2020 US Election (Part One)

[Lexicus]

I mean I was alive and politically aware when the ACA went through.

To the extent that the population doesn't have an appetite for socialized medicine, I'd argue it's exposure to health insurance industry propaganda that's the cause.
Insurance companies have cultivated a prisoner mentality in the population such that they are afraid of change. And this is known and exploited by right-wing propagandists. "You can keep your doctor" and all that.

 

[Kyriakos]

Hm, I think this won't help Warren. Wasn't she supposedly pretty much Bernie-type Medicare up to now?
Apparently she no longer is, and moves to Petrie-care.

Strategically it makes no sense either, given she was mostly trying to appeal to the leftist voters. I don't see her as attracting more centralists or to the right of those with this (too many other nominees already in the Swarte-Pietcare, namely Pete and Bidenpete).

Or maybe she just wanted to please her billionaire donors?

 

[Berzerker]

Biden doesn't want to legalize pot, he thinks its a gateway drug

it is... the gate being the fridge door

 

[Commodore]

Biden doesn't want to legalize pot, he thinks its a gateway drug

it is... the gate being the fridge door

And to mental illness if recent studies are to be believed.

 

[Birdjaguar]

And to mental illness if recent studies are to be believed.

Being human leads to mental illness. We are all impaired one way or another.

 

[Farm Boy]

Legalization probably does need to pick up speed. We all know it probably isn't good good for you and studies are going to start landing. Today, if it's not good good for you the "but we pay for your medicine" herp-n-derp are really stronk when it comes to "other people's vices that cost me money." They're gunning for nicotine entirely, if they can get it, I wager.

 

[Berzerker]

And to mental illness if recent studies are to be believed.

and relief... Such is the nature of medicine

Current estimates suggest that if frequent long-term cannabis use was known to cause psychosis, the rates of incidence would increase from seven in 1,000 in non-users to 14 in 1,000 cannabis users.

7 per 1000...and I suspect most if not all 7 are destined for psychosis so family histories and maybe a 'psychosis gene' can be a tip off.

Overall, the evidence suggests cannabis use will bring forward diagnosis of psychosis by an average of 2.7 years.

https://ndarc.med.unsw.edu.au/blog/does-Cannabis-cause-mental-illness

Its a complicated subject, how do we know people who will suffer from psychosis are not more inclined to use pot? Maybe that goes hand in hand with the condition, many self-medicate with pot before a formal diagnosis.

 

[Lexicus]

And to mental illness if recent studies are to be believed.

Well guns are a gateway to, uh, death but you don't want those to be illegal because "muh slaveowner paper" or whatever

 

[Azem.Ocram]

If my vote counted, I’d vote for the Democratic nominee. However, my state can reliably be expected to vote for him or her regardless. I will gladly vote for Warren, Sanders, or Yang but absolutely will write in Sanders if Biden or Bloomberg get the nomination.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Most Swedes are very polite. I’m not, I usually give as good as I get. So, let’s rightfully assume you are correct about having a better grasp of the general opinion in America and I fully agree that should at least be the case. You also have Estebonrober backing up your claim that Americans are more into the genocidal idea of glassing troublesome nations. I’ve seen no other Americans here dispute that argument, which is unsettling, but as such I’m willing to accept it as general opinion.

You know I support Bernie. I do it mainly on account of the wealth and income inequality issues and the effect of hollowing out democracy in particular. I think Bernie is the most electable candidate in the race because of his clarity on the issues he has consistently fought for over forty years and add to that he is the original on many of the great issues of the debates so far like MFA, GND and an economy that works for all. He is also against opportunistic MIC driven foreign intervention, which I’ve now recently learned from you and Estebon apparently makes him less electable, or have little or no impact to most Americans in general, which is a shame, but it’s still an issue I personally strongly support.

Please, for clarity, who is your favourite democratic candidate so far Tim? I assume it’s someone more to the centre but I have no idea? What are the main issues that candidate run that makes you believe it’s the best choice for America at this point in time? And since you are so deeply concerned with electability – what is this candidates strong points in regard to electability?

You see to me you just seem like an empty can rattling around aimlessly picking arbitrary arguments after Hillary lost in 2016 but I’ve already been proven wrong once in this discussion and I’m open to try better understand your perspective if you open up a little about it. Maybe most people here know, but I really don’t.

I am not really impressed by the differences in the candidates position wise. My interest is having the strongest possible candidate who can pull the most voters along and strengthen the down ballot results for the Democrats. My other interest is that whoever gets elected doesn't create a gigantic wave of expectations that won't be met, because the Democrats are horribly weak about that. Obama stirred them up with the whole 'hope and change' business, then shepherded a GIGANTIC and profoundly revolutionary reform through Washington that was decades overdue...and two years later the Democrats said "Why didn't you restructure the entire nation from the ground up? I expected change. You suck." So the GOP went right back to "there shall be no more progress and we'll wait for our next opportunity to do more damage."

My biggest discontent about Bernie is that I see him going down the exact same path. He promises pie in the sky with ice cream, and he knows full well that when he has to shove stuff through congress we'll be lucky to get the pieces together to rebuild the freezer that the GOP has been destroying for the past forty years so that in a decade or so we can maybe think about ice cream. He has tremendous appeal to the "I want it all and I want it now, where's a magician?" crowd, but that crowd is horribly fickle.

Meanwhile, back at coming to an understanding about USians...please keep in mind that I'm probably just as disgusted as you are at the general USian view...but that doesn't mean I am not aware of it, or lying to you about it.

 

[Commodore]

Well guns are a gateway to, uh, death but you don't want those to be illegal because "muh slaveowner paper" or whatever

I didn't say weed should be illegal though. That's an assumption on your part. I think it should be a controlled substance available only through prescription like any other medication. Barring that, the same laws that govern the consumption of alcohol should govern the recreational use of marijuana.

 

[tamyrlin]

Well guns are a gateway to, uh, death but you don't want those to be illegal because "muh slaveowner paper" or whatever

Tobacco products come into mind. Much more harmful and yet uncontrolled . I mean w.r.t pot not guns.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Barring that, the same laws that govern the consumption of alcohol should govern the recreational use of marijuana.

YES. Marijuana bars, a marijuana list in fine dining establishments, marijuana sold in grocery stores and minimarts...sounds great!

 

[Kyriakos]

I haven't used any drugs ever, so cannot say. I do smoke (heavily), and can note that smoking does tend to relax you a bit. Although that effect is seriously diminished after the first years, to the point that it is rendered to more of a very brief fix.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

YES. Marijuana bars, a marijuana list in fine dining establishments, marijuana sold in grocery stores and minimarts...sounds great!

Forgot.

Allowed to keep unlimited quantities on hand.

 

[Commodore]

YES. Marijuana bars, a marijuana list in fine dining establishments, marijuana sold in grocery stores and minimarts...sounds great!

Sure, why not? The system works for alcohol. I don't particularly like marijuana or alcohol, but that doesn't mean I want to see people thrown in jail just for using them. I just think substances like that need to be somewhat regulated to minimize the potential harmful side effects that come from their use.

Forgot.

Allowed to keep unlimited quantities on hand.

But like with alcohol, you can't have an "open container" in the car.

 

[Patine]

To the extent that the population doesn't have an appetite for socialized medicine, I'd argue it's exposure to health insurance industry propaganda that's the cause.
Insurance companies have cultivated a prisoner mentality in the population such that they are afraid of change. And this is known and exploited by right-wing propagandists. "You can keep your doctor" and all that.

Nationalized and public health care are not purely "socialist" policies, despite being universally and inextricably portrayed and conflated as such by American fiscally right-wing politicians. The first government in the world to offer a comprehensive nationalized heathcare program was Imperial Germany under Otto von Bismarck, a staunch Conservative. The Soviet Union, and most other Cold War-era Communist nations, did not have such generous health care plans, but had a system for health care coverage called "work fair," - that is the harder you worker, the more you excelled, and the more loyal you were, the better health care plan you had. What the American political debate calls "socialized health care," is actually just nationalized or public health care, and is not tied at the hip to any government or economic system. But waving around the Ghost of McCarthy like a Halloween prop still seems to be a popular political tactic.

 

[CurtSibling]

Being human leads to mental illness. We are all impaired one way or another.

Speak for yourself. I'm perfect.

 

[Ironsided]

I am not really impressed by the differences in the candidates position wise...

So in the case of Bernie, you are basically not listening to the message before shooting down the messenger. The promises Bernie make are pretty clear when you listen to the words that comes out of his own mouth – the gist being he will do everything in his presidential power to build on a grassroots movement (expand the one he has) for more social democracy in America. He does not go out and promise pie in the sky. He promise to fight for more pie for those who bake it. He constantly reminds people that he is taking on the establishment, the pharmaceutical industry, the MIC and a lot of political capital in Washington. And he usually adds to that – it will not be easy.

And Bernie is already winning ground in a way Obama could only dream of (from his new position of TV-sofa moderate republican). Just yesterday a self-proclaimed socialist woman of colour won a seat in Seattle, USA coming from 8% behind the incumbent in the polls at the start of election-DAY. That's in no small part Bernies doing before he is even elected, if he is even elected.

Seems you suffer some political-parakeet-syndrome as well. You iterate the corporate MSM talking points as if you fact checked and thought long and hard about it. All the while it’s blatantly obvious you have not, because many of these talking points are false or dishonestly sourced and presented at the very get go. And often debunked within hours.

You add to that from a position of not taking a clear political stand of your own. In a democratic race that is the most diverse and colourful since the declaration of independence. That’s a bit like expecting to play cards but refuse to show your hand at the end, holding on to your tokens, and still expect to be in the next game on the next page. That’s where I’m coming at you from here. You are just being quite muddled and often dishonest in your position and argumentation. And you are like a tinnitus that won’t go away - just adding noise upon noise to an already noisy discussion. A bit like you constantly accuse Berzerker of.

 

[Socrates99]

Sure, why not? The system works for alcohol. I don't particularly like marijuana or alcohol, but that doesn't mean I want to see people thrown in jail just for using them. I just think substances like that need to be somewhat regulated to minimize the potential harmful side effects that come from their use.



But like with alcohol, you can't have an "open container" in the car.

When it was on the ballot in MI it literally said "regulated like alcohol". I assume that means all state laws that apply to alcohol also apply to rec weed. It's going to be interesting because like alcohol there are "dry counties" or whatever you'd call them. Right now 79% of MI cities/towns/villages are dry for cannabis. Business is going to be booming in the other 21% since its expected to be a 30 billion dollar industry.