[Politics] TRUMP IS GUILTY

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

Don't impeach him on obstruction, that's like getting arrested for resisting arrest, and there's no crime in the first place.

Impeach him for emoluments.

Emoluments is still making it's way through the courts, however, He settled his civil fraud case, but that does not mean he is exempt from criminal prosecution. We also have the possibility of money laundering they have just started investigating that so we will have to wait and see. Maybe they will have it ready right before 2020 elections. I don't think they should move to impeach until they have all of these things ready to go at once, and right before he is set to leave office so he cannot do anything about it. Waiting until he is unable to retaliate or make pardons is the best option to being able to actually get criminal convictions afterwards.

 

[Asita]

Don't impeach him on obstruction, that's like getting arrested for resisting arrest, and there's no crime in the first place.

Impeach him for emoluments.

Not so, actually. I've explained this before, Obstruction of Justice is a procedural crime that is entirely self contained in the act of trying to unlawfully obstruct, impede, influence or otherwise interfere with an official investigation. I think part of the reason that this causes confusion is because it's a bit of an umbrella term that encapsulates a number of crimes linked by commonality in their outcome, such as witness tampering, fabricating evidence, destroying or hiding evidence, making false statements to investigators...anything that deliberately "obstructs, influences, or impedes any official proceeding, or attempts to do so". To borrow from the open letter from DoJ Alumni, "prosecuting obstruction of justice cases is critical because unchecked obstruction - which allows intentional interference with criminal investigations to go unpunished - puts our whole system of justice at risk."

 

[Erttheking]

So what do we have to suggest that rural communities actually want any of what's being suggested? I'm curious. I've never actually seen any support from these communities for retraining or investment. Just the same old same old about wanting the same jobs they've always had back.

I'm absolutely sure they want their old jobs back. Many such communities are usually built around industries, and the industry is a huge source of character and community identification. Were it to be replaced, it would at minimum need to be gradual and preferentially something at least reasonably similar: you're unlikely to get many miners who want to become customer services representatives, where they might be okay with other manual labour jobs.

The reality is that there is nothing to save these communities. Once, no-one lived there because there was no economic point to living there. Then there was coal and people moved in, now there's not (useful) coal they may as well all leave again. But as above, obviously, they like their community.

They've been left behind by the march of time, and there's no realistic way of changing that. Nevertheless, you can show them some love and sympathy in some way. And something practical, rather than dumb-as-fuck claims you're going to give them their jobs back when it's clearly not going to happen.

That's the thing though. You're right. There's no saving those towns. But they don't want to hear that. They refuse to hear it. I've seen people from downs like that flat out say that living in an urban or suburban area would be suffocating for them and they refuse to do it. From a purely emotional perspective, I get why they react that way, but it doesn't make it any less irrational. I guess people just aren't rational when their home of 20-40 years is going down. And they don't want to hear about how they can get retrained or the government can pour money into the towns (most of these people vote conservative and buy into all that jargon about bootstraps and are against government spending) they want to hear about how American jobs are coming back.

You know the old saying, you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink? In this scenario, the horse is also saying that you're a coastal elitist while it's refusing to drink. And sometimes it tries to kick you. There's another old saying. Democrats fall in love. Republicans fall in line.

I do feel sympathy for these people. I really do. I've read a fair bit about how much it sucks to live in a rural town going under. That can only go so far. Sometimes you gotta drag people into the future, kicking and screaming.

 

[Lil devils x_v1legacy]

So what do we have to suggest that rural communities actually want any of what's being suggested? I'm curious. I've never actually seen any support from these communities for retraining or investment. Just the same old same old about wanting the same jobs they've always had back.

I'm absolutely sure they want their old jobs back. Many such communities are usually built around industries, and the industry is a huge source of character and community identification. Were it to be replaced, it would at minimum need to be gradual and preferentially something at least reasonably similar: you're unlikely to get many miners who want to become customer services representatives, where they might be okay with other manual labour jobs.

The reality is that there is nothing to save these communities. Once, no-one lived there because there was no economic point to living there. Then there was coal and people moved in, now there's not (useful) coal they may as well all leave again. But as above, obviously, they like their community.

They've been left behind by the march of time, and there's no realistic way of changing that. Nevertheless, you can show them some love and sympathy in some way. And something practical, rather than dumb-as-fuck claims you're going to give them their jobs back when it's clearly not going to happen.

That's the thing though. You're right. There's no saving those towns. But they don't want to hear that. They refuse to hear it. I've seen people from downs like that flat out say that living in an urban or suburban area would be suffocating for them and they refuse to do it. From a purely emotional perspective, I get why they react that way, but it doesn't make it any less irrational. I guess people just aren't rational when their home of 20-40 years is going down. And they don't want to hear about how they can get retrained or the government can pour money into the towns (most of these people vote conservative and buy into all that jargon about bootstraps and are against government spending) they want to hear about how American jobs are coming back.

You know the old saying, you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink? In this scenario, the horse is also saying that you're a coastal elitist while it's refusing to drink. And sometimes it tries to kick you. There's another old saying. Democrats fall in love. Republicans fall in line.

I do feel sympathy for these people. I really do. I've read a fair bit about how much it sucks to live in a rural town going under. That can only go so far. Sometimes you gotta drag people into the future, kicking and screaming.

It isn't like living in a city is their only option either. I too cannot stand to be in a city long, I actually get physically ill from the pollution from a city that many who reside there do not think about. The cars, streets, concrete, sewage, but the worst to me comes from people themselves. People stink and produce poor air quality from their living environments. The air pollution, noise pollution light pollution.. it is all too much for me for any prolonged period of time. I work in the city, but when I come home when I look out my back or front door all I see is fields, trees, ponds and non human lifeforms, and I prefer it that way. I become physically ill when I am in the city for any extended period of time. Sadly when I travel I often get ill. Some people are acclimated to urban conditions, but not everyone is, nor can their health survive such a climate for long.

The thing is there are numerous options that do not require an urban setting that also do not require trying to prop up obsolete, polluting industries such as coal, it is just a matter of them accepting any change at all.

 

[Eacaraxe_v1legacy]

The reality is that there is nothing to save these communities.

We are talking at all, or in terms of policy proposals with likelihood of passage? Because if the former, Huntsville, AL, and Oak Ridge, TN, stand as proof otherwise. Unfortunately, that highlights the problem; it would take infrastructure legislation on the scale of the New Deal to accomplish, and at this point not even Democrats are willing to do that.

 

[Eacaraxe_v1legacy]

Idk i can think of a democrat backed infrastructure bill with new deal in the name

If I had said at any point "Republicans were the party of Lincoln, and Democrats were the party of slavery!", doubtless posters (likely including yourself) would have come out of the woodwork to say "that's inaccurate, because the party system changed in the aftermath of the civil rights movement and Southern strategy!". And, if anyone else had said it, I would have too.

Because it's true.

And, like it or not, that door swings both ways. Which is why there was such a focus on Southern modernization during the New Deal, and a massive chunk of why so much post-war scientific and technological development was focused in the South and Southwest. Keeping Southern Democrats happy, and subsequently the New Deal Coalition together, took a fuckload of pork. It just happened to be pork that had massively positive outcomes (to be honest, one could uncharitably characterize the New Deal itself as the biggest pork barrel in American history).

The Democratic party of today is not the Democratic party of FDR's day. Because that Democratic party was still the party of slavery (and in the North, the party of Tammany Hall), albeit one at the beginnings of a transitional period having adopted progressive voters breaking ways with Republicans, thanks to the latter party's naked corruption and embrace of Gilded Age politics.

If you want to claim the successes of FDR's Democratic party, you get to claim its failures as well. Do you really want to start down that rabbit hole?

 

[crimson5pheonix]

Idk i can think of a democrat backed infrastructure bill with new deal in the name

If I had said at any point "Republicans were the party of Lincoln, and Democrats were the party of slavery!", doubtless posters (likely including yourself) would have come out of the woodwork to say "that's inaccurate, because the party system changed in the aftermath of the civil rights movement and Southern strategy!". And, if anyone else had said it, I would have too.

Because it's true.

And, like it or not, that door swings both ways. Which is why there was such a focus on Southern modernization during the New Deal, and a massive chunk of why so much post-war scientific and technological development was focused in the South and Southwest. Keeping Southern Democrats happy, and subsequently the New Deal Coalition together, took a fuckload of pork. It just happened to be pork that had massively positive outcomes (to be honest, one could uncharitably characterize the New Deal itself as the biggest pork barrel in American history).

The Democratic party of today is not the Democratic party of FDR's day. Because that Democratic party was still the party of slavery (and in the North, the party of Tammany Hall), albeit one at the beginnings of a transitional period having adopted progressive voters breaking ways with Republicans, thanks to the latter party's naked corruption and embrace of Gilded Age politics.

If you want to claim the successes of FDR's Democratic party, you get to claim its failures as well. Do you really want to start down that rabbit hole?

They're probably talking about the green new deal. The thing Democrats shot down out of hand because you are, of course, absolutely correct in your analysis.

 

[Eacaraxe_v1legacy]

They're probably talking about the green new deal. The thing Democrats shot down out of hand because you are, of course, absolutely correct in your analysis.

The what? Yeah, I bet there was a sequel to Highlander, too.

Unless you're talking about the non-binding resolution that sounded nice but included absolutely no policy proposals, that couldn't even drum up enough Democratic support in the House to do anything but get smothered by a pillow in subcommittee?

The one McConnell preempted in the Senate with a binding version, knowing it would never get enough votes to invoke cloture, to force Democratic Senators to go on-record as supporting or opposing it? And none of them did, including Democratic Presidential hopefuls or those who cosponsored the non-binding version?

That? Yeah I call that "The Green Meh".

 

[crimson5pheonix]

They're probably talking about the green new deal. The thing Democrats shot down out of hand because you are, of course, absolutely correct in your analysis.

The what? Yeah, I bet there was a sequel to Highlander, too.

Unless you're talking about the non-binding resolution that sounded nice but included absolutely no policy proposals, that couldn't even drum up enough Democratic support in the House to do anything but get smothered by a pillow in subcommittee?

The one McConnell preempted in the Senate with a binding version, knowing it would never get enough votes to invoke cloture, to force Democratic Senators to go on-record as supporting or opposing it? And none of them did, including Democratic Presidential hopefuls or those who cosponsored the non-binding version?

That? Yeah I call that "The Green Meh".

Exactly the same. The demonstration that the Democrats will talk as much game as possible, but then stop and think instead of actually doing anything.

 

[Agema]

We are talking at all, or in terms of policy proposals with likelihood of passage? Because if the former, Huntsville, AL, and Oak Ridge, TN, stand as proof otherwise. Unfortunately, that highlights the problem; it would take infrastructure legislation on the scale of the New Deal to accomplish, and at this point not even Democrats are willing to do that.

You can save some of them. However, you can't infrastructure spend away the fact that some places are just not good places to be to fit into wider economic activity. New roads don't make it worthwhile putting a factory in a place where getting materials in and goods out is inherently a lot more inefficient than most of the rest of the country, and there's a limit to how much public sector industry (e.g. military bases) can be spread around.

 

[Eacaraxe_v1legacy]

You can save some of them. However...

"However" nothing. Appalachia, as a region, actually has a pretty monster comparative advantage that could turn it into one of the wealthiest non-coastal regions in the country inside a decade, with the right legislation today.

Yup, astronomy. You gotta be pretty high to do astronomy, and there aren't many places outside the Rockies higher than Appalachia. All that farmland is ripe for cultivating bright minds to observe the universe, learn, and ponder what it all really means.

 

[Agema]

"However" nothing. Appalachia, as a region, actually has a pretty monster comparative advantage that could turn it into one of the wealthiest non-coastal regions in the country inside a decade, with the right infrastructure spending today.

I can't comment in much detail as I'm no expert in Appalachia. However, I know Appalachia is a huge area and not uniform: you might be able to revitalise some towns but not others, for example maybe around Alabama and Tennessee there can be a boom, but West Virignia is stuffed. If we're thinking agriculture, there may be problems as some areas might be polluted to fuck after strip mining.

 

[Eacaraxe_v1legacy]

I can't comment in much detail as I'm no expert in Appalachia. However, I know Appalachia is a huge area and not uniform: you might be able to revitalise some towns but not others, for example maybe around Alabama and Tennessee there can be a boom, but West Virignia is stuffed. If we're thinking agriculture, there may be problems as some areas might be polluted to fuck after strip mining.

Sure, the entire Appalachian region is pretty diverse, all the way from tundras up north to temperate rain forests down south. Practically all of it is suitable for industrial hemp, though. But, the Allegheny and Cumberland areas, the portion typically known as "coal country", is honestly fairly similar (they're both in USDA hardiness zone 6). It's about as ideal as ideal gets for hemp -- temperate climate, long growing season, humid with good rainfall, excellent soil drainage and chemistry.

Plus, hemp is a hardy cultivar with strong soil-remediation capabilities. So strong, in fact, hemp cultivation is capable of (partially) decontaminating the Chernobyl exclusion zone. Not that you'd want to roll up and smoke a radioactive joint, but holy shit.

https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/can-hemp-clean-up-the-earth-629589/

Industrial hemp cultivation, at least, is already starting to take off in eastern Kentucky and West Virginia. This is literally a no-lose scenario, but last year's farm bill wasn't enough since it only legalized cultivation of low-THC strands.

 

[Schadrach]

"However" nothing. Appalachia, as a region, actually has a pretty monster comparative advantage that could turn it into one of the wealthiest non-coastal regions in the country inside a decade, with the right legislation today.

Yup, astronomy. You gotta be pretty high to do astronomy, and there aren't many places outside the Rockies higher than Appalachia. All that farmland is ripe for cultivating bright minds to observe the universe, learn, and ponder what it all really means.

My step dad actually did construction work on the Green Bank Telescope, in the United States National Radio Quiet Zone. He was a union ironworker until he retired.

I can't comment in much detail as I'm no expert in Appalachia. However, I know Appalachia is a huge area and not uniform: you might be able to revitalise some towns but not others, for example maybe around Alabama and Tennessee there can be a boom, but West Virignia is stuffed. If we're thinking agriculture, there may be problems as some areas might be polluted to fuck after strip mining.

If you want to build in Appalachian "coal country", and it needs to be something that isn't surrounded by mountains and trees in every conceivable direction (like say an airport or wind farm), you build it on strip mine sites.

I've always thought the area would be good for nuclear power - most of Appalachian "coal country" is mostly safe from most natural disasters aside from flooding because it's mostly mountains covered in trees.

 

[Eacaraxe_v1legacy]

If you want to build in Appalachian "coal country", and it needs to be something that isn't surrounded by mountains and trees in every conceivable direction (like say an airport or wind farm), you build it on strip mine sites.

I've always thought the area would be good for nuclear power - most of Appalachian "coal country" is mostly safe from most natural disasters aside from flooding because it's mostly mountains covered in trees.

Honestly, if reclaimed, such sites are ideal for solar thermal. Water availability would be the big issue for nuclear in the region; even late-generation heavy water or molten salt reactors still need readily-available light water for the steam and cooling feed water cycles. Meanwhile, the region has some of the highest solar insolation in the country outside the Southwest and Florida, and strip mine/mountaintop removal sites would be ideal for solar thermal generation. But, the kicker in all this is solar thermal requires no hazardous materials to construct and operate, nor rare-earth minerals that are hazardous to produce and subject to geopolitical instability.

 

[Agema]

I've always thought the area would be good for nuclear power - most of Appalachian "coal country" is mostly safe from most natural disasters aside from flooding because it's mostly mountains covered in trees.

Maybe. You generally want your power stations at least reasonably near places they have to power, because there's a loss of energy in shunting it along power lines - probably around 1% per hundred km on a very high voltage line and worse at lower voltages. Doesn't seem like a lot, but it adds up. Plus the infrastructure costs, maintenance (including accessibility), etc.

Also these days solar and wind is likely to be cheaper than nuclear, or with rapidly reducing costs is soon to be. If suitable to the area, they'd be a better bet. Although again, might be even more convenient places to put it.

Of course, getting solar and wind may be relatively slow moving given that half the US population and politicians hate it just because it's associated with lefties. Money will out in the end, of course, but China's way ahead of the USA on renewables for a reason.

 

[Schadrach]

Water availability would be the big issue for nuclear in the region; even late-generation heavy water or molten salt reactors still need readily-available light water for the steam and cooling feed water cycles.

I would assume for something like that you'd build along one of the larger rivers like the Kanawha, like the chemical and power plants already in the state tend to already get built (and for the same reason). There's a reason John Amos Power Plant is right by the Kanawha.

John Amos is also unfortunately right in that weird spot where it's too big to benefit from one set of subsidy to move to greener power but too small to benefit from others.

Meanwhile, the region has some of the highest solar insolation in the country outside the Southwest and Florida, and strip mine/mountaintop removal sites would be ideal for solar thermal generation. But, the kicker in all this is solar thermal requires no hazardous materials to construct and operate, nor rare-earth minerals that are hazardous to produce and subject to geopolitical instability.

Don't solar thermal plants also require a lot of water to operate?

 

[Catfood220]

Dear America,

Please come and pick up your garbage, he is making the place look untidy.

Yours sincerely,
Great Britain. X

 

[Baffle]

Dear America,

Please come and pick up your garbage, he is making the place look untidy.

Yours sincerely,
Great Britain. X

And he made the queen's hands look massive.