What would YOUR platform be? by SIGNYM

REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

What would YOUR platform be?

POSTED BY: SIGNYM
UPDATED: Saturday, June 11, 2016 13:40
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VIEWED: 1768
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Thursday, June 9, 2016 9:03 AM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

I think many people are fed up with the current presumptive candidates. Their stances and proposals just don't fit what we would like to see, and so as voters we have to make compromises between what we want and who we can vote for.

So the final election results - whatever they are- are hardly a fair reflection of the popular will.

With that in mind, what would YOU like to see?

Let the fun begin!

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Thursday, June 9, 2016 11:55 AM

THGRRI

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
I think many people are fed up with the current presumptive candidates. Their stances and proposals just don't fit what we would like to see, and so as voters we have to make compromises between what we want and who we can vote for.

So the final election results - whatever they are- are hardly a fair reflection of the popular will.

With that in mind, what would YOU like to see?

Let the fun begin!

Anyone but Trump and Putin

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Friday, June 10, 2016 8:59 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Quote:
The REAL interests of the USA would have us capable of manufacturing everything of military, scientific, and infrastructural significance here, at home. And there's more I would add, but that properly belongs in the "What's YOUR platform" thread.

Elon Musk, for all of his money and brains, is an idiot outside of his specific money-making niche. He's not a "technology" expert any more than a physicist is a "biology" expert. His car-making venture wouldn't be making money except for government subsidies, and his rocket-launching venture is energetically ridiculous- you have to loft more than twice the amount of fuel than with a one-way launch. The only purpose that his space vehicle is good for is space tourism. It's not meant for heavy-duty satellite, space station, or exploration launches.

And I think the fault goes back to wealthy Republicans who, after Roosevelt, and stinging from the 90% tax rates that were imposed on the wealthy in the 1940s and 1950s, sought to dismember "government" by portraying it as "evil".

Now, between the twin onslaughts of destroying the parts of government which looked after the common good, and buying off the rest, there are NO agents who are looking after "American interests".

The conundrum that you presented (and there was just an article in the WSJ about chip-making and the Pentagon, which was exactly the same) is the result of decades of wealthy businessmen successfully representing THEIR interests at the expense of the general (and long-term) good, and the [results of this greed-]fueled plan coming home to roost. - SIGNY

http://www.fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?bid=18&tid=60561&mid=1
011942#1011942

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You can't build a nation with bombs. You can't create a society with guns.

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Friday, June 10, 2016 9:25 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

See?

Curiously, and despite THIRDSTOOGE's constant accusations and insinuations, I'm not only an American citizen, I'm also an American patriot and a USA nationalist. I've been complaining about illegal aliens and "free trade" deals long before Trump made them cause celebres.

But in order to be a patriot and a nationalist, one must first accept that our government should be representing OUR CITIZENS' interests, not the interests of people elsewhere and other entities everywhere.

Let me give you an example of what that means:

If I'm contemplating immigration policy, who am I supposed to be thinking about? Am I supposed to be thinking about preserving our culture, and being able to institute national economic and employment policies which won't be drowned by waves of cheap foreign labor flowing across the borders?

Or am I thinking about "poor people everywhere"? Or am I thinking about my relatives in Mexico who would really like to come across the border? Or am I thinking about the companies that make greater profits from illegal, exploitable labor?

Now, IMHO, we should be thinking about OUR CITIZENS' interests, as distinct from "poor people everywhere" and "my second cousin and his family in Juarez" and "Tyson, home of illegal chicken-pluckers".

It's a mental twist to stop thinking about "those people out there" and start thinking about "these people in here", but that's what being a patriot and a nationalist means.

So when I think about environmental degradation, I don't propose trying to save the Brazilian rainforest, I've proposed thinning our forests HERE, and making them resistant to megafires.

It's not that I don't care about people elsewhere, I do. I can think of hundreds of way to help the world in general, much of which starts with First, do no harm. Give our globe-straddling military we could do a tremendous amount of good by simply not killing people and destabilizing governments everywhere.

But let's assume that you really DO want to help, and that it isn't just some excuse for more meddling in other nations. You can't "help" people everywhere and elsewhere unless you, as a nation, are in an economic, financial, and social position to do so. And that means that you, as a nation of citizens, must have have control of your own economic, financial, and social destiny. None of which we have.

People have been brainwashed into thinking that "globalism" is somehow a progressive stance, when in reality all it means is giving up any control over your future to international banks and other corporations.

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You can't build a nation with bombs. You can't create a society with guns.

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Saturday, June 11, 2016 12:43 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

Well, I guess nobody has any specific wishes or goals for our future. Maybe our expectations have been whittled down to "not getting fucked too badly".

Once upon a time, we looked towards the future with enthusiasm. Many of our scifi stories were about exploration and knowledge. Now they're all about post-apocalyptic dystopias.

There are so many things wrong with the USA that's it hard to know where to begin.

My first choice, because it's the easiest, is "No more meddling in foreign nations", whether thru government-connected NGOs, or CIA-State black ops, or weaponizing various conflicts, or mercs, or outright sending in soldiers. A kind of neo-isolationism. I just don't see our vital interests involving Saudis or Syrians, or even South Koreans or Vietnamese. It seems that our government feels it has to have its fingers in every pie everywhere, but it's not only expensive it's counter-productive.

The other thing I would do is drop the TPP and the TTIP like a hot potato.

I would slowly start increasing tariffs on items of strategic, military, or infrastructural significance, like cold-rolled steel, chip fabrication, and the specialized transformers needed for power generation and transmission.

I would propose a deal to take care of our illegal immigration problem, which has several parts, all or nothing.

Offer the "public option" in healthcare.

Simplify the tax code. IN THEORY, USA corporations have the highest tax rate in the world. IN PRACTICE, with so many write-downs etc they pay very little. I'd just aim at a lower rate on straight income, and put people and corporations on the same schedule. Institute a tax on financial trades. I would really REALLY hope to let some air out of the futures markets, that's one place where our banks are wholly exposed and it's the one place they don't have to "make good" to their depositors if those loans don't work out. Separate once again investment and savings banks.

I would seriously think about instituting a real central bank - not The Fed, which is a privately-controlled institution which gains its authority by being THE bank with which our government does its business (including borrowing money)- but a real government bank. Last I read, the Constitution only allows the Federal government to print money, but if you look at any of our paper money, what does it say, right across the top? It says "FEDERAL RESERVE NOTE".

In fact, I'd seriously think about significantly raising the quality of capital that banks have to hold in order to lend, on the way to ending "fractional reserve banking". Fractional reserve banking, btw- allows banks to loan money that THEY DON'T REALLY HAVE*. In effect, it allows banks to "print money", and blow up -or collapse- the money supply on speculation. Bubble and bust.

Anyway, that's enough for one post.

*That deserves some thought as to what "money in the bank" really is. Is it coins and bills? Bits and bytes? Promises to pay? If you think about it, you'll see that "bank money" comes in different forms, some more robust that others.

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You can't build a nation with bombs. You can't create a society with guns.

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Saturday, June 11, 2016 1:10 AM

1KIKI

Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.

I haven't read much but off the top of my head I'd like to see

isolationism

protective tariffs

full employment, even if it means government paying people to restore our lands and rebuild, or build our infrastructure, create livable housing, teach our children, and care for our ill, disabled and elderly

Let me just point out that the author left out vital relevant facts in the opinion piece. Doing that is known as cherry-picking. And whether you do that in the news, in discussion, in debate or in opinion, when you distort the facts, you've changed the nature of your communication into propaganda. But WE don't have any of THAT in the US, do we?!

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Saturday, June 11, 2016 10:05 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

My platform would be increasing NASA’s budget to 5% of total federal spending from 2014’s 0.5%. I know it is a program that does not return good value for money spent but it can be paid for by cancelling the U.S. Nuclear Modernization Programs, which are programs that don’t return good value for money spent.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budget_of_NASA
www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/USNuclearModernization

And while we’re dreaming, why not Medicare for All and Bring Back Firefly?
www.flickr.com/photos/forrestjr/5129512427

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Saturday, June 11, 2016 11:55 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

I guess your refusal to engage in serious thought about serious issues is the reason you're voting for Hillary?

But, I get your desire for Firefly to come back.

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You can't build a nation with bombs. You can't create a society with guns.

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Saturday, June 11, 2016 1:40 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
I guess your refusal to engage in serious thought about serious issues is the reason you're voting for Hillary?

Perhaps you should co-blog with Arthur Silber, who writes in a seriously thoughtful style about issues. You two are compatible: “The destruction of the basic political structure of this country has been a continuing project for well over a century. That destruction has been the purpose of both the Republican and Democratic parties, and it reveals itself in two major ways: through a foreign policy of aggressive, non-defensive interventionism overseas, and by means of an increasingly powerful and intrusive government domestically.”
http://powerofnarrative.blogspot.com/2007/09/nation-on-edge-of-final-d
escent-i.html

But you should donate so the blog can continue to run.
http://powerofnarrative.blogspot.com/2016/04/eviction-starvation-and-o
ther-unlovely.html

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