US Politics

Please tell me when and where I told Ukrainians what to do.

By all means set out reasons why you believe the referendums are not open.

Cascades of video evidence (doorbell cams, CCTV) of ‘election officials’ dragging residents out of their flats to ‘vote’, accompanied by masked, armed russian goons.

Ukrainian relatives and colleagues with direct accounts of family/friends being told in no uncertain terms that they’d have citizenship revoked and worse, if they don’t vote ‘in your best interests’.

That’s just the tip.

Spoiler alert: I’m Ukrainian.

Thanks. Evidence from people on the ground is the most powerful. From that it's safe to say that the Russians will play dirty to win referendums.

They're not going to do a David Cameron and hold one only to lose it. On that basis I still think they will only try it in areas where they think they have a good chance of being able to get away with it. Would they be able to threaten and bully enough people to win a referendum in Lviv? I don't think they would, or if they did try, the degree of violence required would go beyond what they are up for.

At the end of all this the Russians want peace and an end to sanctions. I think they can make enough of an argument to get away with taking Russian speaking areas (and it's not about what's right but what the side with the power can get away with), but if they try it in western Ukraine, or other countries, they won't get sanctions lifted for ages, and that is probably not in their interest.

On tariffs

https://open.substack.com/pub/iandunt/p/guestpost-everything-you-need-to?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=1z1ixv

Stephen Miller's appointment is a rare political action that genuinely deserves the much overused word 'chilling'.

And can you take the Ukraine talk to the Ukraine thread or just start an 'I heart Vlad' one, thanks.

the degree of violence would go beyond what they are up for.

So far it looks an awful lot like they're up sending their own guys to die a lot, but when they don't die they're up for war crimes. Maybe they'll want to chill on the first bit but I think the degree of violence is as much as they can.

At the end of all this the Russians want peace and an end to sanctions

You're talking about the literal invader here. Did you say the same about the US/UK in Iraq?

I mean, Netanyahu wants peace, but he wants it by running out of Palestinians to kill. I guess it's also technically true with Russia, but saying someone wants peace when what they really want is to win at violence on their terms is a bit disingenuous.

To be fair there might be a difference between what Russians (citizens) and Russia (state) want. Don't know if there is, but it's not unimaginable...

Kristi Noem, dog executioner ffs

Putin also invaded Georgia in 2008, in case anyone's forgotten that

Amazing that having complained about immigrants eating dogs, they've now got a certified dog killer running the immigration service. Never not bonkers.

. * Waves in Chechen *

I mean, Netanyahu wants peace, but he wants it by running out of Palestinians to kill. I guess it's also technically true with Russia, but saying someone wants peace when what they really want is to win at violence on their terms is a bit disingenuous.

I'd have thought it was pretty obvious that the Russians, ie their government, wants peace, but on their terms.

I'm not sure Netanyahu wants peace. He has prolonged the war because his government will collapse the moment it ends and then the prosecutors will come knocking. In many ways Israel has been permanently at war since it was founded.

I'd have thought it was pretty obvious that the Russians, ie their government, wants peace

Not only not pretty obvious but I think you're more or less the only person who thinks that.

It would be incredibly easy for Russia to have peace - they could just withdraw from Ukraine.

I'd have thought it was pretty obvious that the Russians, ie their government, wants peace, but on their terms.

I think this is a fairly obfuscated way of saying that the Russians want to win the war they started, and be at the point after - where they've got want they wanted and there's no longer any fighting.

You're right, that probably is obvious. Phrasing it as 'they want peace' is disingenuous and not how most people would describe the situation.

On the swing to Trump among Latinos

https://www.thefp.com/p/latino-democrats-flipped-starr-county-for-trump-republicans

TLDR, Trump appealed to them on inflation and immigration, and they felt the Democrats offered them nothing.

The only argument Democrats seem to have left for these voters is that Trump is a racist. But not a single person I spoke to seemed concerned about that.

“They still haven’t proved how he’s racist,” said Olivares. “He’s not very polished, we all know that. He’s offensive when he speaks. But I’m willing to deal with that if he’s going to put this country back in line.”

^^ I think that's the essence of it, isn't it?

It seemed pretty clear from the off that Putin thought it would be a quick win. So in that sense he never even wanted a "war". Only a successful invasion. But that isn't really the common use definition of peace, is it?

Agreed on Netanyahu though. He couldn't give two shits what the solution is provided there is a route to ensure he's in power and out of jail.

Anyways on the US haven't sorted out the paywall on this yet, but curious to read https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/09/opinion/democrats-identity-politics.html

Very annexdotal but fucking everything seems to have a voter referencing women’s sports.

I don't want to start a discussion about it, but just in terms of how much it impacts the average voter it must be such a fucking tiny occurrence in the average voters life surely?!

I realise you don't necessarily only ever vote for what effects you.

On the swing to Trump among Latinos

TLDR, Trump appealed to them on inflation and immigration, and they felt the Democrats offered them nothing.

The only argument Democrats seem to have left for these voters is that Trump is a racist. >But not a single person I spoke to seemed concerned about that.

'Felt' and 'seem' (to have left) are doing a lot of heavy lifting. Here's an outline of the competing candidates views on the major domestic issues. Plenty of feedback that when these were presented to voters, with the parties removed, they back the democrat ideas. It's not a messaging failure, they just didn't penetrate the media bubble. (below lifted from CBS)

-Harris says she'd provide bigger tax benefits for families but would offset the costs by raising corporate taxes, while Trump has said he'd extend the tax cuts enacted in 2017.
-Under Harris' tax plan, according to an analysis by the Penn Wharton Budget Model, 95% of Americans would see lower taxes, and higher earners would pay more taxes. The top 0.1% — whose annual average income exceeds $14 million — would pay about $167,000 more in taxes.
-Harris wants to eliminate federal taxes on tips, which Trump first proposed.
-She also says she wants to provide a financial cushion for small businesses with a tenfold increase in the startup expense deduction — lifting it from $5,000 to $50,000. New businesses wouldn't need to claim the deduction in their first year, when many take losses and would not be able to use it. Instead, they'd be able to wait until they're profitable and use the deduction at that time. Businesses would also be able to take part of the deduction in one year and save the rest for future years.

Child tax credit

-After Trump's running mate JD Vance pitched boosting the child tax credit to $5,000, up from the current top tax break of $2,000, Harris one-upped Vance's number, suggesting a child tax credit of $6,000, although this would be for the parents of newborns.
Harris also suggests a return to the pandemic-era expansion of the child tax credit, up to $3,600 for young children. She hasn't released income eligibility thresholds, but it's likely that it would phase out for those at higher income levels.

• Earlier this year, Senate Republicans blocked legislation that would have increased the child tax credit.
  
  

Housing shortage

-Harris says she'd address the nation's housing shortage with several initiatives. She promises to build 3 million affordable new homes and rentals by the end of her first term, offering tax breaks to builders who construct homes for first-time home buyers. She's also proposing a $40 billion fund to help local governments find solutions to the low housing stock. And she wants to provide Americans who have paid their rent on time for two years with up to $25,000 in down-payment assistance, with more support for first-generation homeowners.

Inflation

-Inflation has cooled nearly to pre-pandemic levels, but prices have risen nearly 21% since the beginning of the pandemic. A recent survey found two-thirds of middle-income families said they're falling behind their cost of living
-Harris is trying to address the effects of inflation on lower- and middle-class Americans, an approach used by the Biden administration. She blames price gouging by food suppliers and grocery chains for high prices at the store and pledges to take on corporations with the first federal law against price gouging. Economists have expressed doubts about the efficacy of such a law because they say that the reasons for food inflation are complex.
-She also wants to lower prescription drug costs, which has been a focus for the Biden administration. Last month, the White House announced Medicare reached agreements with drug manufacturers for lower prices for 10 drugs that treat a range of ailments, from heart failure and blood clots to diabetes, resulting in savings for patients of 38% to 79%, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. It was Harris who cast the tie-breaking vote for the Inflation Reduction Act, which granted Medicare the drug negotiating authority.

Immigration

-Harris has not yet issued an immigration policy platform. At campaign events, Harris has mostly brought up the bipartisan border security deal that collapsed in Congress earlier this year after Trump urged GOP lawmakers to reject it. Harris has promised to revive the bill and accused Trump of scuttling it for political reasons.
-The legislation would have enacted permanent restrictions on asylum, given the president the power to quickly deport migrants when border crossings soar and boosted the ranks of border agents, deportation officers, immigration judges and asylum adjudicators. It would also have expanded legal immigration, allocating 50,000 new immigrant visas annually for five years.
-While the bipartisan border deal did not include a legalization program for undocumented immigrants — a longtime Democratic priority in immigration negotiations — Harris has expressed support for an "earned" path to citizenship for this population on the campaign trail.
-Julie Chavez Rodriguez, Harris' campaign manager, signaled to CBS News that Harris would likely continue a June order by Mr. Biden that has severely curtailed access to the U.S. asylum system. It's a move officials credit for a four-year-low in illegal border crossings.
Harris' campaign has tried to distance her from the more liberal immigration positions she espoused when she was a presidential candidate in 2020. Those prior positions included an openness to decriminalizing the act of crossing the border without authorization and overhauling Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Abortion

-Harris and Trump have opposing views on abortion access, an issue that could be a crucial motivator for voters in November.

-Both Trump and Harris have highlighted the Supreme Court's reversal of Roe v. Wade in June 2022, and the role that the three justices appointed by Trump played in that landmark decision, albeit for different reasons: Trump has touted his nomination of three of the five justices who voted to overturn Roe, while Harris has criticized her opponent for specifically selecting justices who would dismantle the constitutional right to abortion. Since the high court's decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, nearly one-third of states have near-total bans on the procedure in place, while access to abortion is severely restricted in a handful of others.
-Harris has made abortion rights a focal point of her campaign and lambasted "Trump abortion bans" on the trail.
-In her speech at the Democratic National Convention accepting the party's presidential nominee, the vice president pledged to sign into law legislation that restores the federal right to abortion — if such a bill is passed by Congress.

IVF

-Access to in vitro fertilization services became a campaign issue after the Alabama Supreme Court ruled in February that frozen embryos created during the IVF process could be considered children. The decision threatened the availability of IVF services in Alabama and thrust access to fertility treatments into the national conversation, including among the presidential candidates.

-Harris has repeatedly said she supports the right of women to make their own decisions about their bodies and family-planning, and told the crowd at the DNC that since Roe's reversal, she has heard stories of couples who have had their IVF treatments cut off.
The vice president said in a video shared to social media that Trump "is literally the architect of this entire crisis," and said the Alabama ruling is a "direct result" of the Supreme Court's decision overturning Roe.

Climate

-Harris has not outlined her climate policy yet, but she is expected to continue to pursue the goals of the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, which funded energy and climate projects aimed at reducing carbon emissions by 40% by 2030.

-As vice president, Harris advocates moving the country toward a "clean energy economy" while not completely backing away from oil and gas, which is a major industry in battleground states like Pennsylvania. The Keystone State is one of the top natural gas producers in the country.
-In an interview with CNN, Harris said that as president, she wouldn't ban fracking — a technique for extracting natural gas from shale — a departure from a statement she made in 2019 that she'd support a fracking ban. Citing the creation of 300,000 clean energy jobs during the Biden administration, she told CNN that her experience as vice president shows "we can increase a thriving clean energy economy without banning fracking."
-A Harris campaign spokesperson said 300,000 clean energy jobs were created under the Biden-Harris administration in both 2021 and 2022.
-The Democratic Party platform says it will increase protections against drilling and mining in the Arctic, although U.S. oil production has hit record highs during Mr. Biden's presidency. -Mr. Biden approved almost 50% more gas and oil leases during his time in office than Trump did during his first three years in office.
-Trump has vowed to undo what he calls Biden's "electric vehicle mandate" on Day One in office. A spokesperson for Harris' campaign told Axios Harris doesn't support an electric vehicle mandate. The Biden administration has not issued a mandate, but it has introduced incentives to encourage Americans to buy EVs and set a target that half of all new vehicle sales be zero emissions by 2030.

Guns

• President Biden in 2022 signed the most significant update to gun safety law in almost three decades in the wake of mass shootings in Uvalde, Texas, and New York. The Bipartisan Safer Communities Act augmented background checks for gun buyers under 21, provided billions for mental health services and closed the so-called "boyfriend loophole" to prevent convicted domestic abusers from purchasing a firearm for five years. It also clarified the definition of gun dealers — 26 GOP-led states are suing to block this provision. The measure also creates penalties for straw purchases and gun trafficking. In 2023, Mr. Biden announced the creation of the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention, to be overseen by Harris.
  
• Before she became the nominee, Harris visited Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, the site of the 2018 mass shooting that left 17 dead, where she called on states to pass "red flag" laws, which allow courts to seize guns from those deemed to be a threat to themselves or others. Twenty-one states have enacted red flag laws, but many do not enforce them. She also announced federal funding and resources aimed at providing training and technical assistance to help states with their red flag programs. In 2024, the Justice Department announced the creation of the National Extreme Risk Protection Order Resource Center, dedicated to training and technical assistance to support states and localities in implementing their red flag programs.
  At her speech at the Democratic National Convention, Harris only made passing reference to gun violence. "In this election, many other fundamental freedoms are at stake," she said. "The freedom to live safe from gun violence in our schools, communities and places of worship."
  
  

Education

-As a senator, Harris backed a bill that would have provided tuition-free college for most families.
-The Democratic Party's platform also calls for free college tuition for all. This is not an idea Harris has been discussing on the campaign trail.

Apparently one consequence of the sanctions was that it forced the oligarchs who had taken their wealth abroad to bring it back and invest in Russia - which is exactly what putin had wanted but previously been unable to do.

Apparently UAE property market booming

Especially given Russia is relatively prosperous and Ukraine is a wreck.

while prosperous russian soldiers loot anything from toilets and washing machines to museums, art, graves and raccoons

All this perverse misreading of Putin is bonkers, Alice in Wonderland stuff. Could it please fuck off to the Ukraine thread where I can ignore it?

Interesting article on political involvement / engagement of young men (20-29.)

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2024/11/11/how-trump-won-the-podcast-bros-00188518

Elon spent $200m on helping Trump get elected
https://apnews.com/article/elon-musk-america-pac-trump-d248547966bf9c6daf6f5d332bc4be66
https://bsky.app/profile/jessedamiani.bsky.social/post/3larcpdnfgs2q