* That was supposed to say “‘Twas ever THUS,” not “this.”

Anyway.

no worries, same difference, made sense always

Friday, February 21

Poll
Nevada Democratic Presidential Caucus KLAS-TV/Emerson

Results
Sanders 30, Biden 16, Buttigieg 17, Warren 12, Steyer 10, Klobuchar 11, Gabbard 2

Spread
Sanders +13

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but see (day after debate) a delegate-rich state


Thursday, February 20

Florida Democratic Presidential Primary
St. Pete Polls

Biden 27, Bloomberg 32, Sanders 11, Warren 5, Klobuchar 7, Buttigieg 8, Steyer 2, Gabbard

Bloomberg
+5

The only one doing any lecturing was Bernie Sanders (3 mansions & multi-million dollar bank accounts) Wednesday night about the EVILS OF CAPITALISM and it was directed at those who identify as and vote Democrat.

Overall, the Democratic debaters sounded incoherent except when discussing SOCIALISTS POLICIES that in reality, only benefit other ELITIST like themselves!

The Bloomberg voters have been seeing in the never ending onslaught of commercials WAS NOT the Bloomberg the Democratic audience saw at the debate Wednesday night. They saw someone who was woefully unprepared and out of touch!

Democratic strategists: Paul Begala “This was a gift to Bernie Sanders, a rough night for Bloomberg. Elizabeth Warren gutted him like a flounder on Long Island Sound.”

Why did the debaters waste so much time and effort attacking someone who wasn’t on the ballot in Nevada......or South Carolina?

Why couldn’t the Democratic debaters do something (anything) to keep Bernie Sanders from winning Nevada??

You’re a —SOCIALIST
You’re a —COMMUNISTS

That’s the best the debaters could do? What kind of strategy is this??

Why didn’t anyone attack the unsustainable policies of Bernie Sanders? “Medicare For All” along with the rest of Bernie’s delusional proposals......that would consume more than 120% of the gross national product of our nation. No challenge about how this would ever be paid for without bankrupting our nation......yet the debaters allowed Bernie to escape unscathed?

This Wasn’t A Joke


Bloomberg spent more to reach Nevada than Donald Trump did to win 2016

Bloomberg will spend more money between now and SuperTuesday than the rest of the debaters combined between now and the Democratic Convention in July.

Here's those "3 mansions" he's talking about

Sanders wins Nevada, and it's looking like a landslide.

im only seeing 10% results and wow!

Candidate Votes CCD* CCD Pct. Del.
Bernie Sanders ... 6,084 ... 280... 44.7% —
Joe Biden ... 2,709 ... 122 .... 19.5 ... —
Pete Buttigieg ... 2,463 ... 98 ... 15.6 ... —
Elizabeth Warren ... 1,589 ... 74 ... 11.8 ... —
Amy Klobuchar ... 1,079 ... 27 ... 4.3 ... —
Show more candidates
Total CCD from fewer than 10% of precincts 627
* County convention delegates (CCD) are the current number of county delegates each candidate will get at the state convention, which determines the number of pledged national delegates each candidate receives.

How the is Elizabeth Warren consistently in fourth place behind Biden and even Buttigieg? Buttigieg, seriously?

bernie has most of her voters? i mean they share the same issues.

she’s scoring consistently a 12% everywhere

now here’s the revelation: it looks like in nevada, with its greater minority component, progressives are grabbing a larger portion of the electorate

in nh+iowa, which is mostly white voters, moderates were beating progressives by a small margin. the numbers are in the previous page.

in nevada bernie blew up not by taking warren votes—but by reducing the moderate vote and expanding progressives overall.

which is frankly impressive.

He is appealing to sections of the democratic base who have felt taken for granted by the party. He's also tried to bring new voters into the fold and try to bring people who had fallen out of favour with the political system a reason to come back in.

He took a gamble looking for pockets of voters who are ignored and clearly it's going to pay off. It's evident considering this is the result once we moved on from the first two white states. Hyped!!

^^apparently enough disenfranchised voters to overcome the union’s objections, yeah.

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as for the horse race:

steyer is beginning to register a pulse. he’s all about global warming, but not sure where to add his total (moderate or progressive?). i have very bland memories of the guy. did not expect him to still be here.

klobuchar tanking, and her campaign apparently just arrived to south carolina, which does not bode well for her. she might be out soon.

also very curious to find out what happens to bernie in sc where biden claims to have a firewall. not sure it’s a real wall. we’ll see after this...

Biden has been in South Carolina saying lies about how he was involved in the civil rights movement and was arrested in South Africa during apartheid. It will catch up to him. After all, it was his downfall in '88.

uncle joe might end up losing but i really don’t want to fling shit onto other democrats

But it's not right that he's taking credit for racial justice movements that he had nothing to do with. He should be called out on it. It's something black voters should be aware of.

since the boy scout is trailing on his tail and wants the moderate vote i’m sure he’ll have no qualms doing the deed the same way he destroyed amy

It wouldn't work coming from Pete considering black people couldn't give two shits about him

Why would Joe Biden say his dead son was the Attorney General of the United States?





Just a friendly reminder that Buttigieg split Iowa with Bernie and Bernie edged him out in New Hampshire.

These are the only two Democratic candidates to “win” anything......that’s it!!!

Elizabeth Warren hasn’t been a factor!

we’ll see how it plays out. i’ll support whoever is the nominee. if they want to cut each other up, it’s up to them.

and sanders seems to be closing on biden in the south carolina polls. a lot is going to be riding on next week’s debates.

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eta: looking at nevada entrance polls, bernie took 51% of the latino vote without having to pander to cultural stereotypes lololol. support by age group drops steadily with oder voters: 65% for 17-29, 50% 30-44, 27% 45-64.... 11% with 65+ (lol boomers)

Happy Birthday Robert!

why does beauregard keep spamming this thread?

gross

you got drunk in the golden toilet. understood it the first time, still gross.

Happy birthday and all that but by any definition I've read, at 62, you're a boomer, not a Gen-Xer.

Probably because the board started collectively ignoring the Trump thread. He went where the action was.

lol he should continue to talk to himself elsewhere

ANYWAY

here’s an article that sez bernie is not so scary

https://www.vox.com/2020/2/22/211489...-establishment

and yeah it even mentions the aggro supporters

eg: “ Some of the anti-Sanders sentiment is driven by pique at his followers’ most obnoxious behavior. But it would be better to bring these voters into the tent than leave them outside attacking inward.“

lmfao. a but perverse, like submitting to blackmail. but ok, there are other areas that make good sense, e.g. his long career showing other sides to him than just “fiery revolutionary.”

Perhaps his supporters being on the outside in the first place motivates them to attack inward. I will be very curious when he wins who in the media and the party will buckle and get in line and who will lead some sort of hopeless Never Bernie stance. As I recall, most Never Trumpers either flipped or became castigated by the Republicans.

perhaps but it would be awesome if they cooled it some. then again maybe it’s a good cop/bad cop strategy.

either way the repukes are nobody to emulate. we’re trying to get away from all that. let’s not all become beauregards in charlottesvilles.

anyway i’m a lot less scared of bernie than i was... oh... a couple of weeks ago?

the electability argument is turning out to be more speculative then empirical. i mean everyone can spin but the numbers appear real.

if he can bring a coalition of disenfranchised voters across the spectrum that makes up for the inevitable loss of independent voters, then it could be historical.

please don’t tell me “it will happen” because i’m not a man of faith. i need to see proofs and empirical signs.

From The New York Times:

Is anyone familiar with/have sympathy for Modern Monetary Theory (MMT)?

Because it tells you that Bernie would raise taxes on the rich for social equity reasons, but he won't actually need theirs or your tax money to fund his programs.

MMT also tells you why Trump's tax cuts and budget deficits have increased the health of the economy

right, the idea is that deficits don’t matter

but i am not sure how long that can go on

krugman isn’t too sure either...

it did not work for third world countries in the past century because the cost of servicing the debt was too high

although that was in foreign debt not local currency

maybe the usa has achieved virtual reality. or world monopoly.

but mmt sort of presumes no currency exchanges. no? which is not the case of our reality.

but still... im not an economist, and this shit is like quantum theory or something

Yes, this only applies to countries with sovereign currencies and doesn't apply to debts in foreign currency.

I won't taken over the whole thread, but MMT tells us a number of things.

1) The US govt creates the US dollar when it spends or credits banks. It doesn't need tax money whatsoever to undertake any project or buy anything for sale in US dollars.
2) Taxes are still important for equality and to prevent inflation via excessive spending causing resources to run short. However there is no indication that this is close to happening.
3) Fiscal surpluses or deficits are meaningless. What matters is whether the economy is being fully employed or not, and that likely involves a greater amount of government involvement in the economy.
4) As it presently sits, a New Deal-esque job guarantee and health program would improve the US economy, as long term austerity has left the economy under utilised. There is 'fiscal space' for more government spending. This is the same reason Trump's tax cuts and deficit spending have boosted the economy: there is room to grow and Trump's spending facilitated it.
5) Therefore, Bernie could pay for his plans in the same way any war is paid for... The government simply credits the accounts and creates the dollars. Then, if and only if inflation begins to rise due to the higher amount of economic activity, taxes could be raised down the line. Bernie's taxes on the rich would likely already offset any inflation risks anyway.

This diverges significantly from our mainstream understanding of economics and I understand any skepticism. Stephanie Kelton (former chief economist of the U.S. Senate Budget Committee) and Bill Mitchell (Australian economist and professor) are two people to look up if anyone is interested.

Kelton on CNBC giving a good overview https://youtu.be/7cho7naef_k

Mitchell going into a bit more detail. Full lectures of his are available online https://youtu.be/YnyDRwSqp2E

how does the mmt explain the weimar republic?

Bill Mitchell discusses Weimar and Zimbabwe far better than I could.

http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=3773

In short, MMT says runaway inflation will occur when the productive capacity of the economy reaches it's limit. Both cases have unique historical reasons for reaching this ceiling: reparations and politics in the case of Weimar, and Mugabe's poorly managed land reforms in the case of Zimbabwe.

Contrast that with Japan, which has run fiscal deficits almost consistently for 30 years and has become a world power (aside from the brief periods of budget surplus, which were quickly followed by recession/downturn)

just read the naked capitalism article on zimbabwe + weimar citing foreign currency debt + lost productivity

this one: https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2010...inflation.html

im trying to go to sleep (and failing) so i hope you stick around a bit in this thread


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the usa also has had recessions that follow surpluses

ok let me look at that link you posted

Just finished work here in Aus, so happy and ready to answer any questions haha.

The takeaway message I suppose is that the Weimar and Zimbabwe experiences are historically contingent, and little to do with a stereotype of 'money printing', which is wielded by fiscal conservatives to pursue a 'small govt' agenda imo

100% re: recessions. Australia had consecutive surpluses in the 1990s, where the economy was propped up by growing household debt and the mining industry. We didnt have a recession however have, according to some measures, the 2nd highest household debt:GDP ratio in the world as a result. If the government won't spend, the private sector has to go into debt in order to meet costs

right, austrians (the school, not you) argue that the money supply alone brings inflation

this is something else

i just read half of that link you posted and it blew my mind a little. his axioms sort of turned my mind inside out.

however i am out of gas for charts and case studies and will have to finish tomorrow hahaha. im sorry, 11pm here and im up at 5.... ooooof... sleep is a deficit that matters :D

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oh! australia not austria! see, i need sleep lol

No worries mate! Haha

Yes, it's as close as you can get to a revolution in economics, and is head spinning as a result. As you can tell, I'm sold... But yeah hence why I'm understanding of skepticism

But this is why I'm not just a supporter of Bernie (not that I can vote), but also think he can pull of his plans and change the economic paradigm along the way. Then I hope the neoliberal hacks who run my country can't help but take notice

Deficits do matter. Should be used freely when the economy is sour, but only to increase demand (no tax cuts for the richies)

Read a little of that Mitchell screed. He’s a hack. Very, very wrong on what unemployment means..