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CR: COVID-19 --Political Talk


Mrs Whiggins

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Means testing direct stimulus misses the point.  There is no need to ration stimulus when the entire economy will likely shrink by 5% this quarter and markets are begging the government to spend, spend, and spend some more.  

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Means testing is always a stupid idea because there are always exceptions that you can't account for. I'm sure there are plenty of people who made (relative) "bank" last year that are now on the precipice of ruin and will be very much in need of mortgage relief or a monthly stipend. Yes, they probably should've saved for a rainy day, but that judgment proves meaningless when we are trying to not irrevocably collapse our economy and push formerly prosperous groups of people into financial ruin.

 

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9 hours ago, Anastasis said:

Yeah, let me know when genetic analysis of a virus causing a global pandemic in humans traces back to a dog dipshit. Twice. 

It doesn't have to.  The dog is out there licking other animal shit when you take it for a walk.  Then the dog licks your face.

But this pretty much shows you are culturally insensitive.  You allow an animal to sleep in your bed, and eat plenty of different types of animals, but complain because some other people eat different animals from you.

Also, there were no bats sold at the Wuhan market.  They likely infected chickens through bites.  You know chickens right?  The same bird you probably eat multiple times per week.  And the same one that causes salmonella outbreaks on a regular basis in the USA.  However, I do suppose we killed off enough of our natural wildlife in North America to limit the possibility of some new parasite forming in the wild.  Still, that didn't stop swine flu from forming in domesticated pigs in Mexico.

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13 minutes ago, Bama Chick said:


Still won’t work for some.

Last year’s income isn’t always an accurate snapshot of current income especially for people in the service industry or on commission or who’ve lost their jobs.

Give it to everyone and when taxes roll around next year anyone who makes over the cutoff pays it back in taxes.

No, of course not, but poorer people need the money more.  And I'd rather get it wrong on the margins with a potential application review process for those that miss the cut-off, and raise the payout, than just giving an extra $1,000 to everyone regardless of need.

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12 hours ago, Anastasis said:

Jesus Christ this doesn't have to anything to do with eating bats. SARS-1, SARS-2.  Both originated out of the same fucking milieu. I am suggesting that we should be clear in recognizing this as the threat it is, and maybe do things to prevent it at the fucking source. We should have recognized the threat after the first go around. That's the fucking point.  If you want to talk about other threats, commercial farming practices, historical examples of native americans and shit I am all for it.  But pull your head out of your fucking ass on what we are talking about today.  

What we are talking about today is how do deal with this strain of Coronavirus that will kill a bunch of people.  When we get through that, sure, we can talk about how to prevent further virus mutations, but my guess is that early detection and response will be a more fruitful discussion, as there are multiple different ways for them to mutate.  

And of course the President of the United States and the right wing media are not talking about ways to avoid virus mutations.  They are looking to deflect the blame, pure and simple.  In doing so, they might be interfering with international cooperation on how to counter this, and they are definitely stoking racist anger at home.  There is some Asian immigrant in Kentucky is going get his ass kicked over that.  To be honest, that Asian immigrant isn't really on my top 5 list of concerns right now with everything else going on.  But there is no productive reason for him getting his ass kicked. 

Recently I have been processing this event through the lens of Pearl Harbor.  I'm trying to normalized my fears and stress with what people must have been thinking on Dec 8, 1942.  They must have been angered by the current loss of life, but more so they were likely terrified with what was to come next - the very reasonable speculation that many of their friends would be killed in the next few years.  Processing it this way forces me to remember that tragedy is part of the human condition and that we are capable of great things in overcoming it and moving on to happier days.  But there is also the flip side, which included rounding up Japanese-Americans and putting them in internment camps.  These events test our abilities overcome the racism, particularly when there is some logic for why it's okay to be racist.  The President and the right wing media, are making that worse.  

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Just as a point of reference, every one-time payment of $2K/adult and $1K/child is ~ $600B.  That's roughly the size of our bloated annual defense budget.  It's a big number.  I'm not saying it's not necessary, but damn, it's a big number. 

I agree that means testing just clogs the system.  Let next year's tax returns deal with the inequities, etc.  Anyone still pulling in $200K per year should be able to understand that they're gonna owe taxes on that $6K (or whatever).

Personally, I would prefer to address the other side of the ledger by providing housing relief (owners and renters) as well as relief on loans and other interest payments.  Tacking 6 months onto the remaining 25 years of a mortgage is basically invisible to most people from a long term perspective, but could make a huge difference in the short term.  Virtually everybody pays for housing, many of them pay for one or more vehicles, most of them probably have some form of revolving credit or student loan debt.  Just provide temporary relief.

Edited by jimmyjazz
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3 minutes ago, bonnieblue said:

meaningless when we are trying to not irrevocably collapse our economy and push formerly prosperous groups of people into financial ruin.

Fuck that. 

The economy has been held together by baling wire and duct tape since Trump started his stupid trade war.  Now we're paying the piper.  

Suspend foreclosures and halt interest accumulation on debt to help the middle class.  The poor are already in financial ruin...let's help them first.  The rest will take care of itself, like it did after the Great Depression.

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I haven't filed for 2019, would it be based on the 2018 return? Or W2s from 2019? Means testing would be a bureaucratic nightmare, especially for the people who need it most, who are most likely to not do any paperwork.  

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Just now, Errestaurants said:

How hard he is working, it's not his fault, we are awesome, Ivanka and Jared are badass. Rinse and repeat everyday 

He seriously can't comprehend that we don't blame him for the virus, but we hold him responsible for his failures, including pretending it wasn't serious when it needed to be taken serious.

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4 minutes ago, 'stache said:

I haven't filed for 2019, would it be based on the 2018 return? Or W2s from 2019? Means testing would be a bureaucratic nightmare, especially for the people who need it most, who are most likely to not do any paperwork.  

A very real effect would be that people in the service industries, particularly food and drink, but also beauty, janitorial, etc., tend to derive a great deal of their income from tips, much of which go unreported.

Now, some would say that's what you get for not reporting your tips to the IRS, but I think that's a bit harsh.  Very few of these people are making anything close to what others would call "a good income" when all is said and done.

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His only job (and only real move) is to shift the blame off of his own incompetence and onto China.
His only job and real move is to stop lying to the American people. And to get some goddamn ventilators and ppe to the small community hospital down the street from my house that already has 4 ICU patients with covid-19.
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2 minutes ago, 'stache said:

I haven't filed for 2019, would it be based on the 2018 return? Or W2s from 2019? Means testing would be a bureaucratic nightmare, especially for the people who need it most, who are most likely to not do any paperwork.  

Yes, 2018.  

Look, about 30% of filers made over $100k in 2018.  That's over 42 million tax returns @ $1,000 a month...or $42 billion a month we don't need to spend.

I guess it's the old fiscal conservative coming out in me.

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2 minutes ago, DixonHur said:

Yes, 2018.  

Look, about 30% of filers made over $100k in 2018.  That's over 42 million tax returns @ $1,000 a month...or $42 billion a month we don't need to spend.

I guess it's the old fiscal conservative coming out in me.

When you see the amount available for bailouts, the money is there for universal healthcare and UBI, especially when you consider UBI as a substitute for much of the current welfare programs that cost more in red tape than they are worth in most situations. A fiscal conservative should have thrown a shitfit over the tax handout to the wealthy last year, but there really is no such thing as a fiscal conservative in the GOP it seems, only hypocrisy. 

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2 minutes ago, Zombie said:

I didn't know Michael Stipe worked in the government.  

And they both have the same taste in suitmakers.  

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  • immamac changed the title to CR: COVID-19 --Political Talk


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