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Trump's NASA cuts would destroy decades of science and wipe out its future

latimes.com

271–280 of 420 posts

Re: Trump's NASA cuts would destroy decades of science and wipe out its future

#271
post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this point of view is so utterly lacking self-critical thought about "extreme social views, we demand you accept it or you are haters" .. its just a thought-blocker and dead-end. Endless polarization.

Recent polls of Trump supporter show that they expect Trump’s policies to hurt them personally, but they support the policies anyway because they think they will hurt liberals more. It is difficult to reconcile that viewpoint with any path to a functioning democracy.

At least with tariffs you can understand there will be short term economic pain for presumed long term economic gain Polling of Biden voters seem to suggest they didn't expect the 20% inflation that happened between Biden entering office and Biden leaving office. They didn't think it would hurt Republicans more, they just had experts denying that anything was happening, like the head of the Fed saying inflation was transitory. That situation impedes on the function of democracy in a different way

Re: Trump's NASA cuts would destroy decades of science and wipe out its future

#272
post #256

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Orban and Erdogan also won the popular vote, that's hardly a get-out-of-authoritarianism free card.

>Orban and Erdogan also won the popular vote, that's hardly a get-out-of-authoritarianism free card. You should learn more about the electoral system under authoritarianism. In any free election, Orban or Erdogan have no chance.

Their first elections were not under an authoritarian system yet, their actions turned it authoritarian afterwards.

Heck, Orban was already prime minister in 1998 before the current stint, similar to Trump.

Re: Trump's NASA cuts would destroy decades of science and wipe out its future

#273
post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not an American and may not understand what is going on inside, but from the outside it appears that you are simply engaging in political smears. Authoritarianism means oppressing the masses, having an undemocratic government and acting against the will of the people. It happens in Venezuela. It happens in Turkey. It happens in Hungary. It doesn't happen in the US. If anything, what is happening in the US is exa…

Authoritarianism means oppressing the masses, having an undemocratic government and acting against the will of the people. It happens in Venezuela. It happens in Turkey. It happens in Hungary. It doesn't happen in the US. We have an undemocrstic government. Thousands of polling stations have shut down since the gutting of the Voting Rights Act. Voter rolls have been purged in key swing states. As a result of these th…

>As a result of these things millions of people were unable to vote.

By similizing the American electoral system to those in authoritarian countries, you trivialize the suffering of people oppressed and often physically exterminated by authoritarian regimes around the world. Millions? Seriously? Try talking to any refugee from an authoritarian country about this. Just please be as polite as possible and choose a smaller person, I'm afraid that because of your extremely offensive position towards their suffering, they may try to cause you physical harm.

>There is no oppressed majority in the U.S.

Of course not, the US seems to be a fairly authoritarian-free country. It's just that if we assume that the US has these tendencies and try to be fair with the terms, it is quite obvious from whom they come, and against which majority the attempts at oppression are directed.

Re: Trump's NASA cuts would destroy decades of science and wipe out its future

#274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not even remotely helpful to keep parroting "this is what Americans wanted." Not only do Trump voters not represent a majority of Americans, the media landscape is so fractured that many people did not know what they were voting for and just wanted cheaper groceries. Is that stupid and naive? Yes. But it's also stupid and naive to generalize and say "Americans want this."

> just wanted cheaper groceries. 1. And why would voting for Trump get that? 2. It didn't happen either way 3. Stupidity is not an acceptable excuse 4. You vote for a person not a specific policy

> You vote for a person not a specific policy

You're not wrong as general rule of thumb imo, or in a straight sense of reality, but tell that to the evangelicals who spend their time slandering abortion.

Re: Trump's NASA cuts would destroy decades of science and wipe out its future

#275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For a starting premise, we might define "enough" as a balanced budget.

If a balanced budget is your goal, only two steps are required: reduce military spending, increase taxes. No need to cut research. In practice the current budget bill is wildly unbalanced and will vastly extend our debt, despite extensive cuts to important programs.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_spending_in_the_U... Defense spending is 12% of the budget. Even if we cut every dime from defense we would still have 88% of the problem and be no closer to a balanced budget

Re: Trump's NASA cuts would destroy decades of science and wipe out its future

#276
post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who think that's a massive elephant are shortsighted. You know what illegal immigrants do? Work. For shitty wages. You know what that does? Boosts the US' labor force and economy, which buffers the declining fertility rate [0]. The fact that anti-immigration (of any sort) folks never think beyond first-effects is mind boggling. Illegal immigration causes some problems; it also solves others. [0] https://en.m.w…

so your reason that why we need them is because they are wage slaves that will eventually replace us? Why not just use the billions of dollars spent on immigration to boost wages, make life more affordable, and give tax cuts to ACTUAL AMERICANS as an incentive to have more kids?

Tax cuts aren't what people are waiting for to grow their families. It's parental leave, childcare, affordable healthcare, and the feeling that the system their kids will grow up in isn't getting actively gutted in favor of the rich and religious zealots.

Re: Trump's NASA cuts would destroy decades of science and wipe out its future

#277
post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're ignoring the massive elephant in the room. The previous administration let millions and millions of completely unvetted and undocumented immigrants into our county, creating an unprecedented crisis. I view Trump's actions as reclaiming our country from the brink. All of the instances you mentioned are simply fallout from the crises Trump was handed, and it astonishes me how liberals cannot see this simple fact…

What are the symptoms of this "unprecedented crisis" and what makes it a crisis?

Chicago spent $300 Million on freebies for migrants.[0] The mayor of NYC saying that the migrant crisis "will destroy New York City".[1] 1/3 of polled schools said that the influx of ESL migrant children had had a "significant" impact on their school districts, taking resources and attention away from American schoolkids.[2] 77% of Americans considered the border situation to be either a "Crisis" or a "Major Problem"[3]

[0] https://apnews.com/article/chicago-migrants-black-latino-bid...

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/07/nyregion/adams-migrants-d...

[2] https://www.reuters.com/investigations/an-american-education...

[4] https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2024/02/15/how-american...

Re: Trump's NASA cuts would destroy decades of science and wipe out its future

#278
post #188

The All-In-Podcast recently interviewed (1-1) Jared Isaacman (NASA admin nominee) about the bloat. Worth watching the whole interview ~1 hour. [0] Jared Isaacman: What went wrong at NASA | The All-In Interview https://youtu.be/6YdOjoaQTOQ?si=FUeL8mJ6LwHwO_B4&t=1275

The interview where several billionaires floated the idea of getting rid of congress so that private industry can then somehow operate unfettered.

Re: Trump's NASA cuts would destroy decades of science and wipe out its future

#279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He’s the President of the United States and the one (officially) making these decisions. It’d be absurd not to include him in talking about these issues.

I think you could very easily debate the merit of such a cut without talking about who proposed it. If you can't talk about the issue without talking about who proposed it, it's likely you don't actually care about the issue itself.

Pretending that Trump isn't a key part of what's going on isn't some kind of noble pure objectivity, it's just being willfully ignorant. Politics doesn't go away just because you ignore it. You have to address reality as it is, not some clean abstraction.

Re: Trump's NASA cuts would destroy decades of science and wipe out its future

#280
post #218
post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you read about Maduro wanting to imprison the leader of a region of Venezuela, who belongs to the opposition party, you'd call it authoritarianism. If you read that the Secretary of Defense of Turkey declined to commit to obeying court orders, you'd call it authoritarianism. If you read about Viktor Orban sending actual troops rather than police to a city because of a flimsy pretext, you'd call it authoritarianism…

I am not an American and may not understand what is going on inside, but from the outside it appears that you are simply engaging in political smears. Authoritarianism means oppressing the masses, having an undemocratic government and acting against the will of the people. It happens in Venezuela. It happens in Turkey. It happens in Hungary. It doesn't happen in the US. If anything, what is happening in the US is exa…

> may not understand what is going on

This much is accurate.

Once again, how would this be described in the press if it were another country:

"Secretary for the Homeland said 'We are staying here to liberate the city from the socialists and the burdensome leadership that this governor and that this mayor have placed on this country and what they have tried to insert into the city'"

And then had a sitting Senator thrown out of the room and handcuffed.

Yeah, that's authoritarianism.

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