volkris @volkris@qoto.org
I think the most pressing and fundamental problem of the day is that people lack a practically effective means of sorting out questions of fact in the larger world. We can hardly begin to discuss ways of addressing reality if we can't agree what reality even is, after all.
The institutions that have served this role in the past have dropped the ball, so the next best solution is talking to each other, particularly to those who disagree, to sort out conflicting claims.
Unfortunately, far too many actively oppose this, leaving all opposing claims untested. It's very regressive.
So that's my hobby, striving to understanding the arguments of all sides at least because it's interesting to see how mythologies are formed but also because maybe through that process we can all have our beliefs tested.
But if nothing else, social media platforms like this are chances to vent frustrations that on so many issues both sides are obviously wrong ;)
Joined Dec 2022
@IgnatiusJReilly is it Biden?
Because I was talking about Biden.
@alan but again I'm trying to highlight that it's not just about how much taxes are cut or how many new services are provided, It's about how my specific representative made either intelligent or bone-headed votes in his job to provide for those.
So often I hear friends of mine complaining about some governmental policy while at the same time they support and talk about voting for the representative who cast his vote for the thing that they are complaining about.
They should be kicking that guy to the curb. He voted wrong. He voted against the interests of his constituents. But, the friends will be so focused on the faction that they let him off the hook. He escapes accountability by hiding in faction.
We need to be promoting the idea of people looking at how their representatives actually vote, and then holding them accountable for it.
Too often the focus on faction lets representatives escape accountability as it is, and you're talking about making that even worse.
@paka yep, and I've faced such shortages.
@manton keep in mind that expansion of the court would exacerbate a lot of the things that people are complaining about these days.
You think it takes a long time to issue an opinion with only this number of justices? It would exponentially increase the workload as more are added, as they all have to send opinions back and forth to negotiate with each other over the opinions they are releasing.
@jacobhyphenated That's not true at all.
The executive branch is and has always been free to take Trump to trial under other legal theories.
That they chose this theory that will take time for the court to resolve falls entirely on them. They could have changed course at any point.
@bibliolater sure but that's what I'm trying to highlight: you say disastrous performance, but so many got exactly what they wanted, and really it's dealing with those people that is the crux of the issue.
We need to engage with these morons who want a WWE fight. Unless we realize how they operate we won't be able to fix this thing.
@paka You're still missing it: You're assuming there is bread in the first place.
You're talking about large amounts of cash taken out of a business making bread, but that assumes there is a business making bread.
What if there is no business making bread?
THAT'S crucial to consider. Because if no business is making bread, then there is no bread.
volkris
boosted
@bibliolater @politics not so fast: so many Trump supporters aren't really interested in the win as much as they are interested as the fight. They explicitly just want somebody to fight.
So not so much a disastrous performance for Trump, he was providing the fight that he's basically been tapped to provide.
I disagree because I consider critiques of private healthcare to be more honest.
People who promote universal healthcare sell this fiction of just putting money in and getting healthcare out, ignoring that there are real people involved in making that happen, and they do want to get paid for their efforts. They aren't simple cogs in the machine that turns money into healthcare.
People who are critical of private healthcare, at least they are living a little bit more in reality, talking about how real world people interact with real world money.
@urlyman Yeah it's a little complicated and academically it's pretty interesting how the district voting system in the US causes very different outcomes in the overall party system.
It's one of those cases where I quote economists that say there are no solutions, only different options with different trade-offs.
@olimould That's not it at all.
The right just wants somebody to troll, and they found a troll.
The left is just following tradition for the sake of tradition. They are looking to nominate the sitting president because that's just how things work, regardless of whiteness.
It has nothing to do with whiteness.
@Hyolobrika I don't think it's good that we talk about this in such politically misleading terminology.
When you tell people they have a right to healthcare, fine that's not a perfect statement, but more importantly, when they don't get the health care that they think they were promised, that's not just good, that's bad.
I think it's really important for politics to be honest because that's the only way for society to have honest discussions about the trade-offs and balances that they are looking to make.
It's not perfect being the enemy of the good. This is flat out bad.
@QasimRashid I completely disagree because for one thing quoting them both and then pointing out the truth raises one while warning about the other! It highlights that one is lying.
And second, debate moderators are there to moderate the debate, their job is not to fact check as that would involve them in the debate.
That's not their job. They would undermine their role to engage in the debate like a referee that chooses a side in a sports match.
@javawithjiva@mastodon.social The answer is that the members in the general public of the two major parties just don't really care about those priorities.
Mainstream Republicans consistently say they just want to fight. Like a WWE wrestling match. They don't even care about winning, honestly, they just want to fight. Okay.
Mainstream Democrats are following the tradition of nominating the sitting president. Why? Doesn't matter. That's just what they're doing.
Personally I'm not disappointed since this seemed to be the entirely predictable outcome from that situation in the country.
Either party could win the election by nominating someone else. That they have not really moved in that direction just shows that they're not really interested in winning. They have other priorities.
@MoiraEve@mastodon.world Well it's mathematical reality.
The program has a limited budget and so the independent bureaus that manage those programs cannot continue to write checks outside of their budgets.
Really the programs were founded on unsustainable plans. I guess the answer is to go back to the legislators decades ago who founded these unsustainable programs?
But that's just the theory. In theory they raise taxes sufficiently to pay people enough that they will jump up and fix patients, but in reality there are things like not enough doctors to fix the people, not enough doctors willing to accept that trade, etc.
There is no universal healthcare. Even if governments force doctors to operate at gunpoint, which to be clear I'm highlighting as the problematic thing, there will be a limited supply of doctors. It cannot be universal.
It's always going to be a negotiation, and the issue is how constraining that negotiation is on doctors, how much pressure we put on them to work for others when they don't want to.
In theory everything is wonderful and everybody gets fixed. Reality is much more harsh because it requires people to work to fix people.
@lisagetspolitik I mean, give us someone better than Biden to vote for and then he definitely won't.
So long as the Democratic party decides to put forward this idiot they roll the dice. The party is welcome to put forward someone actually worth voting for. It's up to them.
@Jgmeadows in general people calling other people fascist these days are just idiots.
Yes, it is sad that we have so many idiots.
I think the most pressing and fundamental problem of the day is that people lack a practically effective means of sorting out questions of fact in the larger world. We can hardly begin to discuss ways of addressing reality if we can't agree what reality even is, after all.
The institutions that have served this role in the past have dropped the ball, so the next best solution is talking to each other, particularly to those who disagree, to sort out conflicting claims.
Unfortunately, far too many actively oppose this, leaving all opposing claims untested. It's very regressive.
So that's my hobby, striving to understanding the arguments of all sides at least because it's interesting to see how mythologies are formed but also because maybe through that process we can all have our beliefs tested.
But if nothing else, social media platforms like this are chances to vent frustrations that on so many issues both sides are obviously wrong ;)
Joined Dec 2022
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