351–360 of 489 posts
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In today's democracy you only get what you want if what you want is coincidentally the same as what their donors want.
What are some examples of legislation that has broad support among the voters adjusted for voting power, and is ignored by our representatives?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In today's democracy you only get what you want if what you want is coincidentally the same as what their donors want.
What are some examples of legislation that has broad support among the voters adjusted for voting power, and is ignored by our representatives?
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/perspectives-on-poli...
People's opinions are highly correlated with elite opinions, of course (because elites control what they hear, read, and see, and whether they'll progress in their careers or be employed at all), but when there's a divergence, public opinion is followed 0% of the time.
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> It should be noted that the US decided not to extend the universal free school meals program, because it was "too expensive" at $11B. They also stopped the expanded and early payment of family tax credits, causing a double-whammy hit to poor families (then pile on inflation/food prices, and gas prices). But $50B to large monopolistic companies isn't "too expensive," and we can afford that. That's misleading framing…
Or the tl;dr, there’s always money available for things that directly make money and when it comes to government repayment is in the form of jobs and GDP growth. “But free school lunches also provide a positive ROI!” I agree with you, now convince your representative of it.
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Yep. In the US, a lot of the time support for one program or another is given not on the basis of ideology, but rather on the basis of whether or not the beneficiaries of a program provided commensurate, um, "campaign contributions". Pretty sure impoverished school kids contribute pretty much zero to political campaigns.
Increasingly campaigns are funded almost entirely by small dollar donations raised through social media. This is about to make US politics really weird, and I'm not sure what to think of it. Also basically all legislation that passes which is very little, is written by the staffers of House and Senate leadership without going through committee. It's then handed to members to rubber stamp on the floor if the votes are…
It would be nice if all campaigns were funded by small donations. We should get large corporate donors out of politics
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In today's democracy you only get what you want if what you want is coincidentally the same as what their donors want.
What are some examples of legislation that has broad support among the voters adjusted for voting power, and is ignored by our representatives?
https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/house-bill/2187
Would have allowed for professionals in a given field to be accredited to make investments related to their profession. Or to put it another way, you would no longer need to already be rich to use the tools that the rich use to get richer.
The bill was passed unanimously in the house, and then quietly killed in the senate.
5 years later, we got a neutered version. Now you can make investments if you get a series 7 license, etc. But from what I understand you can’t just take the test and get the license, you need to be sponsored by an institution, but that misses the point of the original bill that represented the actual will of the people.
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What are some examples of legislation that has broad support among the voters adjusted for voting power, and is ignored by our representatives?
Federal legalization of cannabis
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/senate-democrats-unveil-long...
https://news.gallup.com/poll/356939/support-legal-marijuana-...
Such a monumental scam and a gross theft from taxpayers. Companies making billions of dollars in profits don't need free money. I could be onboard with a subsidized loan, but handouts are not needed. FWIW, I work at a company that stands to benefit from this bill. Does the US need to secure reliable semiconductor supply chains free of China? Sure. This is not the most cost effective way to do it.
Clearly, handouts are needed to force/incentivize these companies to build new fabs in the continental US. Otherwise they would have built them under their own gumption by now. When there is no clear benefit for the company to fab chips in the continental US, and a lot of clear negatives (cost, regulations, etc) - you have to do something to outweigh the cons. If the US had been an amazing place to fab chips already,…
That doesn't make sense. I could declare that lollypops are needed, or a third sequel to Space Jam on the same evidence. It's just affirming the consequent. I think that these companies aren't building new fabs because I personally am too poor, so the best way to get us out of this rut is to hand me the billions.
edit: the government needs to stop giving wealthy people money. Buy equity in the companies and get on their boards, don't just hand wealthy people cash and pretend it's capitalism.
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I’m all for healthy free lunches for poor kids. Is it really necessary to give free meals to all Palo Alto kids independent of financial status? https://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/2022/06/19/palo-alto-uni...
Yes! Why would a human being feel that feeding children is NOT their responsibility? Clearly you have never had to be the "free lunch kid", or idealize your childhood independent of the cruelty of "different". You are extremely privileged. The idea that we'd limit what kids we fund for meals, education, etc. is just gross and bifurcates any moralistic or democratic ideals. The US has a serious problem with "bootstrap…
Actually I’d rather they spend the money on teachers rather than lunches for kids whose parents can afford to pay for their own.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
What are some examples of legislation that has broad support among the voters adjusted for voting power, and is ignored by our representatives?
Federal legalization of cannabis
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes! Why would a human being feel that feeding children is NOT their responsibility? Clearly you have never had to be the "free lunch kid", or idealize your childhood independent of the cruelty of "different". You are extremely privileged. The idea that we'd limit what kids we fund for meals, education, etc. is just gross and bifurcates any moralistic or democratic ideals. The US has a serious problem with "bootstrap…
I was at the house of the owner of a company I worked for. I mentioned my amusement at seeing a school bus in this very rural area on the way to his house. He complained that he didn’t have kids so he didn’t see why he should have to pay for that. I replied that, as my employer, he was benefiting from my public school education. That ended that conversation.