Prelude to the Apocalypse

[quash]

I don't even know where to begin

Then how about you put your little brain to work for a while and figure it out?

D-, see me after class.

While many were up in arms over the purported "Muslim ban" (go read the executive order and then read the last travel ban against the Middle East, you'll shit bricks), that Trump actually found a viable solution to the migrant crisis went near unnoticed. Suddenly, Saudi Arabia is willing to take people displaced by the regime cha- er, civil war in Syria.

Wouldn't it have been nice for this to have happened five or six years ago?

get some new material

Coming from someone who has without the slightest tinge of irony pinned the blame for the Great Depression on the contemporary neoconservative mafia?

[CIT]

I don't even know where to begin

Then how about you put your little brain to work for a while and figure it out?

D-, see me after class.

You're all over the place. Take a ritalin and stay on topic, we're talking about the economic impact of Donald's presidency. Alternatively, I'll see you in a couple of years, after the country has been run into the ground and I'll expect you to own up to your foolishness. So sad!

Suddenly, Saudi Arabia is willing to take people displaced by the regime cha- er, civil war in Syria.

WRONG!

[quash]

http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN15D14L

Don't forget to take your Prozac, or else you'll hallucinate and read this as a declaration of war.

[ED-057]

- wants to isolate the country from free trade, to "save" jobs that make no economic sense to exist

As I alluded to in my last post (and Bryan pointed out) we already have a large proportion of jobs with dubious economic justification

, thereby ruining competitiveness in the long run

According to you, Trump wants to isolate the country. Isolationism makes competitiveness irrelevant. And what would be the alternative, other than a "race to the bottom?"

and causing import prices to skyrocket

possibly

- wants to "create" new jobs by making the government borrow billions it can never repay and sinking the money into inefficient, corrupt public works projects

I'd wager that most non-bankers would much prefer that the government use yet more borrowed billions on public works projects instead of bailouts.

- wants to subsidize failing sectors of the economy (heavy industry, etc) that are failing for a very good reason, by communitizing costs, at the expense of depriving real real growth areas (tech, R&D) of its necessary immigrant workforce

I don't recall that Trump ever proposed kicking out scientists and engineers, the only immigrant workers that could be considered necessary for the tech industry. Programmers on H1B visas do not fall into this category, as they are clearly here for the purpose of driving wages down. I doubt that many of the people who are meant to be kept out by the border wall fall into this category either.

In any case, the tech industry may be producing returns for investors but it doesn't employ that many people. Rather, if the hype about AI (eg. self driving vehicles) is to be believed, it will end up putting yet more people out of work. Tech, on its own, certainly can't be relied on to sustain the economy in the long run.

- wants a corporatist government to meddle at will in the economy, opening the door to cronyism

too late, cronyism is already a thing

It should also be pointed out that the US has a large trade deficit, and the voids are being filled by asset bubbles. It would certainly implode, were the current policies to be continued.

[BulletMagnet]

Coming from someone who has without the slightest tinge of irony pinned the blame for the Great Depression on the contemporary neoconservative mafia?

...what? Only in Trumpland is it considered "advancing an argument" to willfully ignore multiple direct (and repeated) queries while deliberately misrepresenting a single offhand comment without actually addressing its content. Get bent, Kellyanne.

[CIT]

http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN15D14L

Don't forget to take your Prozac, or else you'll hallucinate and read this as a declaration of war.

Failing incompetent quash can't even read. Nowhere in the article does it say SA would take refugees. You lost!

As I alluded to in my last post (and Bryan pointed out) we already have a large proportion of jobs with dubious economic justification

Sou you're saying we need even more?

According to you, Trump wants to isolate the country. Isolationism makes competitiveness irrelevant. And what would be the alternative, other than a "race to the bottom?"

You obviously have no clue about macroeconomics — no wonder you voted for Trump. So sad!

There is no better deal than free trade, you'll find that out the hard way. The US economy produces more than it can consume, it must export to sustain itself. And it must import to give it's consumers new Walmart goods they can afford. Anything else will make the US grind to a halt.

possibly

Wrong! It's as sure as day follows night.

I'd wager that most non-bankers would much prefer that the government use yet more borrowed billions on public works projects instead of bailouts.

Big banks are vital in supplying liquidity for the economy. That's why, to keep them from failing, we need working financial regulation, which your president orangeface, by the way, will get rid of.

I don't recall that Trump ever proposed kicking out scientists and engineers, the only immigrant workers that could be considered necessary for the tech industry. Programmers on H1B visas do not fall into this category, as they are clearly here for the purpose of driving wages down. I doubt that many of the people who are meant to be kept out by the border wall fall into this category either.

The US is by far the leading nation in science and research. It's technological superiority depends on attracting talent from all over the world. As immigration regulations make it increasingly unpalatable to come to the US, America's edge in technology will gradually wither away. It will only be accelerated by Trump's war against scientific freedom and objectivity.

And by the way, your border wall is just a silly prop. It won't keep anybody out.

In any case, the tech industry may be producing returns for investors but it doesn't employ that many people. Rather, if the hype about AI (eg. self driving vehicles) is to be believed, it will end up putting yet more people out of work. Tech, on its own, certainly can't be relied on to sustain the economy in the long run.

If it were up to you, we'd still be paying for log drivers and switchboard operators. Fail!

too late, cronyism is already a thing

So for you that makes it OK now. Sad!

[quash]

Who said I was advancing anything? I was just pointing out that you're the last person who gets to tell anyone to come up with new material.

As for your claim that somehow modern conservatism is or was responsible for the Great Depression, it doesn't pass the sniff test. You're acting as if there haven't been numerous paradigm shifts in politics since the freaking 1930s. At this rate, I may as well pin the blame for the Bolshevik Revolution on Bill Clinton.

[BryanM]

Just a friendly reminder that the #1 thing to be concerned about is that Trump is a neo-con, so be sure to pray for Iran daily.

The supreme court can be unfucked, the free money giveaways to zillionaires can be taken back - you can't unmurder or unbreak a country.

(Also for those of you who have some ridiculous need to keep a scorecard of wrong things quash has said - he claimed that Trump wasn't a neocon. He's just hired nothing but neocons for his foreign policy team to....uh... "find where the bodies are buried"..?

... that recycled Obama Excuse only reads well when talking about criminal bankers.. When you're talking about war criminals, it has some rather dark connotations to it.)

we already have a large proportion of jobs with dubious economic justification

The technical term in the literature is "bullshit jobs". Anarchists in London like to buy ads on the subway to make riding on the subway more depressing because riding on the subway isn't depressing enough.

One of the factors of the crash of 2008 was that we were in a jobs bubble - if those jobs were actually earning profit, they wouldn't have been cut. Since they weren't earning profit, then they should not have existed.

A sad truth is that large regions of the country just aren't necessary. West Virginia and Michigan have flatlined, and they're not going to be seeing any population growth anytime soon under current policy.

What's going to replace coal in WV? We're going to "retrain" them? For what? To write and configure neural nets so they can move to San Jose California? They're only 20 to 50 years behind the people already doing that.

The last thing the older generation wants to hear is "Jobs aren't the solution. The coal jobs aren't coming back - you need to all get on welfare." It has to be stupidly blindingly obvious that basic labor is going away and is never coming back, so that even your grandma can see it.

There is no better deal than free trade, you'll find that out the hard way. .... And it must import to give it's consumers new Walmart goods they can afford.

What really makes me laugh is how fraudulent this all is. What we have now is a planned economy.

Take away the massive oil subsidies and implement a true "free market", you have a country where gasoline is over $14 a gallon and everything is expensive as shit. Because everything in this country is a million miles apart from one another.

We already have a universal basic income - it's just implemented in an indirect way.

[CIT]

keep a scorecard of wrong things quash has said

It's not necessary. Everything quash says is wrong. He's a tremendous failure.

Right to wrong ratio: 0:100

Pathetic!

[Mischief Maker]

Let us take a (less than a minute) trip down memory lane:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3yDjylQ5Ps

So obviously Jeff Sessions will publicly decry Trump's firing of her for doing the very action Sessions encouraged.

Is this a coup?

[Blinge]

So.. no one gives a flying fuck about the muslim ban? okay then..

Coup? maybe, i mean the executive branch is defying the judicial one after all.

[Durandal]

So.. no one gives a flying fuck about the muslim ban? okay then..

Coup? maybe, i mean the executive branch is defying the judicial one after all.

It can't be called a 'muslim ban' when only seven countries, which were identified as "countries of concern" by the previous administration, are affected, with apparently over 50 Muslim-majority countries being present on this Earth. On top of which, similar measures have been undertaken in the past eight years:

http://edition.cnn.com/2017/01/29/polit ... countries/

In December 2015, President Obama signed into law a measure placing limited restrictions on certain travelers who had visited Iran, Iraq, Sudan, or Syria on or after March 1, 2011. Two months later, the Obama administration added Libya, Somalia, and Yemen to the list, in what it called an effort to address "the growing threat from foreign terrorist fighters."
The restrictions specifically limited what is known as visa-waiver travel by those who had visited one of the seven countries within the specified time period. People who previously could have entered the United States without a visa were instead required to apply for one if they had traveled to one of the seven countries.

Under the law, dual citizens of visa-waiver countries and Iran, Iraq, Sudan, or Syria could no longer travel to the U.S. without a visa. Dual citizens of Libya, Somalia, and Yemen could, however, still use the visa-waiver program if they hadn't traveled to any of the seven countries after March 2011.
Trump's order is much broader. It bans all citizens from those seven countries from entering the U.S. and leaves green card holders subject to being rescreened after visiting those countries.

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/al-qaeda- ... d=20931131

The discovery in 2009 of two al Qaeda-Iraq terrorists living as refugees in Bowling Green, Kentucky -- who later admitted in court that they'd attacked U.S. soldiers in Iraq -- prompted the bureau to assign hundreds of specialists to an around-the-clock effort aimed at checking its archive of 100,000 improvised explosive devices collected in the war zones, known as IEDs, for other suspected terrorists' fingerprints.

"We are currently supporting dozens of current counter-terrorism investigations like that," FBI Agent Gregory Carl, director of the Terrorist Explosive Device Analytical Center (TEDAC), said in an ABC News interview to be broadcast tonight on ABC News' "World News with Diane Sawyer" and "Nightline".

"I wouldn't be surprised if there were many more than that," said House Committee on Homeland Security Chairman Michael McCaul. "And these are trained terrorists in the art of bombmaking that are inside the United States; and quite frankly, from a homeland security perspective, that really concerns me."

As a result of the Kentucky case, the State Department stopped processing Iraq refugees for six months in 2011, federal officials told ABC News – even for many who had heroically helped U.S. forces as interpreters and intelligence assets. One Iraqi who had aided American troops was assassinated before his refugee application could be processed, because of the immigration delays, two U.S. officials said. In 2011, fewer than 10,000 Iraqis were resettled as refugees in the U.S., half the number from the year before, State Department statistics show.

Until Trump places a ban on all Muslims from entering the USA, the executive order can't be called unlawful. Even if the attorney general disagrees with that or only thinks it's unlawful without being able to make a reasonable case, instructing her entire department to not enforce the president's order is plain idiotic.

[Blinge]

Use a bit of common sense dude, the term is used as shorthand.

May I ask where you stand on this? Posting all that suggests you feel strongly on the issue.

This looks like trump testing the water to me, can't wait to see what wonders are in store next.

[Xyga]

So.. no one gives a flying fuck about the muslim ban? okay then..

No it's just that it's not the only despicable thing happening, we're all seeing it, but commenting in this mad bait thread is useless, rather it helps them.

Our lovely alt-right members, kremlintroll corps, and the 'not supporting but...actually yes' hypocrite conservatives, brexshitters, and other psycho-weirdo-religioso-nazo flavours of the right, are getting closer and closer to living the dream, their fantasy, and nothing we say, not a single byte of our criticism and consternation whatever unspeakable happens, nothing will reach them during that four-years-maelström of stupidity and shame.
Because they're too thrilled and basically hermetic to anything going against their senseless logic, at this point their adrenaline levels are climbing, it is becoming an addiction in the form of a collective destructive psychosis that has reached worldwide pandemic threat-level.

The world will have to endure, WE of the shmups community who are immune to that plague, will have to endure as well anyway because this shit thread pleases them, the more this world will be trampled, insulted, humanely, socially, ideologically and emotionally torn apart by brain dead assholes leading us to a bloodbath and a new dark ages, and the more we'll cry our duisgust here, the more they'll enjoy posting 'ha ha ha liberal tears'.

So it will stay up as long as there's an internet and shmups forums (I say 4 years but who knows when the breaking point will happen and the nets potentially cut off for a lot of people)

[Durandal]

May I ask where you stand on this? Posting all that suggests you feel strongly on the issue.

This looks like trump testing the water to me, can't wait to see what wonders are in store next.

No idea really. I don't think it's an unreasonable measure given the active threat of terrorism and that it's supposed to be temporary "until the vetting process is sorted out", but aside from the obvious inconvenience it causes for travelers between the USA and the designated countries (which as a side note people ironically protest against by causing further inconvenience at airports), the actual implementation of the order itself was a massive shitshow with many relevant departments not even being in the know until they saw it on TV first. This lack of planning and proper implementation doesn't bode well for future policies-to-be-enacted if their legality and actual implementation isn't ensured beforehand. Strangely countries such as Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Egypt, actual countries where terrorists who performed acts of terror on American soil hailed from are exempt, which leads me to believe this order was intended to be more symbolic than effective.

There's not much there can be done against terrorism except for what was already being done with the help of intelligence agencies and existing measures (though I wouldn't mind if more attention was paid to the proper enforcement of those measures), without breaching our rights and freedoms any further. Sometimes attacks get prevented, sometimes they don't. Or to put it simply, 'just let it happen', which up until now has been the modus operandi for the West alongside accepting the widespread occurrence of traffic accidents and homicides, which most of us don't want to admit we've already accepted as a part of our life, despite the lack of a push for an alternative that isn't coming from right-wing populist parties, who IMO go too far with their 'for too long has nothing been done' rhetoric even if it's partially true.
Even though an obvious solution to preventing terrorism would seem to be as hospitable as possible, being 'nice' does not solve economic inequality and giving grown immigrant men with no family nothing to do but loiter around, and the ensuing crimes and festering ghettos.

[ED-057]

Sou you're saying we need even more?

People like having jobs, because they like having income. People need income to survive. Social Darwinism is bad, 'mkay.

You obviously have no clue about macroeconomics

Macroeconomics is bullshit.

There is no better deal than free trade

Better FOR WHO???????????

The US economy produces more than it can consume, it must export to sustain itself.

Maybe you missed the part about our trade deficit? Not every country can be a net exporter. Somebody has to buy all that crap.

And it must import to give it's consumers new Walmart goods they can afford.

Can the price of imports go low enough for people without jobs to afford them?

Big banks are vital in supplying liquidity for the economy. That's why, to keep them from failing, we need working financial regulation

Oh I see now, you're shilling for bankers. LOLOLOLOLOLOL

So for you that makes it OK now. Sad!

Nope. You were trying to attribute a past and present malady to a future cause. Basic logic mistake.

Keep on pretending that the status quo was successful and sustainable, while attacking Trump for daring to question it, and proposing no plausible alternatives yourself. You'll have convinced me any second now.

[BulletMagnet]

Strangely countries such as Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Egypt, actual countries where terrorists who performed acts of terror on American soil hailed from are exempt

It should be noted that Trump has direct business interests in those very places. Y'know, coincidentally.

As for your claim that somehow modern conservatism is or was responsible for the Great Depression, it doesn't pass the sniff test. You're acting as if there haven't been numerous paradigm shifts in politics since the freaking 1930s.

Ignoring your latest willfully obtuse turn of phrase, somehow the "tax cuts for rich people and benefit cuts for everyone else is the only economic policy you ever need" and "no need to regulate anything, ever, especially not the financial sector" boondoggles endure with a vengeance and have exactly the same effects when "modern conservatives" enact them. Y'know, coincidentally.

Still waiting for you to actually respond to a single thing I actually asked you to respond to, by the way.

[CIT]

Macroeconomics is bullshit.

I'm sure it is to you. Just like vaccinations working and the earth being round are bullshit to you too. So sad!

Better FOR WHO???????????

For the majority of people.

Maybe you missed the part about our trade deficit? Not every country can be a net exporter. Somebody has to buy all that crap.

I don't understand why you're arguing macroeconomics, wrongly might I add, when you think it's bullshit.

Oh I see now, you're shilling for bankers. LOLOLOLOLOLOL

The guy you voted for hired Goldman Sachs' COO as chief economic advisor. You must feel pretty pathetic to have been suckered that easily.

Keep on pretending that the status quo was successful and sustainable, while attacking Trump for daring to question it, and proposing no plausible alternatives yourself. You'll have convinced me any second now.

I'm not trying to convince you. I'm just ensuring that in a couple of years, when your jobs haven't miraculously materialized you'll remember that some actually smart people told you so.

[quash]

Failing incompetent quash can't even read. Nowhere in the article does it say SA would take refugees. You lost!

I'm afraid you're mistaken. I have won. Hard.

I got you to talk about something nobody wanted to, and I got you to tacitly admit that the solution is a good one.

Think of this as a contest: for every second you spend thinking about any one of my posts, you owe me a dollar and viceversa. So far, I'm winning by a mile.

But ignoring that, even: why didn't the US establish safe zones years ago? Tulsi Gabbard knows why, and she's a Democrat.

[GaijinPunch]

Failing incompetent quash can't even read. Nowhere in the article does it say SA would take refugees. You lost!

I'm afraid you're mistaken. I have won. Hard.

I got you to talk about something nobody wanted to, and I got you to tacitly admit that the solution is a good one.

Think of this as a contest: for every second you spend thinking about any one of my posts, you owe me a dollar and viceversa. So far, I'm winning by a mile.

But ignoring that, even: why didn't the US establish safe zones years ago? Tulsi Gabbard knows why, and she's a Democrat.

[ED-057]

I'm sure it is to you. Just like vaccinations working and the earth being round are bullshit to you too. So sad!

The guy you voted for hired Goldman Sachs' COO as chief economic advisor. You must feel pretty pathetic to have been suckered that easily.

I'm not trying to convince you. I'm just ensuring that in a couple of years, when your jobs haven't miraculously materialized you'll remember that some actually smart people told you so.

Sorry to interrupt your narrative, but I didn't vote for Trump, am not counting on him to turn the Titanic around, and have not posted anything about vaccinations or the shape of the earth.

But I guess you are just posting regurgitated talking points which you have no interest or ability to advocate for, and assuming that anyone who doesn't agree must fit a preconceived strawman opposition stereotype.

[quash]

Failing incompetent quash can't even read. Nowhere in the article does it say SA would take refugees. You lost!

I'm afraid you're mistaken. I have won. Hard.

I got you to talk about something nobody wanted to, and I got you to tacitly admit that the solution is a good one.

Think of this as a contest: for every second you spend thinking about any one of my posts, you owe me a dollar and viceversa. So far, I'm winning by a mile.

But ignoring that, even: why didn't the US establish safe zones years ago? Tulsi Gabbard knows why, and she's a Democrat.

There's not much to understand here dude lol. If I haven't made it painfully obvious by now, one of my goals in this thread was to show how effective Trump's campaign strategy was by example.

The small factual errors and hyperbole are designed to provoke a specific response; one that harps on less significant details while ignoring the larger picture. Exactly the kind of thing that only appeals to equally indoctrinated ideologues: preaching to the choir, if you will. Meanwhile, impartial observers are noticing how a lot of important things aren't being reported on, and are often times being heavily obfuscated anyways.

Perfect example: when Trump claimed there were thousands of Muslims cheering on 9/11 and the media insisted there were none, only to later come clean that there were indeed some reported incidents of that happening. Trump lied, but the response was undeniably worse than the accusation. What did they have to gain from censoring that which they themselves reported on years prior?

You can thank BulletMagnet for my behavior. He didn't think it was very impressive that Trump managed to expose the media for the sad sacks they are. So I made sure to let everyone here know that if you're taking the bait, not only are you no better, you're quantifiably worse.

[Rob]

[NTSC-J]

Strangely countries such as Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Egypt, actual countries where terrorists who performed acts of terror on American soil hailed from are exempt, which leads me to believe this order was intended to be more symbolic than effective.

Maajid Nawaz said it's "like trying to crack a nut with a sledgehammer and missing the nut".

Also, for those not already following it, The Annotated Trump is recommended reading.

[quash]

Regardless of who exposed it, how many of you still trust them?

In a way, I can't blame you because there really are almost no accurate sources anymore. At the same time though, there is still not nearly enough scrutiny being applied to the media, even now as they are obviously desperate for anything that can potentially hamper Trump.

I mean, has anyone here ever spoken with a journalism major or an actual journalist? Many of them put the most left leaning of you all to shame.

[Rob]

[Satan]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KoNOQ7LMR8c

[CIT]

I'm afraid you're mistaken. I have won. Hard.

I got you to talk about something nobody wanted to, and I got you to tacitly admit that the solution is a good one.

Think of this as a contest: for every second you spend thinking about any one of my posts, you owe me a dollar and viceversa. So far, I'm winning by a mile.

Wrong! Your losing at everything. Trumped and quashed at every turn. Biggest loser in history! In your contest you owe me 1 trillion dollars, plus an apology for insulting my brilliant intelligence. Like a moth to a flame you can't avoid being drawn to your own demise.

And by the way, those links you post? FAKE NEWS!

[quash]

C+, you're starting to get it. You need to go deeper, though.

[Giest118]

quash has demonstrated that Trump's campaign strategy was internet trolling.

Well, Trump won the election, so I can't deny the effectiveness of it.