6th Democratic Primary Debate Discussion

[tomsches 17,553]

PS: Biden imitating a stuttering child.... was a choice.... yikes. 

[ItsTommyBitch 12,640]

After more reflection:

Winners: Bernie, Warren, Yang, Klobuchar

Meh: Biden

Losers: Steyer and Buttigieg

Yang really had some creative answers and solutions and impressed me  He still talked the least, but I think I agreed with some portion of most of his answers.

He's an interesting candidate, and IMO should probably be in someone's administration whether in an official or unofficial role. I've long wanted a Universal Basic Income, but think his approach to it is sort of conservative so thats my main opposition to him - (cutting off other welfare and making it an either or is mostly an appealto conservatives and libertarians that believe in "working for what you have" and are against "hand outs" so its a somewhat regressive approach IMO. Its similar logic behind Pete's "look I want free college for everyone that makes 150,000 or less, but everyone else can screw off"  )

[Lilmonzter 2,864]

Pete doesn't want a purity test because he will fail abysmally at it as will Biden and all the other corporate shills on the stage except for Bernie Sanders. 

Bernie Sanders/ Nina Turner campaign would be potentially a win for progressives

Big loser to me is pbs they're just full of bs the way the moderated the debate 

[HorusRa2 5,005]

The most remarkable thing about the debate other than Bernie's jab at Joe and Pete for their billionaire donors is Bernie's answer on Afghanistan. For those of you who don't know, Bernie has a very mixed bag with regard to foreign policy (some votes like Iraq where he was right and others like Afghanistan where he was wrong). Progressives and people on the left have been waiting and waiting for Bernie to begin to own up to his past votes like Afghanistan and he absolutely delivered by admitting he did not show the leadership necessary like Barbara Lee did with regard to that vote. Bernie continues to pivot to the left on foreign policy in a way that brings credibility to what he is saying when he says he wants to end the forever wars. This is the most remarkable thing so far this primary (to me) as a Bernie supporter. 

 

The only thing he needs to do now is to speak up for Assange and Snowden and be a true advocate for free speech & the progressive left will have the candidate they have always wanted. 

[LibraLove 1,281]

Overall, I think it may have been the best debate so far. Bernie cam, he saw, he conquered. Pete and Elizabeth at each other's throats was ICONIC.

[Morphine Prince 109,729]

This debate was great. It was SO MUCH better than last month's non-event. 

The less people, the better. 

Sanders did great and even though I don't agree with her stances, Klobuchar shined in this one.  

Everyone made their positions clear and the heated moments didn't cross the line of ridiculousness. 

One of the best debates out the six so far!

[rumours 45,521]

I meant to post this yesterday, but I didn't finish watching it till late last night. For me, this was easily the best debate thus far (despite the weird "hEY iT,s cHRiStmAS gIVe a giFt" question towards the end). As someone who identifies as an independent and isn't loyal to the Democratic party in any capacity, these would be my rankings for last night.

 

Candidates Who Did Well (Ranked from Best to Worst):

Amy Klobuchar (She seemed to finally gain some traction on the debate stage.)

Andrew Yang (He had less time than many but had some fantastic answers. I'm really hoping he will gain in the polls.)

Joe Biden (Well... I never thought I'd type that, but here we are. He focused on his experience with foreign policy and institutional knowledge which was a smart strategy imo. Moreover, he kept the gaffs to a minimum thank god. His best debate performance thus far by a mile.)

 

Candidates Who Did Neither Good Nor Bad (From Best To Worst)

Bernie Sanders (Wasn't his most memorable night... however, he stayed true to his principles and certainly didn't do poorly. He did what he needed to do and was... himself.)

 

Candidates Who Under-performed (From Best To Worst)

Pete Buttigieg (I'd say he had the worst performance of all the moderates by far last night. That being said, I actually thought he won the heated discussion against Warren. We'll get to her in a second...)

Tom Steyer (Didn't really add anything imo. He could have not been there at all, and I wouldn't have felt any different about the debate)

Elizabeth Warren (Okay... She is driving me absolutely crazy. A politician who was once a proponent of actual "Medicare for all" - whether I agree with that idea or not - has now decided to moderate... and also circumvent most direct questions. Moreover, claiming she knew better than economists made my eyes roll to the nth dimension. If you are going to force a progressive agenda, I would at least prefer someone who is ideologically consistent like Bernie. Moreover, as she continues to moderate, I now question what role she plays in the race at all.)

 

Well, that's my 2 cents

[ItsTommyBitch 12,640]

7 minutes ago, rumours said:

I meant to post this yesterday, but I didn't finish watching it till late last night. For me, this was easily the best debate thus far (despite the weird "hEY iT,s cHRiStmAS gIVe a giFt" question towards the end). As someone who identifies as an independent and isn't loyal to the Democratic party in any capacity, these would be my rankings for last night.

 

Candidates Who Did Well (Ranked from Best to Worst):

Amy Klobuchar (She seemed to finally gain some traction on the debate stage.)

Andrew Yang (He had less time than many but had some fantastic answers. I'm really hoping he will gain in the polls.)

Joe Biden (Well... I never thought I'd type that, but here we are. He focused on his experience with foreign policy and institutional knowledge which was a smart strategy imo. Moreover, he kept the gaffs to a minimum thank god. His best debate performance thus far by a mile.)

 

Candidates Who Did Neither Good Nor Bad (From Best To Worst)

Bernie Sanders (Wasn't his most memorable night... however, he stayed true to his principles and certainly didn't do poorly. He did what he needed to do and was... himself.)

 

Candidates Who Under-performed (From Best To Worst)

Pete Buttigieg (I'd say he had the worst performance of all the moderates by far last night. That being said, I actually thought he won the heated discussion against Warren. We'll get to her in a second...)

Tom Steyer (Didn't really add anything imo. He could have not been there at all, and I wouldn't have felt any different about the debate)

Elizabeth Warren (Okay... She is driving me absolutely crazy. A politician who was once a proponent of actual "Medicare for all" - whether I agree with that idea or not - has now decided to moderate... and also circumvent most direct questions. Moreover, claiming she knew better than economists made my eyes roll to the nth dimension. If you are going to force a progressive agenda, I would at least prefer someone who is ideologically consistent like Bernie. Moreover, as she continues to moderate, I now question what role she plays in the race at all.)

 

Well, that's my 2 cents

Well, the study that came out saying that her plan would make the economy worse or be financially impossible was debunked by other  economists, so they were just *wrong*  We should respect academic authority on issues, but we also have to know that economic studies paid for and funded by right wing think tanks should be seen with a grain of salt.

Unfortunately, its in the status quo's interests to not report on those kinds of things because its not as sensational a headline  

Similarly, CNN and most MSM - even MSNBC treats her like the beacon of Progressivism when it is clearly Bernie. Whenever they have questions about progressive policies other than M4A now (and still even then sometimes) they go right to her, and even misattribute parts of Bernie's plans as being hers, because they fundamentally just dont understand progressive politics or policies  Like, saying Warren's 2% wealth tax was the highest proposed when Bernie's 8% was right there, he has the most progressive Immigration policy, most progressive wealth tax, most progressive foreign policy, most progressive climate change policy...

But those questions tend to go to Warren anyway because they don't want us thinking about how good Bernie's policies are and unfortunately it is very easy to paint Warren into a box for being wavering in her beliefs and then say "look, progressives!"  

[rumours 45,521]

29 minutes ago, ItsTommyBitch said:

Well, the study that came out saying that her plan would make the economy worse or be financially impossible was debunked by other  economists, so they were just *wrong*  We should respect academic authority on issues, but we also have to know that economic studies paid for and funded by right wing think tanks should be seen with a grain of salt.

If you can forward me the published academic articles (or even regular articles for that matter) that truly debunk the notion that Warren's wealth tax would not hinder GDP growth if derived revenues are allocated to what the Wharton School describes as "productivity-neutral government programs" (of which the money would absolutely go towards), then please send them! I'll be more than happy to read through them thoroughly and see if your statement that they are "wrong " is legitimate.

Moreover, the notion that the study referenced is funded by "right wing think tanks" appears to be a misrepresentation of the truth. The donors to the program (according to their website), while certainly concentrated among those with significant wealth, are not (for better or for worse) out of line with what is typical among said programs.

 

Total Side Note - I am also concerned regarding the implementation of a widespread wealth tax in general. I'm going to look through her website and see if she is specific regarding what valuation method she will utilize to prescribe a value to said assets. If you (or anyone else) know of the page on her site that specifies this, it'd be awesome if someone sent the link

[Economy 52,932]

I still only got to see the first 1H and 20 minutes but so far my impression of best candidates (also counting past debates too):

 

Climate: Bernie, Bloomberg

Economy: Warren

Racial issues: Yang, Bernie

Military and Foreign Policy: Bernie

 

Overall Warren is my #1 because on economy she's by far my first choice whereas Bernie might beat her in more categories but not by as far a margin

 

Also some racial disparity issues and ability to fight climate change required funds to begin with and are enhanced if economy does well for everyone which I like Warren the best

 

I gotta take the time to finish the rest tho

 

 

[ItsTommyBitch 12,640]

11 hours ago, rumours said:

If you can forward me the published academic articles (or even regular articles for that matter) that truly debunk the notion that Warren's wealth tax would not hinder GDP growth if derived revenues are allocated to what the Wharton School describes as "productivity-neutral government programs" (of which the money would absolutely go towards), then please send them! I'll be more than happy to read through them thoroughly and see if your statement that they are "wrong " is legitimate.

Moreover, the notion that the study referenced is funded by "right wing think tanks" appears to be a misrepresentation of the truth. The donors to the program (according to their website), while certainly concentrated among those with significant wealth, are not (for better or for worse) out of line with what is typical among said programs.

 

Total Side Note - I am also concerned regarding the implementation of a widespread wealth tax in general. I'm going to look through her website and see if she is specific regarding what valuation method she will utilize to prescribe a value to said assets. If you (or anyone else) know of the page on her site that specifies this, it'd be awesome if someone sent the link

I misspoke about "right wing think tanks"

I rather should have stated that policy and analysis done by research organizations is often taken to be interpreted as damning smoking gun evidence of something without much actual understanding of the findings and the potential applications of those findings.

PWMB for example claims to be non partisan, and I've not to see any reports to suggest they are all secretly Republicans - and being based out of Columbia Univ, ive got no reason to believe they are funded by hedge fund managers or anything.

However, articles by journalists have used their analysis/findings in order to frame things unfavorably, and this is sometimes at the behest of conservative backers. (Sometimes it is just... dubious/shitty journalism and bad ethics  ) 

~~~

Anyway, The original summation of this finding from the PWMB is in the NYT:

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/14/business/warren-wealth-tax-economy.html

(It is similarly summarized but with less slant and for no paywall here: 

https://www.thedp.com/article/2019/11/warren-wealth-tax-wharton-budget-model-penn
 NYT has limited free articles, so  )

And the original study itself, which was really annoying to find actually. I had read it before but didn't save it  

https://budgetmodel.wharton.upenn.edu/issues/2019/12/12/senator-elizabeth-warrens-wealth-tax-projected-budgetary-and-economic-effects

~~~
The opposition makes note that the PWBM is flawed because it incorrectly assumes how the revenue raised would be used - either to pay the deficit, or to operate in "productivity-neutral government programs." I don't know why you think that universal programs must be deemed productivity-neutral, when the goal of alleviating the prices of these programs and making them universal is about allowing for more time to be productive? So, no I would say even by the studies own example of investing in Education, these are productivity-boosting programs.

But anyway, these are really quite useless bits of data to mark up because we know that they are objectively NOT the intended goal of the revenue, which is clearly outlined and explicitly stated to be about directly giving that money to public social programs. So, there is no need to model what if scenarios about things that the wealth tax is literally Never going to do outside of just a standard method of operating. It also has assumptions based on how other wealth taxes have worked and assumes this one is the same, even though again it is explicitly different. We only have the historical knowledge of wealth taxes in Europe basically, and they did and didn't work for a plethora of reasons, none of which have been shown to be inherent laws about wealth taxes that cannot be avoided. Basically, it would be more accurate to state "If Warren's wealth tax is spent on paying the deficit or to government programs that don't create more productivity, it may cause a decline in the GDP" 

https://theweek.com/articles/878431/elizabeth-warrens-wealth-tax-wont-hurt-economic-growth (Some of the links to studies and articles in this one are worth reading if you feel like it)

http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/11/penn-wharton-budget-model-study-warren-wealth-tax-would-slow-growth-on-earth-2.html

http://www.levyinstitute.org/pubs/op_60.pdf 

(this one is just a short blurb that IMO underscores progressive economic thinking re: inequality and taxes and calls out some of the flaws of our currently generally conservative view of the economy in America)

To be fair, the PWMB's data on the possibility of using the money in productivity-boosting government programs is the most applicable, and it still shows a slight decline, but its also worth noting that they don't even have all of the appropriate data on the social programs that are meant to be funded and whether the return on investment in them could equal or surpass the projected loss, which they estimate would need to be ~15 cents/dollar or more. The one program they do have data on - Early Childhood Education - estimates 7-10, some higher estimates of 13. Things like Early Childhood Education do create delayed returns obviously, but that doesn't bother me - they say this in the study as well.

Considering that again Warren's Wealth Tax plans to invest in multiple, "productivity-boosting government programs" as they define them, IMO it is quite irresponsible to post a study saying that if you only invest in 1 thing, it won't alleviate the potential decline when we know that it plans to invest in multiple things. This means that with more information on the several other avenues of investment, it is more than possible that it could actually break this investment and result in Growth, just logically speaking.  

It's even more problematic that the headline most groups that have reported on this (some having a right wing slant, others non partisan) is assuming the scenario that is not reality - that the revenue is going towards paying the deficit.

So, the methodology is only partially relevant to reality, and it has business and wealthy friendly assumptions baked into it, some of which are assumptions based on what has been and not what this wealth tax wants to actually do.  It should be taken with a grain of salt  

Furthermore, and this article is a bit more lax and opinionated/sarcastic and arguably partisan, but I think it's relevant -

https://slate.com/business/2019/12/elizabeth-warren-wealth-tax-analysis-penn-wharton.html

Warren's estimate of how much money it would generate is off by $1 trillion according to PWMB, mostly by proxy of its estimates of avoidance and the number of households affected by the tax. Basically, they assume more tax avoidance, and Warren's assumes less. The slate article makes a good point though; this still means that a wealth tax of 2-3% (its now 2-6%) is likely to be successful in raising a hell of a lot of money in 10 years even when you assume heavy tax avoidance. Now ofc, the PWMB didn't come out with a study saying that "Warren's wealth tax would raise a lot of money, even if people avoid taxes" even though it is also what they have found  

But what this misses is the fact that Elizabeth Warren is running to be President of the Executive Branch of the United States, and has a plan to tackle tax avoidance that America currently 1) doesn't do, and 2) doesn't enforce even though its on the books so to speak. So, I think it is quite reasonable to assume the impact of tax avoidance on revenue will probably be somewhere between the established high avoidance estimate of the PWMB and the low avoidance estimate of the Warren campaign, unless you just don't think Warren has any intentions of putting her foot down on tax avoidance, and she very explicitly says that she does - even modest success would make the $1 trillion off estimate less than so.

Economics is a social science just like Sociology, Anthropology, Education, Psychology, etc. It is still a believable science, but it is susceptible to biases especially when it comes to thought experiments and theoretical models, wherein underlying assumptions can very easily undermine the results of research or an investigation because the real world applications of those models might not directly map out with their projections. It's something to keep in mind. Our knowledge of economics is not inherent, its socially derived from the history and analyses of past economic models and extrapolated to an understanding of "Economy" in general.

~~~

Ultimately, I would like to point out that in my worldview, were the years under a wealth tax to in fact yield a less dynamic, less robust economy by the numbers, it would not be bad to me. If American "dynamism" is a byproduct of oppression, lower life expectancy, unliveable wages, decreasing life prospects, and stifling of individual success.... then its entirely my belief that we should re-examine our priorities as a society towards one that is less by this definition "dynamic". So while I am fine having a discussion based on the #s, methodology, applicability of studies, it's really not that important to my bigger point.

 

[pachinko 10,757]

Wow, I really was blown away by Amy. Her passion is evident.