ComradeKayAdams

APOLOGIES TO EVERYONE for briefly hijacking the gun thread! I’m replying to posts that I forgot to address weeks ago: 1. Progressives love this country because it’s their home. It’s no more complicated than that. Calling people “America haters” if they disagree with your political opinions is childish and unproductive. Having said that, I can answer your question on a personal level: I like our popular culture, the melting pot nature of our demographics, our spirit of innovation and creativity, the geography, our Bill of Rights, and our federal system of checks and balances. 2. Progressives are ignorant on how the rest of the world works?? Progressive policies aren’t already implemented elsewhere?? Universal health care? Federally mandated living wages? Universal pre-k? Progressive tax codes? Community-owned grocery stores? Swiss non-interventionism? German labor movement? French energy infrastructure? Housing for the homeless in Finland? Drug war strategies in Portugal? Legal prostitution in the Netherlands? Social democracies and mixed economies in practically every major industrialized country in the Western Hemisphere??!! 3. While you seem quite confident in your own grasp of political issues, I vaguely recall a conversation of ours in the global warming thread last summer. I backed you into a debate corner where you admitted that you believe in a vast global conspiracy, involving everyone from climate scientists to the U.S. Navy, in which all the climate data is fabricated. Is my recollection correct? How did you think that conversation went for you?? How about replying to my post on the inflation topic (thread: “How much did you pay for gas and groceries today?,” top of page 15, June 10)? Share with the forum what you know on perhaps the most pressing political topic in the news these days. 4. Good for you for acknowledging the distinction between liberals and progressives! Most Americans don’t. This is a lot of material here…I’ll tackle as much as I can before my bedtime! 1. Definitions: I’ve been careful to use “classical liberalism” as a synonym for modern libertarianism and for advocacy of strict Constitutional constructionism. I don’t think I’ve been conflating classical liberalism with crony capitalism? The over-the-top extreme wealth disparities and wealth suppression naturally generated by economic libertarianism, however, do tend to corrode democracies so that they devolve into corporate oligarchies like the one in which we’re currently living. Classical liberalism always seems to lead to great social instability. Never mind modern (i.e. post-Age of Enlightenment/Industrial Revolution era) European history; the most prominent demonstration of this in American history was the economic volatility and strife of the Gilded Age that fueled Debs and the original American progressive movement of the early 1900’s. 2. Trust in Government: Classical liberals tend to play this game where they insist that government is hopelessly inefficient and incompetent, and then they proceed to elect politicians who do everything in their power to undermine said government services, thereby reinforcing their original point. Government is a necessity for a few vital goods and services: things like national defense, law and order, and firefighting. Progressives would add aspects of health care, education, and housing along with various market failure safeguards for labor exploitation and pollution and monopoly/oligopoly effects. Socialists would add at least a few more services, if not many more. I would hope everyone wants to work to keep government as streamlined and efficacious as possible with the minimum necessary safeguards, but I also don’t want to throw babies out with their bathwaters. As you probably figured, I’m not a fan of debates on negative rights vs. positive rights because it’s a totally meaningless distinction to me. 3. Perceived Failures of Progressivism: I’ve noticed how many Americans tend to blame progressives for government failures that are actually neoliberal in nature, not progressive...namely the economic ones. Remember how I argued that progressives don’t have much political power in the United States? We couldn’t even get a completely watered-down Build Back Better Act passed! The Biden administration has been neoliberal to the core since day one. But while I think our ideas are super awesome for the most part, some admittedly need to go back to the drawing board and/or need work on the messaging. I’ve already conceded some of the law-and-order issues to you. I won’t concede border control and economic protectionism to you because true progressivism isn’t about open borders and globalism; it’s about humane treatment of illegal immigrants and pro-worker policies. I can partly concede the “Cancel Student Debt” movement that you raised because that solution is WAY too simplistic. It ends up being unfair to many Americans who already paid off their college debt or who didn’t go to college, and it doesn’t address the root problems behind exploding college costs. From the perspective of macroeconomic growth, however, Millenial/Gen Z post-secondary educational debt is a gigantic drag on our economy. 4. Contemporary Failures of Classical Liberalism: I could go on and on about its flaws when it comes to solving modern macroeconomic problems, everything from fiscal policy to monetary policy. But in the interest of my waning time before bed, I’ll limit my complaining to the big one that is government spending (or rather, lack thereof) in the face of recessions. Let’s take the looming post-COVID recession as a case example. We know during the pandemic that the professional/managerial class (PMC) got wealthier and the working class got poorer. These are objective economic facts, colloquially known as the “Kay-shaped” recovery. Nevertheless, those who identify as classical liberals still argue that the rich are paying too much in taxes right now and the American social safety net is way too generous. The silliest ones even advocate for a flat tax. All of them would rather cool off inflation by having the Fed raise interest rates before ever entertaining the notion of raising taxes on the PMC. But raising interest rates will hit the working class disproportionately hard in the form of unemployment. The U.S. has a 70% consumer spending-based economy, but the very sizable working class won’t have the money to jumpstart it. And we know from recent history (going back to Reagan) that these prospective post-COVID tax cuts for the rich will just be redirected right into company stock buybacks and dividends, not investments in DOMESTIC jobs. 5. Future of Progressivism: There’s an ongoing civil war within the progressive movement between the social justice warrior coterie and the economic populist one. I think American progressivism has a bright future as long as the economic populists lead the conversations. The movement is doing extremely well with the under-40 crowd (demography is destiny, as they say!), but admittedly has stalled with Latinos and the male working class since 2016. My people (social democrats and greenies, plus any socialists and commies) need to collaborate and consolidate power like the lefties did in France recently under Jean-Luc Melenchon. I can see a nice path being paved forward for progressives to take over the Democratic Party and the country by the end of this decade. The path pavers here would be the rank incompetency of the Biden administration, the Manchin/Sinema legislative blockade, the Roberts court’s illegitimacy in the public’s eyes (from Citizens United v. FEC back in 2010 all the way to the upcoming Moore v. Harper case), and the massive social catalyst that is the Dobbs reversal of Roe and Casey. EDIT: Corrected a few obvious spelling/grammar errors.

I don’t disagree with anything you said here, ALF. It’s unfortunate that Republican voters think opening the floodgates on domestic fossil fuel supply will have a major effect on inflation and gas prices. A cursory look at U.S. fossil fuel import/export data from the past 5 years would shatter those hopes, as would a cursory look at international inflation and gas price data from the past 5 years. The lesson, in other words: our energy industry isn’t nationalized, and fossil fuel prices are subject to international supply/demand forces. Yet another GOP inflation talking point that should be dispelled by election season (but won’t) is the notion that excess government spending and increased spending agency among the labor market are major contributing factors. We can look at 5-year national/international data on federal budgets, consumer spending, wage growth, and inflation to figure out that these aren’t good explanations, either. And the observed spending spikes in 2020 were necessary to prevent a dangerous deflationary cycle. At the moment, natural gas is about 30% of our total domestic energy consumption. You don’t think we could get that number down to 20% by ~2035 and 5% by 2050 if we relied on nuclear? That would be three decades worth of preparation! Almost all of the effort would come in the simple form of preventing new public land sales for fracking. Every employee who recently joined the natural gas industry would still have the opportunity to finish their careers in it if they so choose. “Libs” are slowly changing their minds on nuclear. I’m seeing it! It’s true, though, that “cons” are historically more favorable to it. Yet another reason why I’m so pro-nuclear is because it lends itself better to political compromise than any of our other energy options.

Certainly not me. What’s our current debt-to-GDP ratio? ~130%? $30.5 trillion debt divided by $23 trillion annual GDP? I’d like to see us work that number down to sub-60% by mid-century, in anticipation of the eventual petrodollar collapse and a possible end to our world reserve currency supremacy. Trust me, I’m far from a mindless MMT disciple! I only brought it up to make the point that halting progress with something as critical as renewable energy infrastructure because of uber-rigid fiscal austerity measures is irrational. I would first cut into the ridiculously bloated military budget before anything else, in the range of a 25-33% reduction. Next, I would raise the highest marginal tax rate to 45-50% (most demand-siders say it should be 65-70% for optimal macroeconomic growth…) while closing certain tax loopholes and raising Wall Street speculation taxes. If we still need to find more energy infrastructure revenue somewhere, then we can have an exhaustive bipartisan evaluation committee on wasteful government programs. And if we still need more, then as our next resort we can turn to MMT economic guidance and relax our debt reduction benchmarks. Yeah, I kinda noticed the condescension. I’m an engineer as well (biomedical background, a bit of research experience in nanotech and materials physics and E+M waveguides, math training at level of a standard ABD experimental physicist), so I’d rather you not treat me like some ditzy far-left Pollyana-ish renewables fangirl. Oh and that’s another thing: I’m a female, so please don’t call me a “dude.” I’m also not your “pal” because I don’t know you personally. Finally, I did not appreciate the “Star Wars movies” comment. If you were to re-read my post, I openly acknowledged that practical superconductors were “pie-in-the-sky” for the next few decades. I wouldn’t say never, however, as you have suggested. Until the mechanism that explains high-temperature/non-BCS superconductivity is well-understood, there’s no definitive physics-based reason why room-temperature superconductors are impossible. With all those unpleasantries now out of the way, let’s talk electrical power. You may have laughed at my guess in costs, but we also failed to outline some basic assumptions and specifications to make any cost estimates meaningful. Using your expertise in this subject matter, maybe we can put together a sensible back-of-envelope determination of a TOTAL price tag that taxpayers could expect for a FULL 21st century electrical grid upgrade?? Assumptions: construction timeframe of 25 years (2025-2049), full eventual transmission/distribution line replacements, no new line networking (or is that too rough of an assumption?), using only current technology, nuclear fission power generation (but we’ll keep this cost separate because I’m only interested in the power grid’s network upgrades), ~350 million EV’s in circulation to be serviced by 2050 (FYI we’re currently at about 280 million total cars in the U.S.), 80% of all vehicles on road to be EV’s by 2050, expected 50% of all new car sales to be EV’s by 2035 and 75% by 2040 and 100% by 2045. Now with those general assumptions in mind, here’s where I’m hoping you can fill me in: 1. Transmission lines (material costs, factory processing, special supply chain finagling): $??? billion 2. Distribution lines (material costs, factory processing, special supply chain finagling): $? trillion 3. Public charging stations, power substations, step-up/step-down transformers: $?? billion 4. Government-funded labor training and utility installation work payroll: $??? billion 5. Government funding for research and design: $??? million If we add these 5 numbers up, what might that total be? Say, ~$3 trillion?? That would average out to be $120 billion per year from 2025-2049, or perhaps we front-load it to be $300 billion per year from 2025-2034. No biggie! I would take that out of our defense budget without hesitation. You could then raise Wall Street speculation taxes to pay for the nuclear fission power component of the electrical power grid renovations.

To address your first two questions: I would guess about $150 billion total over the next 10 years. Is that correct? And do you know what the ANNUAL military budget is? Something around $750-800 billion and rising, I believe. And don’t forget that the highest of the seven income brackets is at only 37%. And don’t forget MMT options, either, for those non-libertarians who properly understand that federal debt is not the same as personal household debt. Like I’ve said all along…the main problem is a lack of political willpower, not technology or cost. Your third question: No, I don’t know anything about the status of U.S. transmission/distribution line workers. If there is a labor shortage, then that sounds like the impetus for a good old-fashioned public works project! Yay! Keynesian economic solutions FTW! Your last question: No, I don’t know the supply chain status for transmission line materials. Are you referring to steel? Copper? Aluminum? There are actions the private market and/or government can take over the next 10+ years to smooth out material supply chain networks. I seriously doubt the situation is hopeless. I would also be remiss to not mention here that transmission/distribution line materials are an active area of research in nanotech and strongly correlated electron system physics. Inexpensive ceramic superconductors that operate in the 250-300 Kelvin range would be considered their holy grail, I suppose, albeit way too pie-in-the-sky for a timeline of three decades. In the meantime, materials scientists and engineers still have a fair amount of unexplored geometrical leeway for making practical power loss reductions in ohmic and dielectric heating. Your last paragraph: you said that 70% of our electrical power grid is 25+ years old. So if the infrastructure is long overdue for an upgrade, might as well do it now and do it right this time (i.e. build it so that it is ready to accommodate a 21st century future replete with renewables).

I don’t think it needs to take us several decades to get to a satisfactory state of renewables. With the proper political willpower, we could get it done within one decade. If you recall earlier, I provided an example of a national energy percentage breakdown that could get us to net zero emissions by 2050: 45% nuclear 20% EV 15% solar 10% petroleum 5% natural gas 5% all other renewables 0% coal Using CURRENT technology only (so stuff like Generation 2+ fission reactors, lithium-ion batteries, and silicon-based photovoltaics), we could get to something like the following by the end of this decade, simply by enacting sufficiently large government expenditures on energy infrastructure: 35% nuclear 10% EV 10% solar 20% petroleum 20% natural gas 5% all other renewables 0% coal As you can see, I’m accounting for the fact that any practical energy solution will take longer than a decade to wean ourselves off petroleum and natural gas. This sample breakdown would put us well on our way to meeting net zero emissions, and that’s assuming only incremental technology improvements made henceforth. I didn’t even factor in any major nanotech/materials breakthroughs in EV batteries, solar panels, or generation 3/4 fission reactor plants. Those would surely come about at a rapid pace if our country actually tried. The technological difficulties for carbon-free energy aren’t quite as daunting as those faced at the very beginning of the Manhattan Project (which took us ~4 years) or of NASA’s race to the moon (which took us ~8 years). Moreover, we have an international STEM community collaborating on carbon-free energy R&D, unlike the Manhattan Project and NASA moon landing which were carried out under strict national secrecy. So basically, what I’m saying is that I’m much less worried about the technology issues than I am the political ones. What we need by 2024 is the next great U.S. energy president to emerge who takes this subject seriously and who demands an all-hands-on-deck approach involving both the government and private industries. What we don’t need are more MMGW deniers, EPA haters, fossil fuel crony capitalists, and free market fundamentalists.

Yes, I watched the video. Please re-read my original response to you. I spotted you one key example of how the video was misleading the viewer. You really need to be consulting a multitude of different sources on renewable energy technologies. A 5-minute Prager University clip, lacking any sort of nuanced discussion whatsoever or any presentation of opposing viewpoints, is simply not enough. All of your electrical power grid concerns can easily be addressed with a greater commitment to nuclear fission energy. I’m not going to defend Biden’s energy policy because it’s nowhere close to my preferred one. Mine is most closely aligned with that of former 2020 Democratic presidential candidate, Jay Inslee. I didn’t vote for Biden, either. I voted for Howie Hawkins in 2020 and for Bernie during the primaries. Biden is proving to be as incompetent and ineffectual as I had feared. And no, that is NOT an endorsement for Trump or any other GOP’er on this topic. It’s a call for quality challengers in the 2024 Democratic Party presidential primaries. If it seems to you like everyone is blaming the United States, that’s partly because you live here and probably consume American-centric news media. But as I mentioned before, we also happen to be the world’s second largest greenhouse gas emitter. We’ve also had the world’s largest economy and military since the end of WW2, making us the de facto leaders of the free world whom everyone looks up to, for better or for worse. Uh…it was a completely tongue-in-cheek post. I was never actually angry at you. It’s okay, though. I will quietly give you a sad face emoji reaction and then proceed to slowly back out of this conversation. Are you also against subsidies for the petroleum industry?

Oh wow…you just don’t know when to quit, do you, dear Leh-nerd?! I mainly logged in to PPP tonight to catch up on all the patriarchal Roe v. Wade hot takes. But thanks for “manspreading” your opinion on climate science, too. Is there any leftover bandwidth in this thread for Lil’ Miss Commie Kay? Do I have your male permission to share my rebuttal now? Would that be okay with you? After my response, then I suppose you can “mansplain” middle school Earth science back to me while I bake desserts, read Kendall Jenner gossip*, menstruate, and do other stereotypical female activities in the background that denote my gender-based inferiority to you. Per usual Commie Kay readership experience, I shall summarize my points in numerical form: 1. Climate Change: I nearly threw my laptop across the room when I read this comment: “Don’t trust him, trust me. I am The One.” Is this honestly how you would summarize my environmental (or any) opinions?! The Commie Kay modus operandi has always been to simply provide informational guidance, with the expectation that my dear readers will do additional research on their own and not just take me on my word. My advice here is to seek the wisdom of those whose livelihoods depend on having real, accurate, verifiable, and falsifiable climate change data. That is partly why I trust NASA-funded Columbia U. scientist types over Prager U. “scientist” types (the other part being that they…you know…just happen to make more logical arguments backed by a more sound understanding of the scientific method). But you, my ever so obstinate PPP friend, have stated that you have no interest in further inquiry…hence why you remain stuck on your ridiculous ~60% MMGW confidence level and not at a more reasonable 95+%. UGH. 2. Hypocrisies: Yes, there are charlatans and dishonest actors among the broad left-wing environmentalism movement. Please feel free to call them out! But their unfortunate existence isn’t a justification for climate justice inaction (or reverse action). 3. Solution Difficulties: Yeah, I get it. Addressing climate change is extremely hard. Why do you want to give up when you face adversity? When the going gets tough, the tough get going. You appear to not be tough, Leh-nerd. You appear to be weak. You are a weak GIRLY man, Leh-nerd. A giant, weak, pathetic, pu$$y of a warrior for Mother Earth. Put on a cute dress and tuck your tool of oppression (i.e. your pen!s) between your legs and restock your Playtex tampon supply and go legally change your TBD username to something phonetically similar like “Eleanor,” Leh-nerd, because you are a weak little B!TCH getting Chris Rock face-slapped by the Will Smith pimp that is anthropogenic global warming. Disgusting. 4. Redistributive Models: As a social democrat, I am technically an ideological descendant of Karl Marx (hence my clever username, “COMRADE Kay Adams”). I am therefore not averse to the concept of wealth redistribution. Capitalists must necessarily exploit labor in order to turn a profit, so the naked laws of labor supply and labor demand are inherently unable to allocate monetary worth fairly. Simple extreme example: Jeff Bezos’ efforts have earned him the sum worth equivalent to the GDP of a small country, while his diligent warehouse workers subsist around the poverty line. Generally speaking, I can be okay with any redistributive model that has consensus favorability among data-driven macroeconomists. I was fine with certain aspects of the bailouts from the Great Recession and the COVID-19 Pandemic, but I would have also bailed out the working class in places and not predominantly bailed out the CEO’s and the professional/managerial investor class. I am okay with government choosing winners and losers in the energy industry if it can be shown that the winners are improving society and if negative externalities are taxed. 5. Plants’ Pain: No, I do not wonder if plants experience pain because they do not have central nervous systems to process their sensory information. I learned about this back in high school freshman biology class while I studiously took notes in the front of the class. Did you? Apparently not. Apparently the only biology you were learning freshman year were the birds and the bees from any random FLOOZY in a skirt. Or perhaps you skipped to chemistry, i.e. getting high off of DOOBIES? Or perhaps you skipped to physics, i.e. studying the fluid mechanics of BEER funnels? Certainly not Earth science, based on your current performance in this THREAD…LEH-NERD. 6. BONUS DISCUSSION WITH COMMIE KAY: West Virginia v. EPA: Today, the Supreme Court severely limited the EPA’s power to regulate state-by-state environmental pollution, including greenhouse gas emissions (the ruling affects the powers of every other federal agency, too). In practice, this will render consistent and sufficient regulation of emissions standards nearly impossible. So much for meeting the moment and taking climate change seriously, eh Leh-ny? I know the industrial oligarchs are loving this judicial decision, but what say you and your originalist/states’ rights/Civil War cosplay buddies?? Surely you’re skeptical enough to realize that this had little to do with “properly” delineating legislative and executive powers and everything to do with delivering for GOP corporate donors, aren’t you?? P.S. Note that I’m only giving your post 1 eyeroll emoji reaction because Two Bills Drive isn’t letting me give you more, nor do they offer a more fitting clown face emoji or steaming pile of sh!t emoji. Keep digging the response hole for your TBD posting grave, Leh-nerd, as I bury you under the entire offered array of TBD negative emoji reactions. On deck: sad face emoji and angry face emoji. P.S.P.S. Yes, I will accept your Vizzy at the next Bills tailgate! Thank you so much! *- Commie Kay Fun Fact: My abs are almost as rock solid as Kendall’s now. My secret? Oh you guessed it, Leh-nerd! VEGAN DIET. 100% whole-foods, plant-based**. I also jog ~15 miles a week and do Bikram yoga once a week, but vegan diet FTW! **-Commie Kay Bonus Dietary Tip: Avoid cooking with vegetable oils! You appear to be all over the place in your angry rant. My far-left progressive environmentalist comrades are 100% with you on deforestation, urban/suburban sprawl, and meat/dairy industry complaints. We want to hold the rest of the world accountable with their fossil fuel consumption, too, but we acknowledge that the United States is the country over which we have the most control (FYI: we are the second biggest greenhouse gas emitters by a wide margin). And what’s the alternative?? Two moral wrongs don’t make a moral right! If we want to curb China’s fossil fuel usage, the key is multilateral trade deal leverage. Also, what ever happened to the United States wanting to be #1 in things?? I’d love to see our country take the lead on the world stage in the rapidly emerging renewable energy market. It is to our great economic advantage to do so. At the very least, let’s not fall too far behind Europe.

Wow…no one here is talking about Joe Rogan’s endorsement of Ron DeSantis? It’s a big deal! Sad to say, but Joe Rogan has a lot of influence over Americans. Maybe enough to play a kingmaker role in the GOP primaries. LOL…Ron gets nothing….especially international politics. Gustavo Petro is a run-of-the-mill social democrat who admires Lula and Bernie. He wants to turn Colombia into a Latin American version of a Western European country. He regularly criticizes Hugo Chavez, Nicolas Maduro, and Venezuelan totalitarianism. I’d say that Petro’s victory was a visceral reaction to many decades of failed right-wing Colombian politics and is probably a harbinger of a strong leftward shift throughout Latin America as a whole (if we were to ignore the other harbingers, that is: big leftist victories recently in Mexico, Honduras, Chile, Peru, Argentina, and Bolivia). See my paragraph above. This specific pendulum swing is only extreme if you think, say, German politics are extreme (er…present-day German politics, that is). Colombian government is so historically entrenched in corruption, however, that I have doubts as to how much Petro can change. Some of his energy infrastructure ideas come across as a bit too idealistic for a country that only allows for a single 4-year presidential term, anyway. Bear in mind that American corporate media will be coming out strongly against Petro because our mainstream media is the mouthpiece for the neoliberal establishment oligarchy. Petro will likely challenge trade ties with the United States that are undoubtedly exploitative in nature toward the Colombian populace.

Okay, so I think we’re on the same wavelength for much of this topic! Where we continue to differ is on our optimism levels for renewable materials. FWIW: my educational and professional background is in biomedical engineering, I have numerous friends in the materials science/engineering field, and my dad’s own educational and professional background is in solid-state physics. A lot of my optimism is based on the reality that, as a civilization, we have barely scratched the surface (pardon the pun, I guess…?) in our understanding of photovoltaic cells beyond the silicon-based semiconductors or of rechargeable battery materials beyond the lithium-ion cells with polymer electrolytes. Furthermore, scientists working in the nanotech subfield are at the early stages of learning how to construct “designer materials,” i.e. materials not normally found in nature. When you build materials atom-by-atom and layer-by-layer, you can manipulate atom/molecule types and lattice spacings so that you meet and surpass various engineering specs. This gives us many more material options beyond what Mother Earth may give us in her mine deposits! I mentioned the need for a “Materials Manhattan Project” in the 21st century. This research infrastructure already exists all over the country, mostly in academia but also at select DOE+DOD government labs and a few private industry labs. However, the research activity is not happening at nearly the extent commensurate with the climate urgency. It would be useful to have a centralized, top-down, umbrella organizational structure that would oversee all of the disparate materials research, set overarching goals, establish benchmarks for monitoring progress and for quality control, allocate funding, and handle all of the communication to the public as well as to the politicians.

Maybe I could have phrased that sentence differently. It was meant to be an inference from a prediction for the near future, not a statement of the present backed by any sort of rigorous peer-reviewed economics research paper. My near-term prediction assumes the following conditions: 1. Supply chain networks tending toward normalization as COVID shutdowns and the Russia-Ukraine war’s initial economic perturbations continue to recede in the rearview mirror. 2. Likewise, worldwide consumer habits stabilize. 3. Likewise, global energy corporations stabilize supply releases as they match stabilizing demand. 4. Consumer prices remain sky high. 5. Fossil fuel companies continue to operate at profit margins higher than they were pre-COVID. 6. A persistent lack of connection between consumer prices and the labor market (based on international data comparisons for wage growth and different BLS-equivalent unemployment metrics). Commie Kay’s Conditional Conclusion: I mean, seriously…if these 6 conditions hold, then what other conclusion should I reach other than corporate pricing power is being overexercised to take advantage of the perceived remnants of a dual global crisis (COVID + Ukraine invasion)? Oil and gas employers set their prices and have practically full control over their supply. We have numbers that can check energy supply and labor market health, so we have ways to call out the typical nonsensical talking points from the green energy-hating conservatives and monetarist libertarian freaks. Direct corporate collusion doesn’t necessarily have to be in play; it could be an incidental market oligopoly effect, given the relatively small number of fossil fuel companies. Where do you generally stand on this inflation topic, Doc Brown? Would you prefer to address it with high interest rates and fiscal austerity?

If you are a naturally skeptical person and not a right-wing partisan, then you should have as much skepticism for this video clip as you do for any of the left’s arguments. Note that Prager University is a non-academic conservative organization. Mark Mills is a fellow of the Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank. Both are funded by the fossil fuel industry. While I’m not doubting the numbers presented in the video, he is obviously framing a narrative by highlighting only flaws with renewables and not mentioning any benefits, any of the latest research progress made with renewable materials, or any flaws from other energy sources. His remark about a 1000+% mining demand increase, for example, is blatantly misleading because no one is arguing that our global energy infrastructure needs to be fully converted into wind and solar. I won’t speak to global renewable energy-based solutions not buttressed by nuclear, but I have seen a series of energy studies for the nuclear-based ones. Conclusion: both the net Joules (available supply minus energy demand) and the net carbon emissions can add to zero! If my memory is correct, they used renewable material technology specs from ~2010, inflation-adjusted cost expectations into the future, a service demand of 10 billion people (a commonly used global population estimate by 2050), simple carbon sequestration efforts (reforestation, namely), and assumptions that all major countries were cooperative (including China, India, U.S., and the South American lithium triangle…yes, these were technical papers and not political ones…but it’s okay because international trade coercion will be a powerful motivating tool in the years ahead!). Some fossil fuel usage was expected to remain, of course, which is the only realistic expectation for the future. Interestingly enough, carbon sequestration was shown to be a very significant variable in all of this. Seriously, Leh-nerd?! One well-earned thumbs down emoji reaction for you. I feel like a broken record around this forum…please reply with a published/peer-reviewed post-July 1988 scientific research paper that either challenges the observed warming of the planet altogether or explains it with any mechanism other than atmospheric carbon dioxide ppm. If climate science is the “religion” that you intimate, then you should have little trouble providing me with this simple request. Furthermore, I want to know more about these “redistribution models” you have in your mind. Do you not think that wealth is already being redistributed from workers to capitalists? Capitalists that include fossil fuel industry magnates (incidentally, many of which will eventually comprise the same magnates benefiting from the renewable energy transition as their own respective business models evolve)? Your thoughts on the various Federal Reserve/Congress bailouts during the Great Recession (circa late 2008-early 2009) and COVID Era (circa March-April 2020)? Was this wealth redistribution righteous? No, you know what? I’m instead going with a vomiting emoji reaction. You brought this on yourself.

Anticipation of future profits, sure…but more on the temporal order of weeks and months, not years and decades. Biden’s long-term statements on a renewable energy transition, compared to the COVID-initiated supply shock phenomena dating back to early 2020, have very little to do with the currently observed inflation in the global energy sector. If anything, oil and gas employers are looking into the past and not the future when setting their prices. They’re trying to recover for their shareholders the expected gains that were lost during the pandemic. And incidentally, the supply chain disruptions and the Ukraine war are slowly morphing into a convenient cover for continued price gouging. Yes and relative to our global counterparts, we also have a terrible public transportation system and serious issues with suburban sprawl that limit our options. I’m definitely not seeing how a gas tax holiday is going to help us much. Aren’t most gas taxes state and local, anyway? And the Federal Reserve seems dead set on raising interest rates to treat inflation like chemotherapy treats cancer. This is becoming a crisis of Biden’s own volition because he’d rather kowtow to corporate oligarchs rather than help ordinary Americans. I’d just go with windfall profit taxes at this point and play supply chain hardball with oil and gas, similarly to how JFK handled the steel industry or how Nixon enforced price/wage freezes for several months.

Perhaps that Friday melancholy is your conscience crying out to you? You can’t just dabble in Meatless Mondays and then go back to being an awful human being to animals for the rest of the week. Your omnivore diet is exhausting you, Leh-nerd. Physically. Nutritionally. Mentally. SPIRITUALLY. I’ll address your points as you sequentially made them. Your first paragraph: I suppose the key difference between us is that I don’t subscribe to your over-the-top negativity regarding battery/solar technology. I personally know many people in the materials science/engineering field and follow this subject closely. Progress within the past twenty years has been substantial and would be much greater with additional research funding and larger research efforts…a “Materials Manhattan Project,” if you will. You may also be overestimating how much we would need to rely on renewables in the future. I’m speaking solely in terms of technology here and ignoring political willpower factors, but I would center our mid-century national energy infrastructure around nuclear, solar, and EV’s. Currently, we are at about 80% fossil fuel usage and 20% renewables/nuclear. 30% of our energy goes to transportation needs, while the remaining 70% goes to electric power for industrial/residential/commercial needs. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to achieve the following energy breakdown in order to reach our 2050 net zero emissions goal: 45% nuclear, 20% EV, 15% solar, 10% legacy petroleum, 5% legacy natural gas, 5% other renewables wherever optimal (wind, geothermal, etc.), 0% coal…with carbon sequestration techniques to counter legacy oil/gas usage (including reforestation efforts and indirectly through meat/dairy consumption reductions…hopefully Leh-nerd Skin-erd is still reading this post?). And yes, this would imply a forced collapse of the U.S. natural gas revolution within the next three decades because they can’t control their methane leaks (not to mention the water/air pollution and artificial earthquakes). Addressing your last two paragraphs: An acknowledgment of the well-established science of anthropogenic climate change is automatically an acknowledgment of mankind’s ability to effect meaningful change to the climate, even if it’s too late to stave off some of the effects. The “there’s nothing we can do” crowd are as scientifically illiterate as they are nihilistic. “Saving the planet” obviously means preserving the planet for human habitability, not preserving the physical planet. Preserving ecosystems like old-growth forests and biodiversity like with megafauna are fundamental components to keeping civilization alive and thriving. Overpopulation is an enormous problem that should be talked about more openly. I have no idea what the optimal global population size might be: somewhere within the wide range of 10^8 and 10^10 humans, I assume. What I do know is that fertility and GDP per capita are inversely correlated (same with fertility and education levels) for countries. It may seem counterintuitive to some of my greenie Luddite friends, but I believe that broader industrialization and increased technological dependencies will end up improving the planet’s habitability conditions. I wasn’t trying to set up an ideological discussion of free markets versus central planning. The free market is a powerful engine for innovation, but it is also amoral and mostly driven by short-term profit interests. Public research funding and subsidies are essential components to a national energy plan. There are renewable energy jobs to create and international renewable energy markets to access, but free markets won’t necessarily lead to these solutions if we continue subsidizing fossil fuels like we do with the current transportation infrastructure set up as it is.

So you want the free market to dictate our energy policy? What are your thoughts on fossil fuel subsidies, going back to the days of the 1950’s Federal Highway Act? And who pays for the negative externalities in your free market system? So you don’t want to listen to climate activists? Do you think it is remotely reasonable or responsible to ignore over half a century’s worth of climate science research canon on the off chance that future discoveries could, in theory, come along and prove anthropogenic global warming to be wrong? Why did you ignore my post in the “How much did you pay for gas and groceries today?” thread (page 15, Friday, June 10)? I do not like it when people ignore me. It makes me feel sad. << Insert Commie Kay sad face >> Um…oil and gas company profit margins ARE noticeably higher now than they were at any point in the years preceding the pandemic! Yes, I’m referring to the percentages and not the net dollars. Look it up for yourself. One can call it “price gouging”, or one can call it “businesses doing what good businesses do for their shareholders through share buybacks and dividends, in response to pandemic-related losses.” Either way, it’s a non-trivial component of the inflation. It’s by no means the entire explanation of inflation, of course. I covered the multifaceted topic of inflation in the “How much did you pay for gas and groceries today?” thread (page 15, Friday, June 10). Did you read it? Oh, that’s right…you didn’t. Because you instead chose to be an irreverent d!ckhead to me. The summary, when reading between my lines, was that right-wingers have no coherent message on inflation beyond the predictable partisan whining of “Biden = high gas prices, Trump/GOP = low gas prices.” The one consistent right-wing talking point, I suppose, is that Biden needs to allow more drilling permits so to increase the supply. “Drill, baby, drill” in Alaska, Gulf of Mexico, national parks, backyards, etc… But what is the mechanism that will ensure the oil companies drill in these new places when they already own plenty of property on which they still have yet to drill? Or the mechanism that ensures these companies sell the new additional supply domestically and not on the international market? Are right-wingers warming up to the idea of nationalizing the energy industry?? Hmmm… I’m not sure what else the GOP is proposing? Some of them may agree with the Federal Reserve raising interest rates, even though that’s going to ensure a recession and hit the working class hard. The libertarian wing of the GOP has long been clamoring for a contraction of the money supply. I assume emergency fossil fuel windfall taxes are off the GOP negotiating table because that would be socialism and socialism is evil?? Did I type too much again with this post?? Awww…poor baby. I should have been more sensitive to your pathetically short attention span and notoriously subpar reading comprehension. My sincere apologies, SoCal D!ck.

Progressives don’t hate the country! It would certainly be accurate, however, to say that progressives are more scathing in their criticisms of typical American public policies. As you probably guessed, my opinion of classical liberalism is low and my opinion of American conservatism is even lower. Neither philosophy belongs in the twenty-first century. A classical liberal’s view of macroeconomics is overly simplistic and doesn’t pay attention to international data that informs us on how to best grow economies. There are also the modern ethical assessments of economic policy that classical liberals ignore, especially regarding certain goods/services like health care, education, and housing. American conservatism is even worse because it subsumes laissez-faire capitalism, incorporates sentiments of American supremacy into a foreign policy which is slowly bankrupting our country (financially and morally), and hides various bigoted beliefs often behind the guise of either religion or (painfully misinterpreted) science. I would say that the rise of modern progressivism in the United States is a direct consequence of the Reagan tenure’s shortcomings and the ascent of neoliberalism. NAFTA, the Iraq War, the Great Recession, and this ongoing post-COVID recession (or depression?!) have further irrevocably alienated Americans from classical liberalism and conservatism. There are consequences to shrinking the middle class and decimating the lives of the working class! Or rather…there SHOULD be consequences to doing so. Just looking at polling data and the national surge in labor activism…I’m cautiously optimistic that progressives will take over the Democratic Party by the end of this decade and start exerting real political power throughout the 2030’s.

I highlighted two points of contention in your post: 1. It’s not that they don’t care, “they” being the Biden administration and Democrats in Congress. They are simply constrained by what their corporate donors allow them to do. And in the case of many like Biden, at this point in their lives they are also probably too entrenched in neoliberal philosophy to explore aggressive alternative actions. I do have a tinfoil hat theory for you, however: the Democrats see a harrowingly unlikely path to victory over the next two years, so their plan is to make Biden/Harris the scapegoats and elevate someone more salable like Gavin Newsom during the 2024 presidential primaries. Hey, it would work on me! I hate Newsom, but I’d still vote for him over the rebranded trickle-down economics nonsense that the GOP always peddles as their economic panacea. 2. Even if the Keystone Pipeline System was fully functional at this very moment, it would only put a VERY modest dent on overall gas prices. This very modest dent doesn’t come close to justifying all the environmental damage that it would eventually create. Further exploitation of the Athabasca tar sands should not be encouraged in any way. And what about the Indigenous groups that the pipeline construction affects? And what about that whole climate change thing? The boreal forests of Western Canada are way too important for combating MMGW. The Keystone Pipeline System would mostly help Canada, anyway, but not the U.S. in terms of jobs. I would advise Western Canadians to find other ways to grow their economy. Since the inflation topic is by far the most important one in politics today, FWIW here’s my little contribution to PPP: What I think Biden should generally be doing to ameliorate the problem: 1. Issue a series of executive orders that expedite supply chain networks, especially at shipping port bottlenecks. 2. Publicly articulate a clear short-term and long-term national energy plan so that fossil fuel companies can better anticipate demand and moderate their releases of supply, thereby stabilizing some of the inflationary pressures (much of which is still a consequence of fossil fuel supply shocks). 3. Provide any sort of Keynesian-esque demand-side relief to working-class families (tax relief, energy credits, etc…just do something for them, please…). What is or what has been (mostly) out of Biden’s control: 1. Anthropogenic global warming constraints on public policy (note to anyone who still thinks it’s a myth: please reply to me with a published post-July 1988 scientific research paper that either refutes the observed warming altogether or explains it with any mechanism other than atmospheric carbon dioxide ppm…a published scientific research paper, please; not a link to some random fella’s website…). 2. Fossil fuel oligarchic control of government since the 1970’s energy crisis (they are chiefly responsible for our country’s relatively pathetic state of renewable energy research/development at this present moment in time). 3. Enormous global supply chain disruptions due to COVID-19 and its subsequent variants. 4. General supply chain weaknesses on the U.S. side that were exposed by the pandemic and that were, in large part, due to decades of outsourcing of domestic manufacturing jobs. 5. Putin’s invasion of Ukraine that has affected much of the fossil fuel energy and wheat/grain food markets. 6. The world economic market for fossil fuels that sets the supply, the demand, and thus our prices of oil and gas independent of U.S. political decisions. 7. The privatized status of the U.S. fossil fuel industry, which means that these companies are largely free to sell domestic supply wherever they want in the world, make use of drilling permits however they want, and thereby drive domestic energy supply/demand/costs (to some extent) to their own financial advantage and not necessarily for any greater societal good. 8. The cumulative effects of American imperialism since the advent of the Cold War that have limited import/export options on the international energy markets.

I agree with your first two recommendations, but not the third. Enforcing full legal responsibility for a gun’s use is not practical and opens a Pandora’s box of draconian punishments in any number of less typical criminal situations. At the moment, here is what I generally support with regard to gun control: mandatory classes/training/licenses for gun ownership (obvious exemptions for military or law enforcement experience), mandatory safety devices and safe storage laws, raising the age to 25 (not 21!) for all semi-automatic rifles, enhanced and universal background checks (particularly around DSM-5 mental health issues), increased spending for local community mental health programs, sensible augmentations to school security measures, red flag law implementations, closing gun show loopholes, banning high-capacity gun magazines, banning ghost guns, and banning bump stocks or other firearm conversion devices. I carefully read everything else you typed, but I’m only going to respond to a couple parts because I don’t really disagree with any of the points you raised. Sorry to disappoint or bore…but as you may recall, I’m a centrist on the Second Amendment issue! 1. Gun control research references: The study that I was mainly thinking about when typing my post was “What Do We Know About The Association Between Firearm Legislation and Firearm-Related Injuries?” (Epidemiologic Reviews, January 2016) by Professor Julian Santaella-Tenorio of NYU, published while he was at Columbia U. It was somewhat of a landmark paper because it prompted a flurry of research that uses international data and isolates a host of statistical variables (a.k.a. right-wing excuses for gun violence) like video game violence and religious affiliation. In my admittedly very non-expert opinion, we need to see more conclusive research done on the link (or lack thereof) between fatherlessness and inner-city gun violence as well as between mental health and gun violence. If you do decide to delve into all this wonky academic stuff, bear in mind the distinctions made between mass shootings and general gun violence. 2. Progressive political strength in the United States: Okay, so I should have clarified what I mean by political strength. Progressives are presently thought to be roughly 40-45% of the Democratic Party electorate. The Democratic Party needs to court their votes in order to win anything, so in that respect progressives ARE powerful and have some degree of influence. However, I tend to think of political strength mainly in terms of legislation that actually gets passed, politicians that actually get elected to office, or even just platforms on which candidates actually run. The Democratic Party certainly does lean into identity politics rhetoric and some of the anti-police rhetoric in order to stitch together their voting bloc, but us sad progressives can’t get hardly any of our domestic economic agenda, none of our foreign policy/anti-MIC agenda, and much of our environmental/energy/civil infrastructure demands met at the national level. The reason? Corporate influence on moderates/centrists. Corporatists hate the pro-worker pro-Main Street politics of progressives. As I think I mentioned earlier here, we only have 7 true progressives in all of Congress. That is to say, we only have 7 politicians in Congress who don’t accept big money campaign donations.

In all honesty, I think these “slippery slope” fears of species identification are non sequitur responses to gender identification. Rational people can all agree that the concept of gender is distinct from the concept of species. It’s as simple as saying “no” and drawing a red line for the VERY few number of people who, I suppose, genuinely want to identify as an animal. This similarly fallacious argument was used against gay people in the gay marriage debate: we can’t let them get married because then people might try to marry their pet cats or dogs. I really don’t see a problem with conflating biological sex and “psychological sex,” for lack of a better term. In almost every situation that comes up in society, it’s no big deal to accommodate this slight increase in complexity. The vast majority of humans psychologically identify with the same sex as their biological sex, anyway. Civilization shouldn’t collapse because of this. You did, however, bring up one of the very few societal situations where accommodation is not so easy: competitive athletics. I don’t have a solution that I can confidently recommend. Do we force people to compete only with peers of the same biological gender that they were assigned at birth? Do we assign athletic gender based on morphology or hormone levels? Do we increase the number of competitive categories? Do we let the competitors decide for themselves with whom they want to compete? I’ll let you guys debate this one. I’ll stay out of it and just read the responses.

Yes, absolutely! Lax gun laws and the Republicans who perpetuate this status quo are the main culprit! That’s what the gun control policy research is telling us, research which is based on comparative studies with other countries around the world. All the right-wing explanations fall apart in the comparative international research: drug use, atheism, single-parent households, COVID lockdowns, school security measures, transgenderism (lol…), and video games. A mental health explanation may not be entirely far-fetched since we stand alone as the only industrialized country without universal health care programs, but it’s completely disingenuous of right-wingers to raise this issue because they are the ones who will be against any future “subsidization” of poor people’s mental health care. Your attempt to establish an impact equivalency between lax gun regulations and progressive attitudes toward law and order is equally weak, and it’s weak for two main reasons: 1. Across-the-board progressive activism is far stronger and louder in many other countries that have much lower gun violence and many fewer mass shootings. Antagonism towards police officers and deep suspicions of police are pervasive elsewhere and somewhat ubiquitous because of the nature of the types of personalities that gravitate toward the law enforcement profession, but we simply don’t hear about these international problems here in America often because Americans, by and large, don’t care about what happens in other places. With specific respect to gun control activism, the rest of the civilized world looks at gun access as a privilege and not as an inalienable right. It’s a huge distinction between our country and others that is definitely reflected in the stark differences in gun laws. 2. Progressive politicians have negligible political power (at the moment…) in this country, ESPECIALLY compared to the rest of the world. While the AOC and Bernie types are mere fringe political pawns to the Pelosi and Biden types in the United States, they would be considered well-established centrists in, say, mainland Europe or outright right-wingers in Scandinavia. Moderate Democrats in our country always do the bare minimum to court progressive voters, and they are simultaneously always working behind the scenes to undermine actual progressive power (latest example among many: Bakari Sellers raising big money to defeat Rashida Tlaib in Michigan this August). No law-and-order progressive activism ever actually makes it into the broader Dem political platform. No meaningful gun control legislation, I believe, has been passed at the national level since the Federal Assault Weapons Ban in 1994. Cori Bush was the only national Democrat who ran on a “Defund the Police” call, and that’s because her district infamously includes Ferguson, MO. No national politician ran on an “Abolish ICE” call. Bottom line: Team GOP is just trying to run out the attention clock on gun control legislation until the country becomes preoccupied with other major current events. They don’t want to listen to the 70-90% of Americans who want meaningful gun control laws. They only want to obey their NRA donor masters. So I can’t take any of their red herring explanations for gun violence seriously, and that includes progressive antagonism toward law enforcement. You asked for my opinions on a few specific issues that you listed, but I don’t think you’d find my opinions terribly interesting because I’m more of a centrist on law-and-order politics. I identify as progressive because of other things (environment, energy, social democratic macroeconomics, health care, foreign policy, etc.). However, I’ll still try to add a few thoughts: 1. Demonization of Police: The “Defund the Police” movement was never about not having any law enforcement agencies. It was about breaking corrupt police unions and reconstructing these institutions with a more streamlined set of responsibilities. The in situ incompetency and subsequent coverups in Uvalde are highlighting for the rest of the country just what these progressive activists were talking about back in 2020. 2. Police Demilitarization: There is simply NO WAY that our domestic law enforcement agencies require all of the military equipment that they’ve been allowed to possess in order to do their jobs. Furthermore, military and domestic law enforcement have two very different sets of responsibilities. The military mindset that has been allowed to carry over into police departments since Reagan’s Drug War days (~20% of U.S. police have military backgrounds) is undoubtedly aggravating a host of civilian law-and-order situations. All of this is yet another tragic consequence of our country’s sh!tty imperialistic foreign policy, by the way… 3. Lax District Attorneys: I agree that violent offenders shouldn’t be granted any leniency, but I would go easy on nonviolent victimless crime offenders such as those caught up in drug use or those found in the sex industry. U.S. law and order should still ultimately aspire to reflect the spirit of human redemption in order to discourage recidivism. 4. Villainization of Border Patrol Agents: I’ve found many of the detention practices toward illegal aliens detestable and unnecessarily inhumane. This was true throughout the Trump presidency, also true during Obama’s reign, and unfortunately these problems persist under Biden’s administration.

Probably among the most salient sentences that have ever been written in this subforum, yet you chose video links from an obvious right-wing grifter like Matt Walsh over highly cited research from biologists who devote their lives to the study of gender science? Which side, exactly, is in a religious cult?? “What is a woman?” Is that your honest question? The answer is that gender identity is a bit more nuanced than chromosomes and reproductive systems. For whatever still undetermined reason or combination of reasons (genetics, prenatal development, etc.), the brain development of a small percentage of people does not match their visible outside markers of gender distinction. When I say “brain development,” I’m referring to the observable differences between a stereotypical male brain and female brain in terms of structural composition and neural activity. Early studies of transgender people are showing this discrepancy to be the case for them. Neuroscience is an extremely complex subject that you could say is very much still in its infancy, so that’s why the scientific community tends to prevaricate when asked about definitive gender identification protocols. I suppose our society can eventually reach a point where we demand expensive brain scans and elaborate neuroimaging for every single person who wants to identify as a gender incongruous with their physical bodies, but in the meantime…it’s a lot easier to simply ask them. Whatever happened to “live and let live” from the political right, anyway? The lives of transgender people are already extremely difficult (especially throughout their adolescence), so why not just leave them alone instead of amplifying the hatred and discrimination and bullying? EDIT: Note that competitive sports participation and hormone therapy for legal minors ARE legitimate debates to be had on the subject of transgenderism, but they can’t be had with a debate side that disregards these human beings as psychological “freaks” and “weirdos.” Go out and meet actual transgender people and ask them about their lifelong gender-based thoughts and experiences.

The issue is that I don’t necessarily think buildings full of little children become incrementally safer with military-grade weapons located inside them. And I don’t necessarily think the children are incrementally safer in the heat of battle when educators not trained for combat are wielding these weapons. That is not to say that I am completely against the idea of having armed defenders in schools, but this idea would have to be combined with other substantial gun control measures. FWIW, I’m a progressive lefty who considers herself a center-righty on the Second Amendment issue. I’ve tended to defer to gun owners on the types of guns they insist they need for self-defense, but I’m quickly losing patience with right-wing obstinance when it comes to regulating who is allowed to buy these guns. I think the fundamental problem we have here (along with gerrymandering rules) is the lack of campaign finance reform legislation. Those with the most money can best bribe the politicians and control the propaganda. ~70-90% of Americans want meaningful gun control laws, but major campaign donors from the NRA own the GOP and intimidate the Democratic Party into inaction. So far, the only politicians I’m aware of at the national level who reject corporate and large individual donations are AOC, Omar, Pressley, Tlaib, Bowman, Cori Bush, and Bernie. Hmmm…

By chance, have you been following the Democratic primary race in the Texas 28th congressional district?? Jessica Cisneros versus Henry Cuellar? If so, any quick thoughts?? Mine: 1. It’s shameful (but predictable) for Pelosi and Clyburn to be backing a scandal-ridden, pro-NRA, anti-Roe DINO like Cuellar in this particular election season. 2. Cisneros is probably going to lose by an incredibly small margin (<100 votes??), but it was still a very impressive showing since she almost beat an incumbent who had the entire financial backing of the Dem establishment. 3. I’m not at all confident like Pelosi is that Cuellar will win in November against Cassy Garcia, and I don’t think it even matters in the big picture because of the whole DINO thing. 4. This is a bellwether Dem primary and among the most important ones in the country. I think it shows that moderate Dems are slamming into a popularity ceiling with non-Cuban Latinos, and that suppression of progressive electoral energy is going to hurt in November. Meanwhile, we’re managing to see plenty of Latino enthusiasm for a candidate in conservative South Texas “despite” her full endorsement from a supposedly wacky NYC socialist. 5. The generational divide between moderate old Democrats and progressive young Democrats is once again rearing its ugly head. Democrats will have to somehow keep this caustic coalition glued for another five months in the face of a looming economic recession and a failed agenda for the working class (namely: Build Back Better).

Yes, thank you! I was just about to make this same point. All sorts of spurious statistical arguments can be made from insufficient amounts of data. And yes, the concept of some random bespectacled Good Samaritan educator saving the day with a Wyatt Earp-esque fast draw and steady hand is BEYOND absurd. While I’m not at all a gun maven, let’s just take the case of the Buffalo Tops shooting…long story short…I made the HORRIBLE mistake of watching the full 6-minute video recording. My main takeaway here was that prevention of much of the carnage was always going to be completely unrealistic, regardless of the firearm skills of any passers-by. Payton Gendron, equipped with military-style weaponry and decked out in military-style body armor, murdered the first four people outside the front entrance within about five seconds after opening his car door! You also mentioned psychological evaluations as an important component of gun regulations. Well…sure enough, we have come to learn that both Payton Gendron and Salvador Ramos had a despicable history of cat torture. Animal torture is obvious criminal behavior and should have been flagged by someone beforehand for the law enforcement agencies! It’s classic behavior for clinical sociopaths, who are exactly the types of people capable of carrying out mass shootings. So if we’re serious about preventing mass shootings, then we need to work as a society on the identification and management of sociopaths as much as we work on more sensible gun laws. This would have to mean expanded mental health counseling programs under the rubric of a universal health care system.

Buffarukus, You put some time and effort into your response, so I’ll try my best to address every point you raised: 1. Interpretations of Poll Percentage Numbers: Acknowledging the enormous and highly nuanced diversity of thought on this subject doesn’t detract from the central point that these are many tiny Venn diagram opinion circles that often overlap. I’d like to see more Roe v. Wade polling data this month, but we may already have an ~80% national consensus on legal protection for the first 12 weeks (plus the usual list of exemptions…rape, mother’s life at risk, etc.). I would NEVER want to shut down the ~20% from expressing their points of view and trying to persuade the ~80%, but we also have time constraints and many other pressing issues to debate! I don’t think the domain of reasonably productive discourse on abortion lies anywhere outside the second trimester interval. By the way, don’t forget that the abortion stats breakdown is this: 90% occurring within the first trimester, 9% within the second, and 1% within the third. So any realistically productive conversations on abortion should be centered around exploring the nature of what’s happening in these (9+1)% cases. 2. Leaving Things Up To The States: You raised a good question of what makes abortion a uniquely federal health/safety issue, in comparison to other ones that are left to states. I haven’t yet thought too deeply on this question, so others here may have better answers. One part of it may have to do with the immense time and energy and cost that is involved with raising another potential human being. Another part of it may be just what ends up being impractical to implement, which is especially true if you have such large deviations between policies on a state-by-state level. I’d also add that sometimes a large percentage of Americans can simply find a state’s behavior way too ethically appalling, as was the situation preceding the 1964 Civil Rights Act and what I expect will be the case once the 13 red state abortion “trigger laws” come into effect. 3. Sundry Left-Wing Hypocrisies: I think we’re mostly in agreement here. No, the Democrats don’t hold any greater integrity than the GOP on numerous other issues and court rulings that you could name. Yes, the Democrats have been using abortion as a political football. I was never much of a COVID Karen, so I’ll acknowledge that point as well. We should note, however, that the left’s argument is that masks/vaccinations are related to the greater public health while abortion services are related to individual health….so it’s not a perfect “my body, my choice” comparison. 4. The Public Paying for Abortion: Yes, I’m a huge proponent of universal health care. I’d start with the United Kingdom version, but I’d eventually want an even more expansive version than that. So am I okay with forcing those Americans who are morally opposed to abortions to pay for these health services? Well…sure. Why? Because Rousseau’s “social contract” (the philosopher, not the defensive end!). I mean, no one is allowing me tax exemptions for my moral opposition to much of our military budget or to meat/dairy farm subsidies! Nor should they. 5. My Own Evolved Stance on Women’s Privacy: I come from an active Catholic family, so I started out very pro-life as a child and have evolved to very pro-choice (in terms of public policy) as a young adult. What mostly changed my opinion was learning about the personal experiences of women who had them and imagining what it would have been like to have “walked a mile in their moccasins,” as they say. You weren’t ever going to have a serious conversation with me. Your strongest rebuttal was going to be a large scary picture of Moloch drawn in crayon.

First of all, “Moloch’s Gaping Maw” is a PERFECT name for a hard rock band. “Moloch” is equally awesome as a slightly edgy name for a pet dog…even more so if the dog is small and ferociously energetic like a corgi! But getting back to the topic at hand, I can’t tell if you are intending to say that a woman who has an abortion is morally irredeemable? Going by Judeo-Christian principles, that is simply untrue. Forgiveness and redemption are two of its core themes, along with all that other important stuff like love, empathy, respect for the poor and the downtrodden, etc… Secular humanism has these same principles too, though I’m not sure if it applies for sociopaths (another topic altogether…). I can’t tell if you instead are intending to say that it is not your personal obligation to educate/persuade a woman from having an abortion? Maybe not, but it is certainly your obligation to educate and persuade others on your moral values IF you want these values to become laws in a democratic society! Lately, the GOP seems to want to hide their least popular ideas behind the Supreme Court and the 10th Amendment. That can be an effective strategy since we do live in a republic and not a democracy, but only up to a point. The political right seems to be careening past that point now. Why do I say that? Simple: Roe v. Wade scientific polling data is at ~30% legal in all cases, ~50% legal but with restrictions (rape, *****, life of mother, health of baby, first trimester only, no third trimester, etc.), and ~20% illegal in all cases. Comparative polling studies can maybe break that ~50% number down to ~35% up through the first trimester only and ~15% up through the second trimester (i.e. up to what is considered the traditional point of viability). In other words, ~80% of Americans are effectively in support of Roe v. Wade, whether or not they realize it. Does anyone here disagree with my numbers? If so, state what you think those 4 numbers (30% + 35% + 15% + 20%) actually are in this country, right now as of May 2022. If you want to talk about “moral imperatives,” I believe it is now my moral imperative to make sure your ~20% stays out of power this November and beyond. I care about all life as well, including the lives of scared and struggling young mothers who are stuck in red states…lives of women whom you castigate and judge for whatever personal reasons…possibly because you get fulfillment from assuming the white knight role for the innocent unborn…in which case I hope you’ll join me in making sure these unborn have universal health care coverage as soon as they are born…??