The Atlantic: How Democrats Lost Their Way on Immigration
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Beet
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« Reply #50 on: June 22, 2017, 09:27:16 PM »

I'd venture a guess that the vast majority of people wish poverty didn't exist, but the real issue is how to address it and how much of our resources to devote to fixing it. Given the way the world is, there has to be limits. Further, it's not even like the entire country wants to fix everyone else's problems. Sure, you can disagree with them, but you must strike a balance. You can't just ignore their wishes entirely. It is their country too, and those that wish for America to play a limited role are no small bunch.

It's one thing to deport those here already and another to further lock down the borders and prevent a situation in the future where we have another 10 - 12 million undocumented immigrants. The idea that that we can have some sort of border security, but then say, "well, if they manage to sneak in, they can stay" seems kind of ridiculous. Give the people already here at this current point in time citizenship, and work to prevent a similar situation in the future.

It honestly perplexes me how this isn't the viewpoint of 90% of people.

It is the viewpoint of 90% of people...

Yeah, I agree with this 100%.
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Famous Mortimer
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« Reply #51 on: June 23, 2017, 01:24:29 AM »

If Democrats moved sharply to the right on immigration, as requested by Beinart, and maintained their current stance on economic issues, I'd probably stop voting. Why would I vote for a hawkish, neo-liberal party that also panders to the racist right on immigration? I could not bring myself to vote for CEOs who talked about "controlling our borders", I'd rather die than do something so undignified.

Beinart supported the War in Iraq. I'd suggest that his ability to prognosticate is very limited and that his intellectual capabilities aren't very impressive either or, worse, he's very intellectual dishonest. I'm far from an expert on the economics of immigration - I'm barely a dilettante - but many of his statements are opinion posing as fact or conventional wisdom. Many labor economists would dispute his claims about the affects of immigration on the wages of the low-skilled/native-born - the conventional wisdom that Beinart portrays simply isn't present and quoting Krugman - a trade specialist - and Borjas - a very controversial figure to say the least - does not lend much credence to his claims.

It's fine for Beinart to inveigh against the accepted wisdom within the professional class in the US that immigration is good, beautiful and so on but he'd be better off making the case that we simply aren't honest enough about the difficulties associated with diversity and tolerance rather than arguing that immigrants strain the welfare state - they don't, that's nonsense - or that low-skill immigrants saddle the economy - has he looked at the manner in which housing prices are skyrocketing and the problems facing farmers in California? Immigration generates tremendous economic benefits. This is inarguable, it is settled science, it is a fact comprehensible by 7 year olds etc. The question is how we use these benefits; we have failed miserably to put them to good use but this is not an argument against immigration, it is an argument against the failed centrist dickheads who control the Democratic Party and the reactionary troglodytes on the right.

Immigrant led families absolutely strain the welfare system. The claim that they don't is based on the fact that children of immigrant led families are often citizens but they wouldn't be citizens if their parents weren't allowed to immigrate either legally or illegally in the first place.

Also, why are you bringing up the housing crisis? That's counter intuitive. There's a housing crisis because of immigration. If there were less people, the price of housing would go down. That's not even economics, that's just basic math.
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omegascarlet
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« Reply #52 on: June 23, 2017, 10:45:14 AM »

Mortimer's got a point though. You know how many DEMOCRATS I'm friends with who have voiced frustrations in casual conversations about Democrats being ridiculously open border and anti-deportation?

Between the corporate lobbying, the portion of the base that wants basically no deportations aside from felons (??) and the party's perceived need to pander to Hispanic voters, it is really a perfect storm for them. I think Democrats could suffer little to no electoral impact by being somewhat less "generous" towards immigrants, but they won't do that for the reasons^ stated above.

Politically, it's a tough line to walk. You don't want to be seen as a party who seems to care more about foreigners than Americans. Having your presidential candidates basically promise not to deport anyone but violent criminals doesn't help that.

Oh I agree. Yet half the Democratic Party disagrees with their own messaging, but the party peaders are afraid of offending people who probably won't vote for them anyway. If they were to take the sane stance on immigration, they'd probably get all those Obama voters back, but whatever. I guess you're automatically a racist if you support any form of deportations

It's less that immigration reform helps politically and more that it's morally wrong to leave people to struggle in hopeless poverty, especially when the economic growth means that immigrants makes feeding everyone easisr. What justification is there for deporting innocent people?

Well for starters, simply granting blank amnesty gives employers an incentive to underpay

Allow undocumented immigrants to sue and make the penalties for underpaying severe.
If Democrats moved sharply to the right on immigration, as requested by Beinart, and maintained their current stance on economic issues, I'd probably stop voting. Why would I vote for a hawkish, neo-liberal party that also panders to the racist right on immigration? I could not bring myself to vote for CEOs who talked about "controlling our borders", I'd rather die than do something so undignified.

Beinart supported the War in Iraq. I'd suggest that his ability to prognosticate is very limited and that his intellectual capabilities aren't very impressive either or, worse, he's very intellectual dishonest. I'm far from an expert on the economics of immigration - I'm barely a dilettante - but many of his statements are opinion posing as fact or conventional wisdom. Many labor economists would dispute his claims about the affects of immigration on the wages of the low-skilled/native-born - the conventional wisdom that Beinart portrays simply isn't present and quoting Krugman - a trade specialist - and Borjas - a very controversial figure to say the least - does not lend much credence to his claims.

It's fine for Beinart to inveigh against the accepted wisdom within the professional class in the US that immigration is good, beautiful and so on but he'd be better off making the case that we simply aren't honest enough about the difficulties associated with diversity and tolerance rather than arguing that immigrants strain the welfare state - they don't, that's nonsense - or that low-skill immigrants saddle the economy - has he looked at the manner in which housing prices are skyrocketing and the problems facing farmers in California? Immigration generates tremendous economic benefits. This is inarguable, it is settled science, it is a fact comprehensible by 7 year olds etc. The question is how we use these benefits; we have failed miserably to put them to good use but this is not an argument against immigration, it is an argument against the failed centrist dickheads who control the Democratic Party and the reactionary troglodytes on the right.

Immigrant led families absolutely strain the welfare system. The claim that they don't is based on the fact that children of immigrant led families are often citizens but they wouldn't be citizens if their parents weren't allowed to immigrate either legally or illegally in the first place.

Also, why are you bringing up the housing crisis? That's counter intuitive. There's a housing crisis because of immigration. If there were less people, the price of housing would go down. That's not even economics, that's just basic math.

There would be less people to build houses as well. Immigrant families still pay taxes, and don't get much in the way of benefits.

 
Mortimer's got a point though. You know how many DEMOCRATS I'm friends with who have voiced frustrations in casual conversations about Democrats being ridiculously open border and anti-deportation?

Between the corporate lobbying, the portion of the base that wants basically no deportations aside from felons (??) and the party's perceived need to pander to Hispanic voters, it is really a perfect storm for them. I think Democrats could suffer little to no electoral impact by being somewhat less "generous" towards immigrants, but they won't do that for the reasons^ stated above.

Politically, it's a tough line to walk. You don't want to be seen as a party who seems to care more about foreigners than Americans. Having your presidential candidates basically promise not to deport anyone but violent criminals doesn't help that.

Oh I agree. Yet half the Democratic Party disagrees with their own messaging, but the party peaders are afraid of offending people who probably won't vote for them anyway. If they were to take the sane stance on immigration, they'd probably get all those Obama voters back, but whatever. I guess you're automatically a racist if you support any form of deportations

It's less that immigration reform helps politically and more that it's morally wrong to leave people to struggle in hopeless poverty, especially when the economic growth means that immigrants makes feeding everyone easisr. What justification is there for deporting innocent people?

You say it's morally wrong to let Mexicans live in poverty in their own country, so there's a moral imperative to let them come to our country so they can live in slightly less poverty.

Okay.

Why doesn't that apply to the whole world? Do you think anyone should be able to immigrate to the United States as long as they're poor?

Where do you draw the line?

People immigrated to the US because there were jobs. Mexican immigration has been going down for a long time. Immigration had been shown to have long term benefits.

http://www.budgetmodel.wharton.upenn.edu/issues/2016/1/27/the-effects-of-immigration-on-the-united-states-economy
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Orser67
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« Reply #53 on: June 23, 2017, 12:59:39 PM »
« Edited: June 23, 2017, 01:01:49 PM by Orser67 »

Well, I don't consider Greenwald to be a liberal, but otherwise I agree with the general sentiment of the article.

To really address wealth inequality, we need to make labor scarcer, and we can only do that by reducing immigration.

I also think that immigration probably hurts liberalism, at least in the medium-term. It's not a coincidence that the two largest expansions of government (New Deal and Great Society) happened during the period when the foreign-born population was relatively low (between the Immigration Act of 1924 and the period when the effects of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 began to be felt). It's a lot harder to add new government programs when conservatives can portray them as hand-outs to non-whites.
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« Reply #54 on: June 23, 2017, 01:36:51 PM »

Mortimer's got a point though. You know how many DEMOCRATS I'm friends with who have voiced frustrations in casual conversations about Democrats being ridiculously open border and anti-deportation?

Between the corporate lobbying, the portion of the base that wants basically no deportations aside from felons (??) and the party's perceived need to pander to Hispanic voters, it is really a perfect storm for them. I think Democrats could suffer little to no electoral impact by being somewhat less "generous" towards immigrants, but they won't do that for the reasons^ stated above.

Politically, it's a tough line to walk. You don't want to be seen as a party who seems to care more about foreigners than Americans. Having your presidential candidates basically promise not to deport anyone but violent criminals doesn't help that.

Oh I agree. Yet half the Democratic Party disagrees with their own messaging, but the party peaders are afraid of offending people who probably won't vote for them anyway. If they were to take the sane stance on immigration, they'd probably get all those Obama voters back, but whatever. I guess you're automatically a racist if you support any form of deportations

It's less that immigration reform helps politically and more that it's morally wrong to leave people to struggle in hopeless poverty, especially when the economic growth means that immigrants makes feeding everyone easisr. What justification is there for deporting innocent people?

Well for starters, simply granting blank amnesty gives employers an incentive to underpay

Allow undocumented immigrants to sue and make the penalties for underpaying severe.
If Democrats moved sharply to the right on immigration, as requested by Beinart, and maintained their current stance on economic issues, I'd probably stop voting. Why would I vote for a hawkish, neo-liberal party that also panders to the racist right on immigration? I could not bring myself to vote for CEOs who talked about "controlling our borders", I'd rather die than do something so undignified.

Beinart supported the War in Iraq. I'd suggest that his ability to prognosticate is very limited and that his intellectual capabilities aren't very impressive either or, worse, he's very intellectual dishonest. I'm far from an expert on the economics of immigration - I'm barely a dilettante - but many of his statements are opinion posing as fact or conventional wisdom. Many labor economists would dispute his claims about the affects of immigration on the wages of the low-skilled/native-born - the conventional wisdom that Beinart portrays simply isn't present and quoting Krugman - a trade specialist - and Borjas - a very controversial figure to say the least - does not lend much credence to his claims.

It's fine for Beinart to inveigh against the accepted wisdom within the professional class in the US that immigration is good, beautiful and so on but he'd be better off making the case that we simply aren't honest enough about the difficulties associated with diversity and tolerance rather than arguing that immigrants strain the welfare state - they don't, that's nonsense - or that low-skill immigrants saddle the economy - has he looked at the manner in which housing prices are skyrocketing and the problems facing farmers in California? Immigration generates tremendous economic benefits. This is inarguable, it is settled science, it is a fact comprehensible by 7 year olds etc. The question is how we use these benefits; we have failed miserably to put them to good use but this is not an argument against immigration, it is an argument against the failed centrist dickheads who control the Democratic Party and the reactionary troglodytes on the right.

Immigrant led families absolutely strain the welfare system. The claim that they don't is based on the fact that children of immigrant led families are often citizens but they wouldn't be citizens if their parents weren't allowed to immigrate either legally or illegally in the first place.

Also, why are you bringing up the housing crisis? That's counter intuitive. There's a housing crisis because of immigration. If there were less people, the price of housing would go down. That's not even economics, that's just basic math.

There would be less people to build houses as well. Immigrant families still pay taxes, and don't get much in the way of benefits.

 
Mortimer's got a point though. You know how many DEMOCRATS I'm friends with who have voiced frustrations in casual conversations about Democrats being ridiculously open border and anti-deportation?

Between the corporate lobbying, the portion of the base that wants basically no deportations aside from felons (??) and the party's perceived need to pander to Hispanic voters, it is really a perfect storm for them. I think Democrats could suffer little to no electoral impact by being somewhat less "generous" towards immigrants, but they won't do that for the reasons^ stated above.

Politically, it's a tough line to walk. You don't want to be seen as a party who seems to care more about foreigners than Americans. Having your presidential candidates basically promise not to deport anyone but violent criminals doesn't help that.

Oh I agree. Yet half the Democratic Party disagrees with their own messaging, but the party peaders are afraid of offending people who probably won't vote for them anyway. If they were to take the sane stance on immigration, they'd probably get all those Obama voters back, but whatever. I guess you're automatically a racist if you support any form of deportations

It's less that immigration reform helps politically and more that it's morally wrong to leave people to struggle in hopeless poverty, especially when the economic growth means that immigrants makes feeding everyone easisr. What justification is there for deporting innocent people?

You say it's morally wrong to let Mexicans live in poverty in their own country, so there's a moral imperative to let them come to our country so they can live in slightly less poverty.

Okay.

Why doesn't that apply to the whole world? Do you think anyone should be able to immigrate to the United States as long as they're poor?

Where do you draw the line?

People immigrated to the US because there were jobs. Mexican immigration has been going down for a long time. Immigration had been shown to have long term benefits.

http://www.budgetmodel.wharton.upenn.edu/issues/2016/1/27/the-effects-of-immigration-on-the-united-states-economy

Illegal immigrants do not pay income taxes at all and even legal immigrants often avoid paying income tax because of the child tax credit. Immigrant, both legal and illegal, get more welfare than native born families, to say otherwise is simply a lie.
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Jeffster
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« Reply #55 on: June 23, 2017, 01:51:22 PM »


Allow undocumented immigrants to sue and make the penalties for underpaying severe.

There would be less people to build houses as well. Immigrant families still pay taxes, and don't get much in the way of benefits.


People immigrated to the US because there were jobs. Mexican immigration has been going down for a long time. Immigration had been shown to have long term benefits.

http://www.budgetmodel.wharton.upenn.edu/issues/2016/1/27/the-effects-of-immigration-on-the-united-states-economy

You are so out of touch on this issue. You are supposed to be the party of the working class and you are using arguments from the Wharton Business school. "Most academic research finds little long run effect on Americans’ wages." What did Keynes say about the long run again? That's right "In the long run we are all dead." So they admit that immigration does depress wages, but if you look over a long enough period of time, like say 30 or 40 years, then it all evens out so it's all good, right? Meanwhile, American families are suffering from depressed wages and lost jobs during their peak working years when they are trying to support families, but it's OK because we have the new Democratic party here to tell them that in the long run things are going to be to great.

Your party was involved in allowing a huge influx of immigrants and trade deals that took away jobs and depressed wages for American workers, and your solution is to continue the same policies, and just have those workers who lose out go on welfare. Most people don't want to live off of handouts, they want jobs, they want to feel like they are needed. What the hell happened to the party of FDR? What happened to big government works programs in times of high unemployment? Don't just blame Republicans, this is all on your party. You guys had compete control in 2009, with Congressional majorities not seen in a generation and you did crap with it. We should be subsidizing private businesses to take on long term unemployed, and creating temporary government jobs constructing and cleaning up public roads, buildings, parks, etc. We should also be paying to help retrain laid off workers. Again, don't just blame Republicans, you guys had the power and didn't do it.

Stop relying on the old talking point "America is a nation of immigrants" as a way to justify mass immigration now and forever. We've had periods where immigration was reduced and it worked out. The new arrivals became part of the melting pot, and we had the greatest expansion of the middle class in our nations history. Now the share of the US population that are immigrants is the highest it's been since the Gilded Age. It's no coincidence that the periods of high immigration overlap with the periods of high income inequality in US history. Also, we are at the point where unskilled labor is becoming less and less needed due to automation, so we should adjust our immigration policy to only bring in highly skilled immigrants in areas where there is an actual shortage. Let our own unskilled citizens have those few jobs that remain, and let them earn a decent wage doing them, instead of flooding the market with cheaper labor, all so the top 1% can extract bigger profits.

You guys also keep using talking points one would expect from a right wing business executive when you say they do the jobs Americans won't do. The reality is they do jobs at wages so low Americans won't do them, or can't afford to support a family doing them. You claim we wouldn't have enough construction workers if it weren't for illegal immigrants, when it was their presence that drove down wages and took away jobs in the industry, and forced Americans to look elsewhere for work with the hope they could find better paying jobs. If they weren't here then those jobs would pay a higher wage and more Americans would take them. So again, if your argument boils down to needing a permanent underclass of cheap exploitable labor to keep our country going, then you have no business calling yourself a party of the working class. Just admit you are either complicit in that exploitation or are useful idiots for the wealthy 1%.
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Virginiá
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« Reply #56 on: June 23, 2017, 02:27:11 PM »

... this is all on your party. You guys had compete control in 2009, with Congressional majorities not seen in a generation and you did crap with it.

Ah, the ol' "you controlled the federal govt for 2 years, so why didn't you fix everything?!" line. I swear, over the past 3 years, I've seen this brought up so many times in a complaint of why Democrats didn't fix [insert issue]. Collectively, it's like people are upset Democrats didn't fix every single issue there is with their 2 year trifecta, and far shorter Senate supermajority.

Republicans have controlled Congress for a majority of the time since 1994, and instead this is all on Democrats?
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Beet
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« Reply #57 on: June 23, 2017, 02:33:08 PM »

Exactly.. the Republicans controlled Congress for 18 of the last 22 years. As the legislative branch they are in charge of laws and appropriations.
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Jeffster
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« Reply #58 on: June 23, 2017, 02:38:55 PM »
« Edited: June 23, 2017, 02:46:39 PM by Jeffster »

... this is all on your party. You guys had compete control in 2009, with Congressional majorities not seen in a generation and you did crap with it.

Ah, the ol' "you controlled the federal govt for 2 years, so why didn't you fix everything?!" line. I swear, over the past 3 years, I've seen this brought up so many times in a complaint of why Democrats didn't fix [insert issue]. Collectively, it's like people are upset Democrats didn't fix every single issue there is with their 2 year trifecta, and far shorter Senate supermajority.

Republicans have controlled Congress for a majority of the time since 1994, and instead this is all on Democrats?

Most of the big programs and historic pieces of legislation we associate with the 60's occurred in 1965-66 when Democrats had huge majorities after the landslide in 1964. You have to use that brief period of big majorities in both houses to push through your policy wishlist, because it will be a long time before you get another opportunity. Reid should have nuked the filibuster on day 1, so they could have passed everything. The filibuster helps Republicans more than it helps Democrats, based on their government philosophy. Democrats didn't do that, and didn't push progressive legislation because they are just a neoliberal party disguising themselves as the party of the working class.
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« Reply #59 on: June 23, 2017, 02:42:02 PM »

And of course it's typical that you two would only pick one part of my comment and ignore the rest of my argument. What do you say about the fact that the share of our population that are immigrants is the highest it's been since the Gilded Age, and how both periods were marked by high income inequality? Your party claims to care about income inequality and wants to reduce it, well reducing immigration would help in that effort.
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KingSweden
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« Reply #60 on: June 23, 2017, 02:55:45 PM »

All things being equal, I think looking at how Canada approaches immigration and trying to understand why it seems to work well would strike me as the best approach
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« Reply #61 on: June 23, 2017, 02:58:28 PM »

Because I've already commented on what I've wanted to comment on earlier in this thread, Jeffster. I do not wish to engage everything, and your post was rather big. Nothing in it made me want to respond except that one little thing I picked out.

As for what you said - nuke the filibuster on day 1? The filibuster back then wasn't yet the problem it is viewed as today. Republicans massively amped their use of it in the following years so they could obstruct Democrats and turn Obama into a do-nothing president. Personally, I'd rather have a filibuster so long as it isn't abused. At that time, there wasn't really a good enough reason to kill it, imo. Of course it's obvious now, but hindsight is 20/20 as they say.

Also I think it's a little bit disingenuous to compare LBJ's big majorities to 2009-2011. First, LBJ actually got Republicans to support parts of his agenda. The parties were not so ideologically homogeneous back then, and things were far less polarized. Obama had to deal with an almost completely unified GOP front hellbent on denying him any wins, even if it hurt the country. Second, those LBJ 1965-1967 majorities were huge - much bigger than Obama's first Congress. He had wiggle room on various issues, especially when combined with a more cooperative GOP caucus.

Lastly, I do not think Democrats/Obama anticipated losing all that power so quickly. Losing 63 -/+ House seats in a single election is a pretty rare occurrence. I'd be willing to bet their actions would be much different if they could have seen what would happen in late 2010.
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« Reply #62 on: June 23, 2017, 03:08:10 PM »

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« Reply #63 on: June 23, 2017, 03:10:25 PM »
« Edited: June 23, 2017, 03:13:21 PM by Jeffster »

Because I've already commented on what I've wanted to comment on earlier in this thread, Jeffster. I do not wish to engage everything, and your post was rather big. Nothing in it made me want to respond except that one little thing I picked out.

As for what you said - nuke the filibuster on day 1? The filibuster back then wasn't yet the problem it is viewed as today. Republicans massively amped their use of it in the following years so they could obstruct Democrats and turn Obama into a do-nothing president. Personally, I'd rather have a filibuster so long as it isn't abused. At that time, there wasn't really a good enough reason to kill it, imo. Of course it's obvious now, but hindsight is 20/20 as they say.

Also I think it's a little bit disingenuous to compare LBJ's big majorities to 2009-2011. First, LBJ actually got Republicans to support parts of his agenda. The parties were not so ideologically homogeneous back then, and things were far less polarized. Obama had to deal with an almost completely unified GOP front hellbent on denying him any wins, even if it hurt the country. Second, those LBJ 1965-1967 majorities were huge - much bigger than Obama's first Congress. He had wiggle room on various issues, especially when combined with a more cooperative GOP caucus.

Lastly, I do not think Democrats/Obama anticipated losing all that power so quickly. Losing 63 -/+ House seats in a single election is a pretty rare occurrence. I'd be willing to bet their actions would be much different if they could have seen what would happen in late 2010.

You must not remember but the filibuster was already a nuisance in the 2007-2008 Congress. The nuclear option was originally brought up by Republicans in 2005 over judges, so the idea was already out there.



We have known since the 90's that the parties are now clearly divided over ideology compared to the 60's when there were still many northern liberal Republicans and southern conservative Democrats. So the Democrats should have expected not to get Republican support for their agenda once Obama took office.

The Democrats purposefully kept in the legislative filibuster because deep down most of them didn't really want to pass the progressive legislation they promised their voters. They could always use Republican obstruction as an excuse why they failed, and then ask to be re-elected so they can try again, promising next time they'll surely come through. It's so glaringly obvious it's just a big scam.
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« Reply #64 on: June 23, 2017, 03:19:56 PM »

It's fair to say the Democrats' record wasn't good in 2009. A lot of people have been saying for years they should have done more on the recession and mortgage crisis. Obama missed a huge opportunity to be an FDR-style figure. This isn't controversial on the left anymore.
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« Reply #65 on: June 23, 2017, 03:20:10 PM »
« Edited: June 23, 2017, 03:22:30 PM by Virginia »

You must not remember but the filibuster was already a nuisance in the 2007-2008 Congress. The nuclear option was originally brought up by Republicans in 2005 over judges, so the idea was already out there.

No, I didn't. But again, I have to say, eliminating it after a brief period of severe abuse* is still drastic. You're talking about throwing out a procedural tool that has been in place in some form for many generations. That is exactly the kind of bs I hate - changing the rules immediately when you find yourself thwarted. It's what I see Republicans doing anywhere they have power and want just a little bit more (see: North Carolina). And again, it's easy for people to be fed up now, but that is the result of over a decade of abuse.

* what you consider to be sufficiently abusive to justify gutting the filibuster is probably different than mine. The escalation since the 80s is a lot less important to me than the surge shown since Democrats took over in 2007.

The Democrats purposefully kept in the legislative filibuster because deep down most of them didn't really want to pass the progressive legislation they promised their voters. They could always use Republican obstruction as an excuse why they failed, and then ask to be re-elected so they can try again, promising next time they'll surely come through. It's so glaringly obvious it's just a big scam.

Ugh. Ok. I'm sure a few appreciated that outcome, but that sounds mostly like conspiracy talk that is favored among the left as a way to vent their frustration of the party not being sufficiently liberal.

I won't indulge that.
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« Reply #66 on: June 23, 2017, 03:40:45 PM »

You must not remember but the filibuster was already a nuisance in the 2007-2008 Congress. The nuclear option was originally brought up by Republicans in 2005 over judges, so the idea was already out there.

No, I didn't. But again, I have to say, eliminating it after a brief period of severe abuse* is still drastic. You're talking about throwing out a procedural tool that has been in place in some form for many generations. That is exactly the kind of bs I hate - changing the rules immediately when you find yourself thwarted. It's what I see Republicans doing anywhere they have power and want just a little bit more (see: North Carolina). And again, it's easy for people to be fed up now, but that is the result of over a decade of abuse.

* what you consider to be sufficiently abusive to justify gutting the filibuster is probably different than mine. The escalation since the 80s is a lot less important to me than the surge shown since Democrats took over in 2007.

The Democrats purposefully kept in the legislative filibuster because deep down most of them didn't really want to pass the progressive legislation they promised their voters. They could always use Republican obstruction as an excuse why they failed, and then ask to be re-elected so they can try again, promising next time they'll surely come through. It's so glaringly obvious it's just a big scam.

Ugh. Ok. I'm sure a few appreciated that outcome, but that sounds mostly like conspiracy talk that is favored among the left as a way to vent their frustration of the party not being sufficiently liberal.

I won't indulge that.

The current form of the filibuster goes back to Robert Byrd changing the rules in the 1975. Before that it took 2/3 to end debate and vote for a bill, but it also meant that no other legislation could move forward during a filibuster. Then they changed it 3/5 to end debate on a specific bill, but they would allow other pieces of legislation to be on the floor as well so it wouldn't shut down the whole Senate. By the time of the clear abuse of filibusters used in 2007-2008, Only 32 years had passed since the rules change, so it's not like it was a long held tradition. The filibuster from Mr. Smith goes to Washington was not how it was done anymore.

Democrats knew very well Republicans would use it on every piece of legislation, and since Franken wouldn't be seated for a while due to the lawsuit, and Specter didn't flip sides yet, they weren't going to have 60 votes from the start. And why would you hamstring yourself to a system that requires all 60 Democrats to agree and vote for the bill in the first place? You'd expect there to always be a few holdouts. Nuking the filibuster would have given them the room to pass all the stuff they promised their voters while still having a handful of Democrats in red states voting 'no'.
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dead0man
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« Reply #67 on: June 23, 2017, 07:10:26 PM »

All things being equal, I think looking at how Canada approaches immigration and trying to understand why it seems to work well would strike me as the best approach
they only let people in if they have needed skills or lots of money.
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Jeffster
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« Reply #68 on: June 23, 2017, 07:15:24 PM »
« Edited: June 23, 2017, 07:24:40 PM by Jeffster »

After looking up income inequality data and immigration data I simply could not find a chart with both sets of data put together to really see how they changed in relation to each other over time. So I had to use the raw data and put together my own chart.



http://imgur.com/a/YZdWq

While I do agree with Democrats over issues like tax rates and the decline in labor unions on their impact on income inequality, they simply refuse to bring up the issue of immigration on income inequality.

Edit: Is there a reason that imgur pictures don't show up?
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Virginiá
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« Reply #69 on: June 23, 2017, 07:19:07 PM »

Use tinypic.com or imgbb.com
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Shadows
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« Reply #70 on: June 24, 2017, 10:41:14 AM »

After looking up income inequality data and immigration data I simply could not find a chart with both sets of data put together to really see how they changed in relation to each other over time. So I had to use the raw data and put together my own chart.



http://imgur.com/a/YZdWq

While I do agree with Democrats over issues like tax rates and the decline in labor unions on their impact on income inequality, they simply refuse to bring up the issue of immigration on income inequality.

Edit: Is there a reason that imgur pictures don't show up?

Immigration & inequality data comparison has to one of the dumbest comparison ever. This is why people need to study Economics.

There are multiple reasons for Income inequality - All scientific & provem but the biggest is Fraudulent Trickle Down Economics. Apart from that the fall of the strength of union & thus bargaining power, NAFTA causing companies to relocate & using it as a bargaining chip for wage negotiation, the rise of emerging nations with lower wage level (which meant US can't export goods anymore) & rather would import cheaper goods or services & so on.

The biggest reason is obviously Trickle down economics which has caused lop-sided income generation.





Significant income has been created but it's distribution has been rather lopsided.
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RINO Tom
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« Reply #71 on: June 24, 2017, 10:45:58 AM »

Don't have much to add, but can we look at the effective top tax rate for those eras?  I'm pretty sure no one was paying 80% on the top whatever % of their money at any point in history.  During the 1950s, I am pretty sure the Eisenhower administration and Republicans in Congress jammed through additional tax loopholes and even lowered the rate, so the whole "let's take the rates back to where they were under Eisenhower!" has always rung hollow to me.
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Shadows
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« Reply #72 on: June 24, 2017, 11:01:09 AM »

My 2 cents of the topic -

Immigration's role in preventing a collapse of Medicare, SS & entire US economy - US has an ageing population. The number of people who are old vs in the working age is disproportionately higher & could cause a budgetary crisis. An influx of people in their working age paying taxes is what is supporting this system (many just pay taxes & never get anything in return). Without immigration, it would collapse.

Support for refugees - I am bit disappointed in the racist undertones. US has f***ed up countries, killed people mercilessly & has been helped by trade for many decades. US has an absolute responsibility for Syrian & Iraqi refugees. Syrian women are doing prostitution in Lebanon. What kind of a mom would send her child in a boat? These are desperate people trying to have a shot in life. Every reasonable country must share some burden.

Net positive effect of Immigration - Most major economic studies show Immigration is a strong positive on the US economy on the whole. A large share of Silicon Valley CEO's & Top Management people who handle businesses which employ 100's of 1000's, some of the innovative companies, many businesses are run by immigrants. Many of these are highly educated - Pay significantly more taxes than non-immigrants, commit less crime, create jobs or manage large enterprises & are multi-cultural. Are there some odd cases of wage under-cutting? Yes. But a significantly high share of these are highly intelligent, educated people who work their as* off, pay huge taxes, get 0 welfaree e & contribute more to the economy than native borns.

Huge shortage of skilled workers in US - A high school degree is no longer good enough to get a decent job anymore. There is a massive shortage of skilled workers & the average level of intellect is pretty low, look at the low level of intelligence in this forum.

The National Association for Business Economics' latest business conditions survey found that 35 percent of the 112 economists who participated reported their firms had seen shortages of skilled labor during the quarter ending in July. That compared with only 25 percent in the April survey and marked a sharp pick-up from 22 percent during the July quarter last year.

http://www.cnbc.com/2015/07/20/survey-shows-growing-us-shortage-of-skilled-labor.html

A lengthy list of lines of work that will show significant shortages includes occupational therapists, nurses, plant operators and machinists, and the states with the tightest labour markets include Texas and Colorado.


A whopping 61 percent of owners we surveyed said they’re experiencing extreme or moderate difficulty finding quality employees to expand their business. While the 4.4 percent unemployment rate is low, there are still many people who want to work but are not currently employed. This includes people who have lost a job, are re-entering the workforce or are new to the job market. A significant chunk of those individuals are older — with 1.3 million Americans age 55 and older looking for work but unable to find it, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics

https://www.ft.com/content/41978d46-05a7-11e6-a70d-4e39ac32c284

http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/economy-budget/335896-workers-wanted-skilled-labor-shortage-hinders-business

http://www.budgetmodel.wharton.upenn.edu/issues/2016/1/27/the-effects-of-immigration-on-the-united-states-economy

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-03-24/immigrants-are-making-the-u-s-economy-stronger
 t
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Shadows
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« Reply #73 on: June 24, 2017, 11:14:46 AM »

Don't have much to add, but can we look at the effective top tax rate for those eras?  I'm pretty sure no one was paying 80% on the top whatever % of their money at any point in history.  During the 1950s, I am pretty sure the Eisenhower administration and Republicans in Congress jammed through additional tax loopholes and even lowered the rate, so the whole "let's take the rates back to where they were under Eisenhower!" has always rung hollow to me.

Effective tax rates is not a good benchmark to judge income inequality & is mostly irrelevant. Effective tax rates of Top 1 or 2 % is a better indication maybe, but that kind of data is not available. Otherwise Effective is only an average & meaningless number for inequality.

For example - Corporate tax as a % of overall Federal revenue has fallen but payroll taxes has largely made up for it. Reagan for example increases Social Security tax, gas tax, cigarette tax etc & everyone paid for it including low income people while he cut taxes on high income people.


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TheDeadFlagBlues
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« Reply #74 on: June 24, 2017, 12:30:01 PM »

After looking up income inequality data and immigration data I simply could not find a chart with both sets of data put together to really see how they changed in relation to each other over time. So I had to use the raw data and put together my own chart.



http://imgur.com/a/YZdWq

While I do agree with Democrats over issues like tax rates and the decline in labor unions on their impact on income inequality, they simply refuse to bring up the issue of immigration on income inequality.

Edit: Is there a reason that imgur pictures don't show up?

http://www.tylervigen.com/spurious-correlations
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