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Tucker Carlson Tonight


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8 minutes ago, Bozo_Casanova said:

 

I got you fam
FederalDeficit1.jpg
 

 

That looks pretty damn neutral to me. I didn’t vet my quick google search for nation debt, but either it’s wrong or we didn’t use the surplus to pay down the debt. 
 

or maybe it was counting 1993 and not 2001, since those were the actual years of the admin instead of its actual budget years. 

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That looks pretty damn neutral to me. I didn’t vet my quick google search for nation debt, but either it’s wrong or we didn’t use the surplus to pay down the debt. 
 
or maybe it was counting 1993 and not 2001, since those were the actual years of the admin instead of its actual budget years. 

We never got to enjoy any windfall from the end of the Cold War because of Iraq. It was like paying off the mortgage then losing your job.
That looks pretty damn neutral to me. I didn’t vet my quick google search for nation debt, but either it’s wrong or we didn’t use the surplus to pay down the debt. 
 
or maybe it was counting 1993 and not 2001, since those were the actual years of the admin instead of its actual budget years. 

We never got to enjoy any windfall from the end of the Cold War because of Iraq. It was like paying off the mortgage then losing your job.
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46 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

Yeah, also plenty of this.  Examples of just my personal evolution over the past 30 years or so:

"Gay marriage": I used to have the (pretty stupid) position of "fine, they can have civil unions, but don't call them marriage, because that's something different."  Then, between living enough life to realize that fuck, everyone's got it hard, and why create division and hurt where you don't need to, AND an objective reading of the 14th amendment and realizing that it's pretty plain -- if the government is going to offer a license or stamp on a contract, then it can't discriminate based on the gender of the contracting parties.  So, I'm full-on in favor of legalized same-sex marriage.

Trickle-down economics: I bought into the hypothesis, it made some sense to me.  But I've seen us run at that wall numerous times now, and we just smash our heads against it....lots of pain, but no real trickling down.  It was a hypothesis.  It has been thoroughly tested.  It doesn't work.  It would be stupid to continue to buy it in the face of that evidence.

It doesn't mean that I'm a softie for every pet left-side idea or cause -- lots of "good intentions, but leading to bad results" over there.  Things like massive expansion of the availability of student loans (without attendant caps on tuition and such).  Also, it doesn't mean that my views aren't continuing to evolve as new evidence is available/is better understood.

In MOST countries, my views, evolved as they may be from where they were when I got out of college, would still be pretty centrist, wavering between center-right and center-left, depending on the subject matter.  I've made reference to the Economist before - I have always found myself agreeing with many of the positions taken therein (not all - I think the Economist has only paid lip service to the failings of modern liberal democracy and the global economy; they have yet to come around on real, meaningful measures to address those failings).  That puts me pretty close to center-right, at least in the ecosystem of the developed world/other liberal democracies.

But in the modern American political ecosystem, "center-right" positions make you a scorching libtard.  It's insane.  But "insane" is where we live now.

 

I'll say this about Trickle Down Economics; It's an idea that I like, in theory, but it's completely unrealistic becuase human beings, now more than ever, have become greedy pieces of shit. Therefore Trickle Down Economics is literally against human nature. I'd like to think it works wonderfully if we were an evolved, kind society. I remember the movie Enemy At The Gates. Josef Fiennes is talking about the glories of communism and eqality of man, but that's not possible becuase he covets Jude Law's fucking girlfriend. Same goddamn thing. Communal equality isn't possible, because not all humans are equal and never will be equal; there's always going to be something you want. 

Humans will always be greedy pieces of shit. 

28 minutes ago, jimmyjazz said:

Yeah, but that wasn't Clinton's doing.  Democrat presidents don't get to claim surpluses, just deficits.  Republican presidents don't have to claim deficits, just surpluses.

Maybe. I wouldn't know, I'd like to see a Republican President post a fucking surplus in my lifetime. Maybe lets try that. 

Edited by SydneyCarton
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27 minutes ago, Woland said:

We never got to enjoy any windfall from the end of the Cold War because of Iraq  the Bush tax cuts didn't pay for themselves. It was like paying off the mortgage then losing your job.

fify - Iraq obviously mattered, but the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts changed our trajectory permanently, so when Iraq ended we didn't get the peace dividend we would have collected. 

27 minutes ago, Woland said:

We never got to enjoy any windfall from the end of the Cold War because of Iraq  the Bush tax cuts didn't pay for themselves. It was like paying off the mortgage then losing your job.

fify - Iraq obviously mattered, but the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts changed our trajectory permanently, so when Iraq ended we didn't get the deferred peace dividend we would have collected. 

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Quick point of order. The debt during the Clinton admin went from like 4T to 6T. Which is still child’s play compared to what has happened since, but he wasn’t at zero debt. He was for a while at zero deficit, or surplus. 
The debt increase during the Clinton presidency was entirely interest on debt existing before he took office.
Quick point of order. The debt during the Clinton admin went from like 4T to 6T. Which is still child’s play compared to what has happened since, but he wasn’t at zero debt. He was for a while at zero deficit, or surplus. 
The debt increase during the Clinton presidency was entirely interest on debt existing before he took office.
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2 hours ago, SydneyCarton said:

I'll say this about Trickle Down Economics; It's an idea that I like, in theory, but it's completely unrealistic becuase human beings, now more than ever, have become greedy pieces of shit. Therefore Trickle Down Economics is literally against human nature. I'd like to think it works wonderfully if we were an evolved, kind society. I remember the movie Enemy At The Gates. Josef Fiennes is talking about the glories of communism and eqality of man, but that's not possible becuase he covets Jude Law's fucking girlfriend. Same goddamn thing. Communal equality isn't possible, because not all humans are equal and never will be equal; there's always going to be something you want. 

Humans will always be greedy pieces of shit. 

Bingo.  And I've used that exact comparison point (of the extremes) before.  Human nature tells us that communism will never work, because human greed is a thing.  It ALSO tells us that pure anarcho-capitalism will never work, for the exact same reason.

Common sense - and, by the way real-world examples - tell us that a high-functioning mixed economy, with regulated capitalism and social programming, yields the best results, both in terms of economic performance and quality of life.

Some people will have much more.  Some people will have much less.  But most everyone (not everyone, because you can't ever achieve a perfect result when humans are involved) will have ENOUGH.  And people will be safe enough from each other (not perfect safety, for the same reason...but as safe as a society made of humans can reasonably be).

But we are presently incapable as a society from even acknowledging that concept.  The right is so dead-set on their fascism dream that they imagine that all opposition is as extreme as they are, and amounts to collectivist communism.

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5 hours ago, Stilicho said:

If there's one lesson I've picked up from the shag / surly over the years, it's be prepared to back up your bullshit or be prepared to get fucking roasted alive in short order. That doesn't play well with a crowd whose receipts are often doctored TikTok clips and conspiracies involving Jewish space lasers. We're the bully's bully, so to speak.

i think this is closest to 'explaining' Surly as a political outlier in the active college football online ecosystem. i've said it before... there are some damn smart mfers that post here. granted there are many dumbasses as well... but overall and in general, we are a smarter than average bunch that are going to call out bullshit and 'do our own research' (drink!) and apply those critical and higher order thinking skills we learned at our alma mater. 

i mean Cal and Harvard alums surely have more liberal online communities... but they aren't as big and certainly don't care as much about football 🤘

also...i was a member of the College Republicans at UT and was 100% in for George W. as governor and president the first time (as well as his dad, who was my first presidential vote ever). then i got older. and got baptized. and started earning more money. and paying closer attention. and then...me to the Republican Party...

 

giphy (1) (4).gif

 

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5 hours ago, SydneyCarton said:

I too often pinpoint all the shit that was my kneejerk response even into my 20s that I inhereted from adults and other talking points around me. "Well, they should fucking get a job!" and that bullshit. It's hard to shake brainwashing, I guess, even if you're a good and kind person. 

I think one of the problems is that, when you're youngish, you're trying to do all the right things and it may not be entirely pleasant (busting your ass through school, trying to get a decent job and find a place to live etc.).   

So, when people in your peer group parrot these "bootstrap" notions and decry those who aren't "bootstrapping," you can pretty easily buy into it, especially if you have been conditioned that way by your early environment.  Plus, you probably know some people personally that are fuckups fucking up and you tend to think of them as the non-bootstrappers and it doesn't really trigger your empathy for those who actually do lack opportunities.

Edited by TwiceHorn
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8 minutes ago, Longhorn_Fan68 said:

jfc, Tucker. One would have thought getting fired from FN would instill some humility. clearly the man is shameless. on second thought, the word pathetic jumps to mind. absolutely pathetic.

When you don't have a platform on a TV channel that appeals to garden-variety extremists, and you take shelter on a platform that is friendly to super-extremists, you start playing to your new audience.  Not for money, he has that.  He does it for admiration, because he is a pathetic creature, seeking love and validation that will never actually fill the void, because he knows in his heart that he is worthy of neither, and never will be.

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33 minutes ago, Brisketexan said:

He does it for admiration, because he is a pathetic creature, seeking love and validation that will never actually fill the void, because he knows in his heart that he is worthy of neither, and never will be.

Jeez, you just described most of surly.

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1 hour ago, Longhorn_Fan68 said:

jfc, Tucker. One would have thought getting fired from FN would instill some humility. clearly the man is shameless. on second thought, the word pathetic jumps to mind. absolutely pathetic.

 

1 hour ago, Brisketexan said:

When you don't have a platform on a TV channel that appeals to garden-variety extremists, and you take shelter on a platform that is friendly to super-extremists, you start playing to your new audience.  Not for money, he has that.  He does it for admiration, because he is a pathetic creature, seeking love and validation that will never actually fill the void, because he knows in his heart that he is worthy of neither, and never will be.

Crazy is what he thinks will help fund his personal media venture that he's allegedly trying to get off the ground.

He is not far below Trump as Public Enemy #1 of this nation.

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On 9/7/2023 at 9:44 AM, SydneyCarton said:

I misspoke somewhat: We are the only college football board I know of, which basically means in the southern region, who's political BOARD is liberal. As for the rest, it doesn't matter how we got here, most of us are liberal now. 

Because the conservatives are afraid to go there and have their ignorance exposed.  Cognitive dissonance gives them headaches. 

Edit:  "whose"

 

Edited by TexasEd
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1 hour ago, Brisketexan said:

He does it for admiration, because he is a pathetic creature, seeking love and validation that will never actually fill the void, because he knows in his heart that he is worthy of neither, and never will be.

 

1 hour ago, jimmyjazz said:

Jeez, you just described most of surly.

By god, I think we have a new Cloak Room motto, if not an entire site motto! 

"Pathetic creatures seeking love, admiration, and validation." 

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2 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

He does it for admiration, because he is a pathetic creature, seeking love and validation that will never actually fill the void, because he knows in his heart that he is worthy of neither, and never will be.

Kind of reads like Detective Gordon's lines at the end of The Dark Knight:

"Because he's the hero MAGA deserves, but not the one it needs right now. So, we'll hunt him, because he can't take it. Because he's not our hero. (He's Putin's.) He's a not-so-silent gargoyle. A deceitful destructor. A piece of shit."

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On 9/7/2023 at 10:10 AM, TwiceHorn said:

Yeah, if we ever get back to sensible, "bipartisan" compromise politics or lawmaking, the constituency of the board may fall on the more conservative end of things.

Maybe "classically liberal."

On 9/7/2023 at 10:12 AM, SydneyCarton said:

I like to think that my eyes have opened a bit and I've actually changed for the better. I still don't think we should have 30 trillion in debt, and I would fight to bring down our deficit. But not at the expense of public spending and investing in people. 

On 9/7/2023 at 10:19 AM, The Royal We said:

Basically where I am at this point too. I don’t know or care what historical bucket that puts me in either. 

The out and out fuckery caused me to stop/look around/reevaluate some long held beliefs that I essentially inherited from my parents. 

On 9/7/2023 at 10:23 AM, SydneyCarton said:

I too often pinpoint all the shit that was my kneejerk response even into my 20s that I inhereted from adults and other talking points around me. "Well, they should fucking get a job!" and that bullshit. It's hard to shake brainwashing, I guess, even if you're a good and kind person. 

On 9/7/2023 at 10:44 AM, G650 said:

This is it. A lot of us who did vote for Republicans have changed our actual stances after encountering new information. We aren't just against Trump.

I have a lot of theories about why so many of us will look at individual policies/talking points these days, where so many of us in the past fell in lockstep with our parents, just bought into the whole conservative thing/platform, etc.

If I had to guess, most of us are older (40s and up) and as kids/teens/young adults we bought into the Reagan mythos because the 80s were magical (they were and fuck anybody for saying otherwise). Reagan welcomed the Vietnam vets home, and we beat the Soviets in hockey (thanks Jimmy Carter) and we beat the Soviets overall and the Berlin Wall fell, and we launched into a big-ass war in '90/'91 where we utterly kicked ass and imagined that it was what we would have done to the Soviets. We were inundated with Republican talking points in the 90s through talk radio, a lot of us framed Clinton's presidency with metrics that were not realistic or fair, we saw the Republicans rise to power in Texas.

And then, for a lot of us, it maybe peaked with Bush wining office and the country uniting after 9/11, only to have it start to crumble with the invasion of Iraq. I think a lot of us that would be considered liberal these days, but were conservatives in our youths, really stepped back and took stock of things with how W's administration played out (Iraq invasion in 2003 was not the only thing). And there were still flashes of the GOP not going down a really bad road, here and there both nationally and within Texas up through about 2007.

But a lot of us stepped back and really evaluated things starting about 20 or so years ago.

And it helps that many/most of us that have changed our views over time, have a large variety of friends or family that don't look or vote like us, that we have jobs or income that allows us to actually spend time dwelling on policy bullshit and we can even drill down and look at individual policies, and not simply go "librools bad, conservatives good" like so many do.  Get on places like Surly (as few are there are) and you have people here who can name three things in detail about why this or that policy sucks, because that's their area of expertise in real life.  Many people do not have anything that comes close to equating that, especially the rurals.

And a lot of that sounds very pretentious, but for those of you who know MAGA types, how many of those MAGA types actually get out of their close bubble of friends/family that look like them, and more importantly, how many of those MAGA types actually look at individual policies/talking points.  And many MAGA types, because of that bubble, are not in a situation where the policies pushed by Trump and Co. (and Abbott and Co. in Texas) affect them so they don't have to think about it.  If somebody makes up a policy that negatively affects a small number of people outside of their circle, they won't be exposed to the harm of it, or understand why it's harmful.

Or to put it another way - if you hear a MAGA type bitch about the economy, ask them to name three things that are bad about it, and they can't, because they have not thought about it, or if they name something, it's long outdated because current data doesn't fit that narrative so the people playing the MAGA types try to stick with outdated data. Just like many of us regurgitated Republican talking points in the 80s and 90s because we heard some politicians or Rush Limbaugh or whoever say it, they fall into the same trap, except it's a little more insidious - many are getting played through social media by accounts of people that don't exist.  Because those accounts look and sound like their own accounts, and because those accounts are numerous, they are hit with a confirmation bias that's off the charts because there is a lot of money to be made in manipulating them, and it's easy thanks to botnets. 

TLDR: We're old, we have time to think about individual policies, and we know a broader pool of people who maybe affected by those policies, so we look at said policies in that light.

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5 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

When you don't have a platform on a TV channel that appeals to garden-variety extremists, and you take shelter on a platform that is friendly to super-extremists, you start playing to your new audience.  Not for money, he has that.  He does it for admiration, because he is a pathetic creature, seeking love and validation that will never actually fill the void, because he knows in his heart that he is worthy of neither, and never will be.

Tucker and Elon’s personalities reek of guys who are so fucking pissed they weren’t invited to Epstein’s island.

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On 9/8/2023 at 6:07 PM, atomheartbevo said:

 

And then, for a lot of us, it maybe peaked with Bush wining office and the country uniting after 9/11, only to have it start to crumble with the invasion of Iraq. I think a lot of us that would be considered liberal these days, but were conservatives in our youths, really stepped back and took stock of things with how W's administration played out (Iraq invasion in 2003 was not the only thing).

 

 

pre 9/11 I was an apathetic stoner just trying to get high and laid. After the complete goat fuck of a response to 9/11, I opened my eyes, looked around, and saw two political parties, neither of whom I really liked, but at least one party paid lip service to things that I thought really mattered, or should really matter.

So I went from nonpolitical to liberal. It only took a terrorist attack that killed 3,000 americans, and two resulting wars that also killed about 3,000 US servicemen, who knows how many hundreds of thousands of civilians, and cost billions that could have been spent on pot holes, or health care for babies, or whatever. And resulted in not a damn thing being better than it was before.

 

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Taxes weren’t too high in the fifties, and have been imbecilically low ever since. Then again, I believe in society spending on society.

Reagan was a bullshit myth, he empowered traitors, and he fucking exploded the debt. Just like every Republican President in my lifetime.
Fuck Clinton. Fuck Bush, elder and shrub. And may God damn Trump.

Edited by Willfully Horn
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19 hours ago, Neonmoon said:

No. They did not.

Supply side economics have failed spectacularly three times. The Laffer Curve is stupid. 

The Reagan tax cuts of 1981 ballooned the deficit into 4% of GDP by 1982 and 5.7% of GDP by 1983, the largest deficit since 1946. Funny enough, economic growth during Reagans first term 3.26% was nearly the same as Carters 3.19%.

Stagflation was a bitch but was caused by oil supply shocks and stupid monetary and fiscal policies to combat it. Not high taxes or onerous regulations 

Volker crushed inflation by raising interests rates to the moon, which began before Reagan and ended in 1982, and then monetary policy eased, which lead to expansion and a booming economy, paired with Reagan spending like a drunken sailor on the Military in the Cold War. 

 

that part always gets me. ~$2T in just his 8 years - which is equivalent to nearly $6T today. no one (seemingly) blinked an eye. but some kid wants a free lunch, string him and his parents up!

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On 9/12/2023 at 8:38 PM, Neonmoon said:

No. They did not.

Supply side economics have failed spectacularly three times. The Laffer Curve is stupid. 

The Reagan tax cuts of 1981 ballooned the deficit into 4% of GDP by 1982 and 5.7% of GDP by 1983, the largest deficit since 1946. Funny enough, economic growth during Reagans first term 3.26% was nearly the same as Carters 3.19%.

Stagflation was a bitch but was caused by oil supply shocks and stupid monetary and fiscal policies to combat it. Not high taxes or onerous regulations 

Volker crushed inflation by raising interests rates to the moon, which began before Reagan and ended in 1982, and then monetary policy eased, which lead to expansion and a booming economy, paired with Reagan spending like a drunken sailor on the Military in the Cold War. 

 

It is better to think of Trickle-Down economics as a myth rather than an economic hypothesis or theory.  The fundamental flaw with the idea is taught in high-school economics courses (rooted in the hamburger vs. steak discussion) and doesn't address the reality.  A man, or a company, isn't going to hire or create a new business unless there is an economic incentive to do so.   Tax incentives work to change behavior but must be specific and targeted.  They would have made it conditional if they wanted hiring to be associated with tax cuts.  The method they rolled out really showcases how they only sought to expand the wealth of the elite, push the costs, and reverse the trend of the growing middle class.  

 

 

 

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I seem to remember writing a letter to some editor stating that our economy trickles up rather than down and whoever thinks otherwise is sadly mistaken.  This was probably about the same time I decided donald JAIL trump was a con artist.  Forty fkn years and people are no smarter.

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On 9/12/2023 at 8:38 PM, Neonmoon said:

No. They did not.

Supply side economics have failed spectacularly three times. The Laffer Curve is stupid. 

The Reagan tax cuts of 1981 ballooned the deficit into 4% of GDP by 1982 and 5.7% of GDP by 1983, the largest deficit since 1946. Funny enough, economic growth during Reagans first term 3.26% was nearly the same as Carters 3.19%.

Stagflation was a bitch but was caused by oil supply shocks and stupid monetary and fiscal policies to combat it. Not high taxes or onerous regulations 

Volker crushed inflation by raising interests rates to the moon, which began before Reagan and ended in 1982, and then monetary policy eased, which lead to expansion and a booming economy, paired with Reagan spending like a drunken sailor on the Military in the Cold War. 

 

 

 

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what happened with reaganomics to make it look like it 'worked':

https://www.marketplace.org/shows/make-me-smart/40-years-later-is-this-the-end-of-reaganomics-rerun/

 

On 9/13/2023 at 4:24 PM, Longhorn_Fan68 said:

~$2T in just his 8 years

and we're still paying interest on it.

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7 hours ago, elfenix said:

what happened with reaganomics to make it look like it 'worked':

https://www.marketplace.org/shows/make-me-smart/40-years-later-is-this-the-end-of-reaganomics-rerun/

 

and we're still paying interest on it.

 

This is something I have discussed with people like 20 years ago, but Reaganomics did "work", insofar as they were what was needed at the time. I am still of that opinion today. The economy was sclerotic and the deficit spending was what unclogged it. The problem was it became a national addiction, like a sugar high, for the political class. If Bush hadn't done the whole read my lips thing, and congress worked to put taxes and structural reforms in place in the 90s, it would have worked pretty fucking well.

 

But instead we became hooked on tax cuts, wealth progressively migrated up, and here we are.

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11 minutes ago, G650 said:

 

This is something I have discussed with people like 20 years ago, but Reaganomics did "work", insofar as they were what was needed at the time. I am still of that opinion today. The economy was sclerotic and the deficit spending was what unclogged it. The problem was it became a national addiction, like a sugar high, for the political class. If Bush hadn't done the whole read my lips thing, and congress worked to put taxes and structural reforms in place in the 90s, it would have worked pretty fucking well.

 

But instead we became hooked on tax cuts, wealth progressively migrated up, and here we are.

Going on a huge coke bender is a great idea until you run out of coke, basically 

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