Going over the various parts, there were quite a few candidates t the point they had to not allow the normal opening speeches and just go straight to the questions. Keep in mind I am recording my thoughts on what they said, and I am typing as I am looking at the videos so my thoughts may change with them.
As this will be a very long one, some not so political posts to go with this political thread.
The first series of questions were all on Impeachment, and they all agreed on it. That Trump has done enough illicit things, namely an obstruction of justice, its to hold him accountable, and hold the office to a higher standard than is currently being presented. Its also one to set a standard as it will send a message to the next president and the next one after that. Also something that multiple people have mentioned, its their job to proverbially walk and chew bubble gum so they can all seek this while still working towards other goals.
The statement that impressed me was Mayor Pete Buttigieg who said he was still working on climate change, and the fact he and the other candidates were working on being the President after Trump. Regardless how he leaves office, that is their goal and none of the other issues of the day have ?gone on vacation? during this time. Whoever wins enters the Oval office in a much more divided county. Frankly I am still watching the old videos as I am typing so as of writing this I am hoping he still keeps at it like this.
I also like Andrew Yang?s statement that even if Impeached it won?t fix the underlying problems that got him in office to beguine with.
Next series of Questions the Economy:
Senator Elizabeth Warran wants to increase taxes on the wealthy and big business to pay for medicare as its not good. I do like the idea of her plan to eliviate student debt and the payments for community college, so lets see how she does. While she says she won?t sign something that won?t increase the taxes on the middle class, BUTTTT I don?t know how she plans to do so when human nature and rich people acting like rich people is still a thing.
The whole Medicare issue became a three-way fight with Berny Sanders and Buttigieg saying she didn?t give a clear answer on how it was going to be paid and her defending her point, repeating how to pay for your cancer plan and the like. Sentiments that others seemed to feel as they either say outright its going to suck tax wise but its going to elevate the pains of paying for healthcare. They also felt their methods were achievable now, and hers was a pipedream at best. SO, I might not vote for her.
After that, it was mostly focused on it, but it was a verbal brawl on their views, with some complimenting others, while others saying its not going to be cheap.
It did eventually move onto getting Jobs, and I like Yang?s argument against Sander?s guaranteed job plan. Namely the fact that there are a lot of issues when you do the government planning, does not take individuals into consideration, does not take into account individual?s like Yang?s wife who is a stay at home Mom with one of their two sons being on the autistic spectrum. Also when you have government target plans for employment you get a lot of jobs no one asked for, retraining that goes no where, and a whole lot of wasted time, money, and energy. Speaking as someone with a learning disability or two (autism, dyslexia, ADD) I know what that feels like first hand. It sucks. And I?ll add in most of us don?t have our shit together by the time we are legal adults to know what we want to do for the rest of our lives. I do not think Sanders will work, but I will look into more with Yang.
Yang also questioned the questionability of Automation being a factor of loosing jobs as everywhere you go there is self checkout. Therea re even automated long haul trucks out there.
Sentator Tusli Gabbard said they need to addressed the general fears have of both the global issues when it comes to the economy and automation.
Senator Cory booker wants to raise the national minimum wage to 15 dollars and hour, and to ?try and put back dignity into work.? To incentivize keeping jobs in the US. To encourage unions, the latter he has been fighting along side with. How he plans this, I am not sure.
I found Congressman Beto O?Rourk?s idea interesting is to make deals with Mexico when it comes to trade and commerce that incentives unions on their end, as this would make the markets more competitive which its not really over there (his words not mine). It will be interesting to see how he does this, but I agree with his statement that most people don?t want a handout and they have to be given an opportunity to work for it.
Biden wants to cut the loopholes in tax cuts as billions are lost this way.
When it came to the taxing on the wealth issue, Warran accused everyone else on the debate except for Sanders for protecting the Billionaires, which Senator Amy Klobuchar rebutter saying none of them are wanting that, including the lone Billionaire on the panel (who says he was one of the first to suggest such a tax). The more Warran speaks the nuttier she sounds to. She says a lot but a lot of it sounds like a whole lot of nothing.
Cory Booker also made a point that they have one shot at keeping Trump?s tenure just one term, and tearing into each other isn?t helping.
Next Series of Questions: Syria.
Yeah, the pulling out and abandoning the Kurds and other allies weakened our trust, he weakened out standing, and we need to strengthen it.
Near universally, they seem to age that they need to hold Russia and Turkey, and even Saudi Arabia with their wars. This means face potential attacks by freezing Puttin?s assets if needs be.
We cannot solve the climate crisis alone, and need to work with other nations. We will need to be the leaders in this, but need other?s help.
I also find it sadly ironic Trump can get defenseless families in cages on the boarder, but can?t be bothered enough to deal with escaped ISIS prisoners that only escaped because of the half hazard manor this withdrawal has been.
Domestic Issues
The Assault Weapons ban.
Its seemed pretty split with mandatory confiscation and voluntary buy back, and it was ugly. It didn?t seem clear on how it was going to be enforced.
It was an emotional issiue for many who have either been comforting civilian or police families that had loved ones killed with one of these, or as in the case of Texas, the Latin comunites worried a massacure could happen to them from Trump?s racist rhetoric, with at least one of the presidential hopefuls mentioning a friend that he grew up with in their home neighborhood was killed by an assult weapon.
The biggest argument againts the mandatory came from Julian Castro after Anderso Cooper asked him about preventing handguns from getting out more as they cause the majority of deaths. Besides how illdefined the methods and definitions are, and to quote him ?if you are not going door to door [to confiscate the guns] its not mandatory.? Castro also mentioned the neighborhood he grew up and the fear for his life as gunshots were a common background noise. He also remembered neighborhoods like his ?were not looking for another reason for police to come banging on the door.?
This makes a good point as this will inevitably be targeted on the minorities. I am going to throw in an example here, most of the stringent gun laws in California: a lot of them were put in by NRA member Ronald Reagan as a targeted policy against the NRA, which may have been a crippling factor in their eventual fall. Who?s to say this won?t happen again. If not as an official policy, as one by a bunch of racist bullies hiding behind a badge. I have too many family members in uniform not to have love and respect for law enforcement, but there are too many people that should never have been allowed to be cops for this reason.
Castro also added that police violence was gun violence as well, and used an example that will hit us gamers hard. Two days prior to the debate in Fort Worth, a law enforcement officer showed up at the doorstep of Atatiana Jefferson at 2 in the morning while she was playing videogames with her nephiew. The officer didn?t announce himself and just shot and killed her through her window. Castro is afraid, and justifiably so, many would take this as an excuse to commit more acts that shame the badge.
Opioid Epidemic
The fist Question on this was brought up by a teacher, and that was how to deal with it in the rural areas where access to both jobs and rehabilitation are in short supply.
Amy Klobuchar wants to make the pharmaceuticals that got this plague going in the first place to pay for it. It?s a 2 cent tax but it would pay for these much needed aids.
Tom Stayer, the billionair of the group, wants to make it harder for these corporations to vote, to stop treating them like people when it comes to voting.
Yang and O?Rourke wants to decriminalize small amounts of opioids and to focus more treating these people of their disease than throwing them in a jail cell.
When senator Kamala Harris and Castro think the corporations should be treated as criminals, with calling them large scale dope dealers (a fair statement all things considered). SO, they need jail time. We need to hold them accountable.
Pundent's Health:
Well, we have a bunch of old people here, so we had people defending their health.
Biden used his experience, and will be releasing both his tax and health information that is needed.
Sanders invited people to join him at a rally he is going to when asked about his heart attack,
Warren, who at 71 could be the oldest first term elected president, said she is going to work twice as hard as her colleagues and rambled a bit.
Gabbard at age 38, the youngest hopeful of the group, was asked if age should be a factor in this at all. She said that why are only the three oldest ones being asked about their health as she maybe younger than them but she also kept in good health by her military training regiment. She rather ask who is fit, in general, to be commander in chief, and said she has experience in a varieties of areas, including areas that would help her in her office.
Next questions: Should big tech companies be broken up.
When asked this of Yang, it won?t solve the issiue. More competition won?t be a solution (and used the Bing search engine as an example?no one is using it for a reason). It also won?t stop the increased depression and anxiety that is occurring with increased social media usage, which as a parent scares him. We need a new 21st century solution not a 20th century one he says. He also wants them to hold them accountable for holding our data.
Warren and Booker say breaking up the monopolies have to happen.
Stayer focused more on Trump and proving he was the better businessman and soon to be better president.
O?Rourke doesn?t think it?s a President?s job to say which ones need or need not be split. Protect your privacy, hold them accountable, treat these publishers as content as the rouges they are but its not a president?s job to split them.
Sanders wants a president that will get an attorney general with the balls to fight these monopolies.
Harris wants to shut down Trump?s tritter account. She also got into a fight with Warren that went nowhere on semantics.
Women?s reproductive health
Harris and Klobucha want Row v Way to be a national law and fight laws that would prevent woemen from having woman a choice in the manners of their body and reproductive rights.
Booker added that codifying Row v Way would help people that are poor as much of this
Gabbard quoted Hillary Clinton in saying Abortions should be Safe, Legal, and rare (the one thing she agrees with Clinton). Its one of the most serious decisions a woman can make in her life. She believes there are restrictions, such as the third trimester abortions emergencies only (life of the mother at risk).
Biden says if the court denied Row v Way, he wouldn?t support it. He would support privacy, which a woman?s right to choose is based upon.
Buttigieg wants reforms that will try to make choosing the next Supreme court judge that wasn?t an apocalyptic political fire fight.
Castro would like term limits or cycling out judges
After some political dick measuring,
Final Question:
After Ellen DeGeneres defended her friendship With W. Bush, each candidate was to say a friendship everyone would find surprising. I was glad to see they could quickly come up with names and excamples.
Overall I like Yang the best, he seems to make the most sense to me.
I think Biden has the strongest chance though of winning this.
As this will be a very long one, some not so political posts to go with this political thread.
The first series of questions were all on Impeachment, and they all agreed on it. That Trump has done enough illicit things, namely an obstruction of justice, its to hold him accountable, and hold the office to a higher standard than is currently being presented. Its also one to set a standard as it will send a message to the next president and the next one after that. Also something that multiple people have mentioned, its their job to proverbially walk and chew bubble gum so they can all seek this while still working towards other goals.
The statement that impressed me was Mayor Pete Buttigieg who said he was still working on climate change, and the fact he and the other candidates were working on being the President after Trump. Regardless how he leaves office, that is their goal and none of the other issues of the day have ?gone on vacation? during this time. Whoever wins enters the Oval office in a much more divided county. Frankly I am still watching the old videos as I am typing so as of writing this I am hoping he still keeps at it like this.
I also like Andrew Yang?s statement that even if Impeached it won?t fix the underlying problems that got him in office to beguine with.
Next series of Questions the Economy:
Senator Elizabeth Warran wants to increase taxes on the wealthy and big business to pay for medicare as its not good. I do like the idea of her plan to eliviate student debt and the payments for community college, so lets see how she does. While she says she won?t sign something that won?t increase the taxes on the middle class, BUTTTT I don?t know how she plans to do so when human nature and rich people acting like rich people is still a thing.
The whole Medicare issue became a three-way fight with Berny Sanders and Buttigieg saying she didn?t give a clear answer on how it was going to be paid and her defending her point, repeating how to pay for your cancer plan and the like. Sentiments that others seemed to feel as they either say outright its going to suck tax wise but its going to elevate the pains of paying for healthcare. They also felt their methods were achievable now, and hers was a pipedream at best. SO, I might not vote for her.
After that, it was mostly focused on it, but it was a verbal brawl on their views, with some complimenting others, while others saying its not going to be cheap.
It did eventually move onto getting Jobs, and I like Yang?s argument against Sander?s guaranteed job plan. Namely the fact that there are a lot of issues when you do the government planning, does not take individuals into consideration, does not take into account individual?s like Yang?s wife who is a stay at home Mom with one of their two sons being on the autistic spectrum. Also when you have government target plans for employment you get a lot of jobs no one asked for, retraining that goes no where, and a whole lot of wasted time, money, and energy. Speaking as someone with a learning disability or two (autism, dyslexia, ADD) I know what that feels like first hand. It sucks. And I?ll add in most of us don?t have our shit together by the time we are legal adults to know what we want to do for the rest of our lives. I do not think Sanders will work, but I will look into more with Yang.
Yang also questioned the questionability of Automation being a factor of loosing jobs as everywhere you go there is self checkout. Therea re even automated long haul trucks out there.
Sentator Tusli Gabbard said they need to addressed the general fears have of both the global issues when it comes to the economy and automation.
Senator Cory booker wants to raise the national minimum wage to 15 dollars and hour, and to ?try and put back dignity into work.? To incentivize keeping jobs in the US. To encourage unions, the latter he has been fighting along side with. How he plans this, I am not sure.
I found Congressman Beto O?Rourk?s idea interesting is to make deals with Mexico when it comes to trade and commerce that incentives unions on their end, as this would make the markets more competitive which its not really over there (his words not mine). It will be interesting to see how he does this, but I agree with his statement that most people don?t want a handout and they have to be given an opportunity to work for it.
Biden wants to cut the loopholes in tax cuts as billions are lost this way.
When it came to the taxing on the wealth issue, Warran accused everyone else on the debate except for Sanders for protecting the Billionaires, which Senator Amy Klobuchar rebutter saying none of them are wanting that, including the lone Billionaire on the panel (who says he was one of the first to suggest such a tax). The more Warran speaks the nuttier she sounds to. She says a lot but a lot of it sounds like a whole lot of nothing.
Cory Booker also made a point that they have one shot at keeping Trump?s tenure just one term, and tearing into each other isn?t helping.
Next Series of Questions: Syria.
Yeah, the pulling out and abandoning the Kurds and other allies weakened our trust, he weakened out standing, and we need to strengthen it.
Near universally, they seem to age that they need to hold Russia and Turkey, and even Saudi Arabia with their wars. This means face potential attacks by freezing Puttin?s assets if needs be.
We cannot solve the climate crisis alone, and need to work with other nations. We will need to be the leaders in this, but need other?s help.
I also find it sadly ironic Trump can get defenseless families in cages on the boarder, but can?t be bothered enough to deal with escaped ISIS prisoners that only escaped because of the half hazard manor this withdrawal has been.
Domestic Issues
The Assault Weapons ban.
Its seemed pretty split with mandatory confiscation and voluntary buy back, and it was ugly. It didn?t seem clear on how it was going to be enforced.
It was an emotional issiue for many who have either been comforting civilian or police families that had loved ones killed with one of these, or as in the case of Texas, the Latin comunites worried a massacure could happen to them from Trump?s racist rhetoric, with at least one of the presidential hopefuls mentioning a friend that he grew up with in their home neighborhood was killed by an assult weapon.
The biggest argument againts the mandatory came from Julian Castro after Anderso Cooper asked him about preventing handguns from getting out more as they cause the majority of deaths. Besides how illdefined the methods and definitions are, and to quote him ?if you are not going door to door [to confiscate the guns] its not mandatory.? Castro also mentioned the neighborhood he grew up and the fear for his life as gunshots were a common background noise. He also remembered neighborhoods like his ?were not looking for another reason for police to come banging on the door.?
This makes a good point as this will inevitably be targeted on the minorities. I am going to throw in an example here, most of the stringent gun laws in California: a lot of them were put in by NRA member Ronald Reagan as a targeted policy against the NRA, which may have been a crippling factor in their eventual fall. Who?s to say this won?t happen again. If not as an official policy, as one by a bunch of racist bullies hiding behind a badge. I have too many family members in uniform not to have love and respect for law enforcement, but there are too many people that should never have been allowed to be cops for this reason.
Castro also added that police violence was gun violence as well, and used an example that will hit us gamers hard. Two days prior to the debate in Fort Worth, a law enforcement officer showed up at the doorstep of Atatiana Jefferson at 2 in the morning while she was playing videogames with her nephiew. The officer didn?t announce himself and just shot and killed her through her window. Castro is afraid, and justifiably so, many would take this as an excuse to commit more acts that shame the badge.
Opioid Epidemic
The fist Question on this was brought up by a teacher, and that was how to deal with it in the rural areas where access to both jobs and rehabilitation are in short supply.
Amy Klobuchar wants to make the pharmaceuticals that got this plague going in the first place to pay for it. It?s a 2 cent tax but it would pay for these much needed aids.
Tom Stayer, the billionair of the group, wants to make it harder for these corporations to vote, to stop treating them like people when it comes to voting.
Yang and O?Rourke wants to decriminalize small amounts of opioids and to focus more treating these people of their disease than throwing them in a jail cell.
When senator Kamala Harris and Castro think the corporations should be treated as criminals, with calling them large scale dope dealers (a fair statement all things considered). SO, they need jail time. We need to hold them accountable.
Pundent's Health:
Well, we have a bunch of old people here, so we had people defending their health.
Biden used his experience, and will be releasing both his tax and health information that is needed.
Sanders invited people to join him at a rally he is going to when asked about his heart attack,
Warren, who at 71 could be the oldest first term elected president, said she is going to work twice as hard as her colleagues and rambled a bit.
Gabbard at age 38, the youngest hopeful of the group, was asked if age should be a factor in this at all. She said that why are only the three oldest ones being asked about their health as she maybe younger than them but she also kept in good health by her military training regiment. She rather ask who is fit, in general, to be commander in chief, and said she has experience in a varieties of areas, including areas that would help her in her office.
Next questions: Should big tech companies be broken up.
When asked this of Yang, it won?t solve the issiue. More competition won?t be a solution (and used the Bing search engine as an example?no one is using it for a reason). It also won?t stop the increased depression and anxiety that is occurring with increased social media usage, which as a parent scares him. We need a new 21st century solution not a 20th century one he says. He also wants them to hold them accountable for holding our data.
Warren and Booker say breaking up the monopolies have to happen.
Stayer focused more on Trump and proving he was the better businessman and soon to be better president.
O?Rourke doesn?t think it?s a President?s job to say which ones need or need not be split. Protect your privacy, hold them accountable, treat these publishers as content as the rouges they are but its not a president?s job to split them.
Sanders wants a president that will get an attorney general with the balls to fight these monopolies.
Harris wants to shut down Trump?s tritter account. She also got into a fight with Warren that went nowhere on semantics.
Women?s reproductive health
Harris and Klobucha want Row v Way to be a national law and fight laws that would prevent woemen from having woman a choice in the manners of their body and reproductive rights.
Booker added that codifying Row v Way would help people that are poor as much of this
Gabbard quoted Hillary Clinton in saying Abortions should be Safe, Legal, and rare (the one thing she agrees with Clinton). Its one of the most serious decisions a woman can make in her life. She believes there are restrictions, such as the third trimester abortions emergencies only (life of the mother at risk).
Biden says if the court denied Row v Way, he wouldn?t support it. He would support privacy, which a woman?s right to choose is based upon.
Buttigieg wants reforms that will try to make choosing the next Supreme court judge that wasn?t an apocalyptic political fire fight.
Castro would like term limits or cycling out judges
After some political dick measuring,
Final Question:
After Ellen DeGeneres defended her friendship With W. Bush, each candidate was to say a friendship everyone would find surprising. I was glad to see they could quickly come up with names and excamples.
Overall I like Yang the best, he seems to make the most sense to me.
I think Biden has the strongest chance though of winning this.
