This must be that “common sense gun control” I’ve been hearing so much about. Idiots. And they wonder why gun owners don’t trust them to be reasonable and contribute to groups like the NRA.
Don't worry, certain members of the board will arrive soon to start firing off chaff to protect the Democrats and explain this to us. Between this and doubling down on stupid with a Green New Deal, their majority may be short-lived. I would think they would take advantage of having an enemy in control, making mistakes and not interrupt them. Apparently they want to make their own mistakes on par or larger than those of the opposition.
The alternative to a Green New Deal is that we just slap crippling taxes on oil, gas, coal, and various types of agriculture and then tell all the people who work in those fields to go fuck themselves. The biggest beneficiaries of any Green New Deal will be blue collar workers in red states.
In what world are those the two choices? Neither one fixes anything. Taxing energy to the point people start burning firewood to stay warm doesn't sound as though it will shrink carbon emissions.
I see they've redefined their definition of assault weapon from 2 offensive characteristics to 1. Give it time, it'll be revised again to any rifle that can accept a detachable magazine, period.
Yeah but haven’t you heard? The Earth is going to uninhabitable starting tomorrow morning. Economics be damned.
Taxing something generally leads to less of it. Taxing something to an extremely high degree can make it not worth it entirely. But this is a scorched earth approach, and the Green New Deal seeks to ameliorate the pain of such a process and ensure that people aren't as you say, so desperate that they're struggling to stay warm. The goal is to transition from a fossil fuel based economy to a renewables based economy while keeping the jarring impact of such a change from affecting any one group disproportionately or unfairly.
Are small caliber, concealable hand guns still not the OVERWHELMING majority of firearms used in violent crime? I always thought snub-nose pistols, glocks and tec-9’s to be the REAL weapons of mass destruction. They need to vilify the violence, not the gun. Banning them in the USA is putting toothpaste back in the tube, and citizens won’t have it.
You're both right, and you're both wrong. Let's not be stupid and treat climate modelling like it's some yes/no simple thing... you're smarter than that. Some of the largest supercomputers in the world are dedicated to climate modelling, and there are some parts that they get bang on, and other parts that fall off over time. If you want to talk specific use cases and scenarios, fine... but don't be intellectually lazy just to try and back up "your side" of the point you're trying to make.
Fine, I amend my statement to "They can model climate well enough to make meaningful policy recommendations and are just as likely to underestimate the damage as overestimate it."
I fully agree that a number of the more popular US energy/climate policies are archaic. The mere fact that "clean coal" is still a thing is mind boggling, and there's a reason that it's being laughed at during global conferences. That being said, I personally don't think excessive taxation is the way to go... it's not like it's the prime motivator for conversion from gas to electric cars (insane gas taxes), or drinking. I'd rather see policies that motivate people and companies to adopt new and greener tech than beat them into submission or restrict them. Carbon Taxes seem to me something that just gets passed on down to the consumer and becomes just another cost of doing business. I'm no expert, for sure, so if anyone has any intro to how carbon taxes, etc, are successful, I'd love to see it.
My point was that a blunt carbon tax is the alternative to a more nuanced shepherded approach. A carbon tax would be effective, but brutal, because it would just jack the prices up on everything carbon related and let the chips fall where they may. Those chips would likely fall in the form of sudden unemployment, huge strains on family budgets, and grinding halts to certain industries. The Green New Deal is supposed to be an alternative to that, which would take into account the economy as its structured currently and devise a path toward the structure we want it to have, providing support for particularly tough transitions.
I still disagree. While I am with Nett, this is and has always been a play for more tax dollars and more control, it's still a farce. The model has not come close to predicting their promised outcomes and while the climate is changing it continues to appear that carbon plays a smaller role than originally thought, yet they continue to harp on it because it is easy to measure and therefore tax it's output. This is just the ends justify the means playbook. Look, my wife and I are budgeting a solar array right now and also taking a hard look at buying a Rivian when they come out in two years. I have no problems with renewables on a personal level. The problem I have had and continue to have is that they still do not scale and won't scale for quite some time to come. Over-investment in them is still, as a society, a mistake at this point. I brought the Green New Deal up not because of the energy component but because of all of the other bullshit in it - while still not fully defined, sounds like something I will not go for. That is of course beyond the fact that I don't support further taxes of any kind, further centralized control of any kind or larger government of any kind. When your bill includes language stating that you will guarantee jobs with liveable wages for everyone, tuition-free college, provide single payer healthcare and then go deep down the rabbit hole with racial/gender/etc-based justice without further definition all without any particulars of how it's paid for..........Well, let's just say you can count me out. If this is what people want, why not move to Europe where they have this already?
Its quite hit and miss. The most direct miss is that yeah, many of the taxes on consumer goods (plastics) and fuels (petroleum, refined oil, etc.) get put back on consumers. Another point is that companies that mine and process the raw materials are barely incentivized to not do so by carbon taxes. Those raw materials are just resold to China and Southeast Asia where the price per unit is far more beneficial to them and their customers (usually the governments). This has a global economic impact, not just a local (national) one. Australia had to kill its carbon taxes because the farmers there couldnt compete with Canadian agriculture. Now you could tax corporations directly, but then you just off-set the cost to consumers again. The gap between levying the tax on the corps and those corps refitting manufacturing processes and infrastructure to "green" would take years. The gap is where the largest economic offset would be. The current avg. gas price in the US is about $2.25/gallon. Having that price double, triple or quadruple for years is a very hard sell. That being said, there is a good deal of evidence that cap-and-trade works and that a revenue-neutral plan, at least in some way, does seem beneficial. There has also been enormous milestones in the efficiency, safety and carbon output of shale oil production over the last 5 years. This has caused a big reduction in the oil tankers (the largest single polluters) transporting fuel to the US, as well as the other means of distribution. Creating incentives for carbon reducers, green energy suppliers and other producers seems like the best path forward with a measured, incremental increase on carbon production along with punishment/sanctions for policy abusers.
So, this is kind of funny in a sad way. Imagine being invited to the White House, and getting fast food on silver platters: Spoiler You gotta hope it's because of the government shutdown, no? Still, lighting the candles is a nice touch...