US 2024 Presidential Election

[Chimpzy]

Brainworm rideshare driver RFK Jr.'s personal lawyer once petitioned the FDA to revoke its approval of the polio vaccine.

RFK Jr.'s lawyer and top ally asked FDA to revoke approval of polio vaccine

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s personal attorney previously lobbied the Food and Drug Administration to revoke approval of the polio vaccine.

abcnews.go.com

Are we going to grow the economy by resurrecting the iron lung industry?

Yes? Maybe not particularly iron lung, but this will benefit various industries. Health care, insurance, funerary, to name a few. Sure, it may lead to some some crippled, paralyzed and/or dead children, but that is an acceptable price, one which Bobby and its ilk won't have to pay anyway, and they can always implement a federal abortion ban to compensate.

 

[Silvanus]

Yes, you typically do your consideration before writing the rule rather than as it strikes the page.

Regardless of when you write the rule, if it endorses actions solely for fitting a certain political description, then it's logically cyclical and inconsiderate. Political movements are themselves only beneficial (or otherwise) depending on how they impact people-- their outcomes. You yourself frequently appeal to the individual impact of governments when impressing a case for or against, so you already acknowledge that the outcome is what matters. To divorce them from that, declare them moral separately from their impact for the sake of a convenient rule, is to be inconsiderate.

Would it?

Well, yes, if a rule endorses movements called communist without looking at the individual circumstances.

Not necessarily.

If a moral system endorses pain and suffering without any benefit, then it's a bunch of bollocks.

 

[Seanchaidh]

Regardless of when you write the rule, if it endorses actions solely for fitting a certain political description, then it's logically cyclical and inconsiderate.

No more 'cyclical' than any other value judgment. It is not very difficult to come to the conclusion, based on its aims, that the success of the communist cause will benefit humanity, and that hostility toward it is somewhere on a spectrum between mistaken and evil. And it is not in any way a perversion to use this conclusion in moral reasoning.

Political movements are themselves only beneficial (or otherwise) depending on how they impact people-- their outcomes. You yourself frequently appeal to the individual impact of governments when impressing a case for or against, so you already acknowledge that the outcome is what matters. To divorce them from that, declare them moral separately from their impact for the sake of a convenient rule, is to be inconsiderate.

Well, yes, if a rule endorses movements called communist without looking at the individual circumstances.

You smuggled in 'called'. Which is more or less the same move as in the previous paragraph: to pretend the rule reasons with the label rather than what the label represents. The definition of communism is not "that to which has been applied the label of 'communism'".

If a moral system endorses pain and suffering without any benefit, then it's a bunch of bollocks.

If a moral system blames people for fighting against tyranny, and indeed blames them for the reprisal by the tyrant, then it is crap. Act utilitarianism does this in a lot of cases because it doesn't care about moral responsibility.

 

[tstorm823]

It is not very difficult to come to the conclusion, based on its aims, that the success of the communist cause will benefit humanity, and that hostility toward it is somewhere on a spectrum between mistaken and evil.

"If we get rid of all private property and government authority, humanity will benefit, and anyone who opposes that is mistaken or evil" is not quite as self-evident as you want it to be.

 

[Silvanus]

No more 'cyclical' than any other value judgment. It is not very difficult to come to the conclusion, based on its aims, that the success of the communist cause will benefit humanity, and that hostility toward it is somewhere on a spectrum between mistaken and evil. And it is not in any way a perversion to use this conclusion in moral reasoning.

That is a conclusion which rests on other underlying premises: that communism accomplishes certain other quality of life improvements. The moral quality isn't inherent; it relies on those outcomes. So give a situation in which those outcomes are not served (or are outright counteracted) by a "communist" like Pol Pot and the rule fails it's purpose. Whereas an act utilitarian can just... look at the actual circumstances, and what they're doing.

You smuggled in 'called'. Which is more or less the same move as in the previous paragraph: to pretend the rule reasons with the label rather than what the label represents. The definition of communism is not "that to which has been applied the label of 'communism'".

Feel free to delve deeper and deeper into specifics-- the more of that, the closer we get to a case-by-case rationale.

If a moral system blames people for fighting against tyranny, and indeed blames them for the reprisal by the tyrant, then it is crap. Act utilitarianism does this in a lot of cases because it doesn't care about moral responsibility.

Knowingly creating suffering, while also knowingly providing zero benefit, would not be "fighting against tyranny" in any meaningful sense.

 

[Satinavian]

You smuggled in 'called'. Which is more or less the same move as in the previous paragraph: to pretend the rule reasons with the label rather than what the label represents. The definition of communism is not "that to which has been applied the label of 'communism'".

No, the issue is that communist revolutions, even if successful, don't necessarily lead to communist societies as you imagine them.

At the end of a revolt, you have a winning revolutionary army, full of people who made their hands dirty. And those are the guys installing the new system. The "so called" communist regimes of history are what you can expect to get by violent revolutionary action, nothing else.

 

[Trunkage]

Yeah, but, you know, gotta stick with your Team when the voting comes around.

It's more important to vote for your team than to look objectively at reality and how your team affects it.

Just gotta point out that this is not how this election worked. Most people didn't vote for a team

 

[Trunkage]

I'm a great deal more worried about all the people internationally who had no say/didn't vote for him, but whose lives will still be enormously impacted by his decisions (for instance, on climate).

Don't worry, China will be there to pick up the US's slack economically

 

[Trunkage]

No, the issue is that communist revolutions, even if successful, don't necessarily lead to communist societies as you imagine them.

At the end of a revolt, you have a winning revolutionary army, full of people who made their hands dirty. And those are the guys installing the new system. The "so called" communist regimes of history are what you can expect to get by violent revolutionary action, nothing else.

I don't know why you're just doing Communist here. The same thing happened with Mercantilism, Democracy, Monarchism, Capitalism and any religious movement etc.

Eg. The US version of Capitalism has very little to do with what Adam Smith envisioned and millions have died just within its borders just to satiate that word

 

[Satinavian]

Don't despair: the USA got what it voted for.

If it turns out the people don't like parts of it, maybe they might learn from the experience.

I would have said this at Trumps first term. But for his second ?

No, Americans knew what Trump stands for and like it.

 

[tstorm823]

Eg. The US version of Capitalism has very little to do with what Adam Smith envisioned and millions have died just within its borders just to satiate that word

The word "capitalism" was invented by socialists half a century after Adam Smith was dead to criticize systems where the products of labor serve to benefit the wealthy. The word was invented as a parallel to "feudalism" (a word that was coined by Adam Smith's generation), to retrospectively describe systems where the products of labor served to benefit specifically land holders for the monarchs. Neither of these words were formed by advocates for the systems they describe, they were created to be used as criticisms.

 

[tippy2k2]

LO fuckin L JFC...

Did they look into these pardons at all before making them???

 

[hanselthecaretaker2]

Thanks O'Biden

Any serial killers you think you want to pardon before you're out? Maybe someone who eats puppies and adorable orphans?

Fuck it, go nuts Biden. I'm sure there are plenty of shitty people you can let off the hook before it's too late.

He did nuts on that -

Biden commutes roughly 1,500 sentences and pardons 39 people in biggest single-day act of clemency

The president is also pardoning 39 Americans convicted of nonviolent crimes. The move follows a pardon for his son Hunter, who was prosecuted for gun and tax crimes.

apnews.com

vs other presidents-

List of people pardoned or granted clemency by the president of the United States - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

He’s also now auctioning off unfinished sections of border wall that have been sitting the last four+ years at $5 a piece, and they are big pieces.

https://www.dailywire.com/news/exclusive-biden-races-to-sell-off-border-wall-parts-before-trump-takes-office

China will probably buy them and offer them back to Trump for *some kind of leverage* on the tariffs.

 

[Thaluikhain]

China will probably buy them and offer them back to Trump for *some kind of leverage* on the tariffs.

It would be amusing if Mexico paid for some of them...

 

[Silvanus]

LO fuckin L JFC...

Did they look into these pardons at all before making them???

That's a quite misleading summary. Meera Sachdeva pled guilty to defrauding the insurance company by billing for more cancer drugs than were used (as well as drugs that were used when she was out of office). She was not found guilty of providing "diluted" drugs to patients or reusing needles. Those are a mixture of charges that were dropped and claims that weren't charged at all.

 

[tippy2k2]

That's a quite misleading summary. Meera Sachdeva pled guilty to defrauding the insurance company by billing for more cancer drugs than were used (as well as drugs that were used when she was out of office). She was not found guilty of providing "diluted" drugs to patients or reusing needles. Those are a mixture of charges that were dropped and claims that weren't charged at all.

I suppose she was only accused of it, they just never pursued the charges. They also had safety issues as it sounds like there were sharing of needles and not cleaning equipment and whatnot. So all she did was inadvertently give a couple dozen cancer patients a bunch of infections and stole a shit ton of money through fraud. The perfect kind of person who deserves clemency I guess in Biden's eyes!

 

[Silvanus]

I suppose she was only accused of it, they just never pursued the charges. They also had safety issues as it sounds like there were sharing of needles and not cleaning equipment and whatnot. So all she did was inadvertently give a couple dozen cancer patients a bunch of infections and stole a shit ton of money through fraud. The perfect kind of person who deserves clemency I guess in Biden's eyes!

Well no, we don't know for sure about any of that. Needle sharing was alleged in a separate claim, and someone says they contracted HIV at around the same time the clinic was shut. But an investigation found no conclusive evidence of blood-born infection resulting from her treatment. I'm assuming you don't believe that allegations for which someone wasn't found guilty or even charged are grounds to incarcerate them.

There are plenty of truly shitty commute decisions there, like Rita Crundwell. But Freebeacon is a right-wing outlet peddling half-truths and misleading summaries to rile people up, and that Twitter rando fell for it.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Would it not have been wiser to stick Hunter Biden in with a bunch of those, to sorta bury his pardon?

 

[tippy2k2]

Well no, we don't know for sure about any of that. Needle sharing was alleged in a separate claim, and someone says they contracted HIV at around the same time the clinic was shut. But an investigation found no conclusive evidence of blood-born infection resulting from her treatment. I'm assuming you don't believe that allegations for which someone wasn't found guilty or even charged are grounds to incarcerate them.

There are plenty of truly shitty commute decisions there, like Rita Crundwell. But Freebeacon is a right-wing outlet peddling half-truths and misleading summaries to rile people up, and that Twitter rando fell for it.

Well that's good to know about the Free Bacon thing (I'd never heard of it). I wasn't finding any sites that gave a run down of all the people. While there are certainly people on the list who likely deserve it, the few big ones I've seen outside of Free Bacon (like the Cash 4 Kids Judge) are shit people who deserve to die in prison and Biden in his infinite wisdom has decided that they are worthy of being released...

 

[Bedinsis]

Would it not have been wiser to stick Hunter Biden in with a bunch of those, to sorta bury his pardon?

Hunter Biden has already been a story for quite a while for understandable reasons; if Joe Biden had pardoned him in a group of other people the media would have focused on him no matter.