the same state as the Republicans; basically losing all ideological grip in favor of the genuine fascist fucktards their party let in all those years, so there's practically zero doubt that a massive portion of their voters will have no issues switching to Le Pen.

But naturally Bryan you're siding with the fucktards who champion the idea that instead of fixing and improving our society we'd be better off reinstalling nationalism, racism/xenophobia, press and opposition repression, all sorts of religion and primal resentment-dictated imbecile social inequalities, accelerating the destruction of the planet, among other intelligent and civilized niceties.

[BryanM]

But naturally Bryan you're siding with the fucktards who champion the idea that instead of fixing and improving our society we'd be better off reinstalling nationalism, racism/xenophobia, press and opposition repression, all sorts of religion and primal resentment-dictated imbecile social inequalities, among other intelligent and civilized niceties.

"Siding" is too absurd a word to use for what is mere passive observation.

Money's ownership of politicians ensures only bad politicians are given a chance to win. When the decision every election is between bad and worse, natural selection will trend toward worse. That's the only direction things are allowed to go. Shit like concentration camps are an inevitability in such a rigged system.

I'm sorry that being the turtle in the latest episode of National Geographic sucks ass. It'll be another country's turn again soon.

[Xyga]

You know what Bryan ? This might all be a game for you and you're having lots of fun making wacky posts like you're always on crack and you think you're funny, but this is the thread you've started and which is basically the playground for insane fascist fucks to whom you've provided a stage and sided with all along in practice, and yes you fucking did.
Retards like you who basically support the demise of my country and my people make enemies, to me this is clearly where you stand with assholes like quash and opus, you're no different.
Still happy with you shitstain of a thread ? Keep it up, it sure is hilarious.

[BryanM]

You know what Bryan ? This might all be a game for you and you're having lots of fun making wacky posts like you're always on crack and you think you're funny, but this is the thread you've started and which is basically the playground for insane fascist fucks to whom you've provided a stage and sided with all along in practice, and yes you fucking did.
Retards like you who basically support the demise of my country and my people make enemies, to me this is clearly where you stand with assholes like quash and opus, you're no different.
Still happy with you shitstain of a thread ? Keep it up, it sure is hilarious.

Xyga, you have a lot of serious problems.

First of all, I submitted three votes against Donald Trump becoming president. Three of the 14 million people who voted for the nearly certain outcome of Sanders becoming president, instead of a coin flip between a war criminal and a war criminal. I had zero effect on the outcome of the general, there was nothing I could do to impact that specific election. Only a seriously disturbed person would quantify that as "siding" with the extreme conservative neoliberals.

Secondly, no, this isn't a "game" for me. My father contracted cancer when I was 20 years old. It bankrupted my parents. Do you know the names of one of the many poor people who're going to get reamed up the ass by Trump's policies? Peasant boy BryanM.

Third, I'm not some kind of omnipotent god. I'm one person. Why are you furious at a peasant, instead of someone who has actual power that fashioned the system that led to this inevitable result?

Fourth, this is the internet.

If you want to waste energy by being furious at me for wanting a better world where we give a shit about human life, fine. Whatever. Keep yelling at clouds instead of laying out an alternative vision for how the world should be.

Make enemies out of everyone. Good strategy. Call everyone a retard. Especially people like me, who don't want anyone to have to go through the kind of shit I had to go through.

___

*** REMINDER ***

This was what Hillary Clinton had to say about my dead dad.

I was perfectly fine with voting for Hillary in the general, when it was January of 2015. Even though it would have been purely symbolic.

Then she convinced me not to.

[Xyga]

It's you who have a problem, I remember your disappointment for Bernie, but after that how much you've wrote against people who actually still tried to prevent that disaster and how much you've concurred to those freaks's rhetoric in this thread makes me wonder if you have a split personality disorder.

And I have a better alernative yes, I've always stated it: not destroying the world we have just because it has failed us to some extent. Fuck accelerationism it's retarded as hell, were you seriously thinking that wrecking everything our world is would heal your misery ?
No it'll make it worse indeed.
Fighting, it's fighting those assholes that is the thing to do, not playing the bitter cynical clown nor look down on more people who will suffer the consequences, even if they're from other countries.

And come on "it's only the internet" give me a fucking break, like I was saying to BM the other day I'm strongly against offering them ever more free space to dispend their ideological venom, because this has been their #1 mass subversion weapon, this is how they fucking win. It's believing it is harmless to let them smear all that anti-democracy and anti-human rights shit over the internet that is flat out retarded, because they're not playing on the same grounds as peolple who like their freedom and other's do, they don't give any fucks about that.

It's not me who's confused about them, I know they're a menace, you do not seem to realize they're enemies.
People who have doubts and think fascists are better than bad democratic left/right politics, are fucking idiots. Pre-world-war idiots to be more precise.

[BryanM]

and on their left by a true socialist/communist party with a steady voters base.

They are all way too divided on major economic/social issues, and none seems to want to compromise with the others at this point.

Ah thanks, I looked at opinion polling and it looks like the socialists aren't even really in the running. A feller by the name of Emmanuel Macron is.

And that Le Pen will lose massively in any match up in the second round of voting.

Not a situation like where Clinton was always within 3% of Trump; these are 20% gaps for an election a couple months away.

Polls are nice. They sure do convey more information than the bits and pieces of shit and hysteria we get out of headlines.

[Bananamatic]

I think america should be more open and tolerant like sweden

[BryanM]

The Sanders-Klobuchar amendment the other week would have saved Americans millions of dollars every year and saved a few hundred lives every year. That's the one where we're allowed to import drugs we exported to Canada and elsewhere for 1/2 to 1/4th of the cost we have to pay domestically.

13 democrats voted against it. Such as our hated Cory Booker.

12 republicans voted for it. Some very prominent ones: Cruz, McCain, and Paul. Guys I generally consider the zodiac killer, a war hero that really likes war, and a silly poodlehead that's sometimes reasonable.

This is such a brain dead simple line in the sand. The 13 democrats and 39 republicans that voted against it are 100% my enemy 100% of the time, and that the 34 democrats and 12 republicans that didn't aren't my enemy 100% of the time.

I considered putting this up as a poll, but I seriously doubt we'd see much variance of opinion here: is there even a single person here who thinks we should not be able to import drugs from Canada? And if so, how much stock do you own in pharmaceuticals?

[Xyga]

And now those nice republitards are destroying obamacare, leaving droves of people without healtcare which was an immense progress for your people, and... so what's your point ?
Aren't you losing benefit too ?
You've found one thing to not agree with that the dems voted and that's in line with your life's tragedy and bam! that's enough to give a pass to the fascist crass that'll make your cuntry and this entire fucking dumb world an even worse place ?
Have you been high the actual whole campaign and passed out these past days since that piece of shit's investiture ? You do see what's happening don't you ? How many times echoing quapus have you joked that it wouldn't happen like it's all for the lulz ?

I'm not with those trying to make excuses or the fucking so-called left and right wing parties that have disappointed their people so hard, but I'll never make the absurd stupid ignorant mistake to think fascists are any better, they're not here to save people, they're here to fuck them, I mean you fucking know what they think, you know what people like them did in the history of humanity...AND YET !!!???
They're bastards who do not belong to civilized democratic countreis, if your regular leaders are bad and your society's getting sick, then fight for your rights, protest, involve yourself change it. Don't call exterminators or make any excuses for them even if you weren't among those who called them.

[Bananamatic]

so what makes trump a fascist again

[Xyga]

that banapost comes at the right time to highlight that when there are people to even ask that question; you know this world is fucked

[Giest118]

I bet you convinced the fuck out of him with that in-depth response.

[GaijinPunch]

so what makes trump a fascist again

Undermining the media on Day 1 is a pretty good fucking start.

[Bananamatic]

sounds like he's just a dumbass running his mouth too much if you mean the bs about attendance
on the other hand it's funny to see the president himself talking shit lke that

so when is he going full 1488 with the death squads and where do I apply

[Durandal]

sounds like he's just a dumbass running his mouth too much if you mean the bs about attendance
on the other hand it's funny to see the president himself talking shit lke that

so when is he going full 1488 with the death squads and where do I apply

so far it sounds like he prefers to share presidential news (or 'alternative facts') directly to the public using his Twitter rather than through the FAKE NEWS outlets
we're not seeing a complete takeover of the mainstream media by the government (yet?) because any journalist who doesn't kneel to Trump already hates his guts and the news about Trump's dumb shit more than overshadows the actual shady shit going on, so for the time being Trump will just be shitposting from his Twitter whenever the MSM criticizes or just satirizes something about him while having more control over national twitter accounts to the point where a zillion 'alternative' accounts to these national twitters have been made by (?anonymous government employees) publishing the (?real) news directly

the moment the government actually starts negatively interfering with press outlets is probably the moment you can safely say he's a dictator

[quash]

Denial, insensitiveness to the other = total incapacity and unwillingness to understand the criticism, threat, absurdly disproportioned violent reaction, coercicion/subversion, absolute hypocrisy playing the victim, it's all there and it's no allegory, you're in the minds of TrumPutin/alt-right and all the fascist sick fucks who follow/admire them, this is how twisted their perverse-narcissistic understanding of reality is. edit: well, 'alt-reality' lol
Mix absurd religious batshitfuckery with it and you've got the recipe of the fucking madness that'll plunge our world into another slaughtering frenzy and a new dark ages.

I am squarely in the purple on that chart, dude. The only way you're ever going to turn a libertarian into an authoritarian is by being authoritarian yourself.

Again, communism has killed an insane number of people in the name of such virtues as equality, yet I don't hear you or anyone else decrying the slaughter of millions of Russians, Chinese, etc. throughout history.

If you want to live in an authoritarian leftist utopia, North Korea will be glad to take you. The rest of us would like to see cool shit happen, like sex robots and drones in space.

[Ed Oscuro]

The total cost, per American, of the following 17 programs said to be on the chopping block is $22.36

Already some funny math involved in the very first line. I find this figure hard to believe when ~35% of Americans receive some form of government assistance. It's the same as the "one download = one lost sale" pitch the record and movie companies make. How can you lose money that you never had? Also the fact that I have 3 kids and a wife that doesn't work means my burden would actually be $111.80.

You're talking about something else entirely. Re-open (or just open, for the first time) that link and look at the first few sentences.

Also keep in mind that agencies have to find a way to spend every dollar in their budget; the figures might look inflated compared to what the programs really need (putting aside, of course, all the missed opportunities due to underfunding).

And look at the list of things Trump wants to kill off. Bert and Ernie, LGBT stuff... "friend of the gays" Trump has turned out to be anything but (which I suppose surprised the hell out of anybody who never heard of Rosie O'Donnell). One of the very first things they did was get the page about LGBT rights off the White House website. Shit costs nothing, it's all about priorities (or in this case, burning hatreds).

so what makes trump a fascist again

Since it was too hard to go to Google:
"an authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization." That's Trump in a nutshell. (And this piece which attempts to answer your question also shows up in those search results, currently, and mentions some other fascist-style tactics the Republicans - at large - are trying to legalize.)

Fascism isn't defined by death camps on day one.

Trump doesn't need to try to shut down the free media openly, and he couldn't have done it to start with. They've only got a foothold on their "alternative" media with which they balkanize news. All they seek to do is make sure their true supporters get the party line, and sow chaos and disbelief everywhere else.

By the by, does this guy remind anybody of somebody?

[BryanM]

so what makes trump a fascist again

As George Orwell pointed out an eternity ago, "fascist" is one of those words that has no meaning anymore due to misuse. It's merely a synonym for "bully" in the popular discourse.

Of course he has plenty of the trappings of fascism: the authoritarianism, the scapegoating, taking capital from other countries by force ("we gotta take the oil"). Of course... these elements alone are not remarkable in the USA. They're basically the backbone of the policy of every corporate republican and democrat. Silencing our public scientific organizations about Climate Change is a step above, however.

The other stuff he's so-so on:

The sincerity of enacting protectionist economic policy I'm very skeptical on; I'll believe it when the tariffs drop. However, the TPP is dead for now, so anyone who isn't a hack should be glad about that.

He's against the economic reforms of Italian style fascism, such as a minimum wage, 40 hour work week, and lower the retirement age. He's doing the exact opposite on progressive taxation.

He hasn't been murdering his political opponents and hasn't made himself emperor for life yet.


However all that aside, it is absolutely possible laws and judges will be put into place where it's impossible to vote the republican party out of power. But again, that's been standard republican policy for decades now. The wealthy are not going to go quietly into the night and they sure as hell don't want normal human beings to have political power. That's a very real concern and a very real possibility - the worst case scenario.

As for all the complaining about him trying to control the media......... where on earth have you guys been. That's how things have gone for decades now - the tv and newspaper news media is a propaganda arm of the republican and democrat parties. They dictate talking points and fired people who didn't tow the line, like this guy and this guy and this lady:



Been going on like this for as long as I've been alive. Is it because Trump doesn't pretend this isn't how things work here that makes you mad? Is it because you can't pretend that things are fine anymore that he's bad? Maybe he is a good civics lesson, because this one specific issue, as well as having billionaires directly in charge of the government, hasn't changed.

It's nice that suddenly people have finally figured out a little about how this all works and are as mad as I've been for the past two decades.



Over 200 more weekends to go. We can break this record.

[Mischief Maker]

I suggest a new poll: "Are Republicans going to impeach Trump within his first year?"

If he goes through with the Mexican import tariff to pay for his border wall boondoggle, I think that's a distinct possibility. Republicans may pander to their base (while establishment Democrats mock their base) but ultimately they work for the donors, who will not be happy about this.

For the record I am in favor of ditching the global free trade experiment and bringing back tariffs. But I'm worried Trump will fuck the attempt up so badly he poisons the issue for some future Sanders.

[ED-057]

I want to open a restaurant. I will call it "The Two Party System."

The menu will have everything a person could ever want. Stale bread and uncooked kidney beans.

After diners have placed their orders, whichever dish has more orders is what will be served.

Service is FREE!... but there will be a yearly membership fee of $20,000 and men with guns will come to your home to collect it.

BTW. I just donated to these nice people. I'm not into dope so can we please legalize prostitution first? Thanks.

[system11]

I do wonder if this is the first time I've ever seen someone talk about what they would do in power, and immediately set out to do it.

And the Eurocrats absolutely hate him, which is good in my book. Fuck their social, political & economic integration project.