Warren 2020 Campaign in turmoil after Iowa?

[Gov Hooka 8,008]

46 minutes ago, Luc said:

Warren was my favourite candidate for a long time, but I think I'm quite pragmatic in this. Warren has better policies than Bernie in my opinion, but she doesn't have the kind of following or 'legacy' that Bernie does, and would've had more trouble winning the GE against Trump than Bernie will.

The only sad thing is that with Bernie, you get all of the stuff that comes with him, mostly his supporters. I hope Bernie supporters (including many on GGD) see that all the conspiracies, the Bernie-or-bust attitude, attacking other candidates so harshly, basically making your base look like a Trump-like cult, is not appealing to me and probably quite a lot of other people.

It's always hilarious to me when people don't support Bernie because of his supporters... As if one should determine their candidate based on the behavior of that candidate's supporters instead of their policies...  And then compare his admittedly passionate and at times rabid subsection of his base to Trump's. The differences couldn't be any more different.  One is completely made up of racists, xenophobes, etc... The other is just a bunch of over zealous passionate Chads and Brads that I personally find annoying but considering my gay poc identity, I feel safe around them. Cant say the same for Trump supporters. 

[Luc 4,776]

11 minutes ago, ItsTommyBitch said:

 

I still don't agree that a wealth tax would make us unable to afford the programs he is proposing...

BUT, I have evolved on this issue a bit recently, and I think its actually a better marketing strategy to make a wealth tax more about power/wealth redistribution rather than as a means of the way that we must pay for everything proposed.

That money can still be used towards those purposes (but it is not the sole means of paying for any single plan proposed, as I've said) but I think all of us, especially in America, fall into a trap of being too focused on the specific elements of how it will affect mathematical models and less on bending and reshaping those models to reflect a new reality. That sounds really hippy-dippy, but I mean it  Our system is not inherent, it works to serve us and we can decide to make it work differently to quite some extent. I understand why people are so focused on certain elements, aggressively so often, but I do think that many people don't understand Sanders' theory of change very much, and it certainly is pretty revolutionary. Y'all should watch videos and clips and read the words of a YOUNG Bernie Sanders (he was hot too tbh  ) arguing that the profit motive isnt inherent to the human spirit and much more to really get a sense of how his politics have been shaped throughout his life.

We've literally been over this like 3x before   but you still aren't getting my point, and I was responding to the message of why Warren could be considered a centrist, or center-left leaning, but bernie is not far left, even though some of his plans are in your words more "aggressive" than his european counterparts he likes to mention. I think I answered that and you havent refuted it here, this ^ comment is a question about how you feel about a wealth tax as a means of revenue generation for social programs... which is a separate topic from how "left" it makes a person's political views

To resummarize, it is the goals, worldview, ideology that informs things like the numbers, not the other way around necessarily.

A 3% wealth tax is more indicative of a capitalist-friendly mentality (center), whereas an 8% is more indicative of a capitalist-skeptical mentality (center-left). Neither is something like "a 100% inheritance tax upon death" (which would be pure meritocracy and remove people's ability to pass on wealth to their descendents) or a fully decentralized government, etc. That is the far left, not what Bernie proposes at all.

~~~

And I'm not talking about demographic size... The income inequality in canada just for example is less than it is in America just by a national indexing average, which is a calculable stat, amongst other indicators.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_inequality_metrics

I did not mean to imply "we have 300 million people therefore we need 30x the taxes of a country of 10 million" if that's the impression it gave. Rather, I am saying that the scale of our problems with income inequality outweighs the scale of income inequality of some other places, that they happen to also be smaller countries with less immediate need for redistributive forces (such as in the Scandinavian model) is more of an aftereffect of how our histories have shaped out than by design.

America for example was entirely built on highly capitalist slave labor and secession of the elite class from a parent country, despite how we often think of it (yes, the founders weren't the "middle class" average Joe, lmfao they were wealthy highly educated elites)

I don't know the *entire* history of Sweden to compare, but I know enough to know its different.

I'm off topic though  PM me if you want to go on with this.

OT: Warren's first name is Elizabeth and her dog's name is Bailey. There was a large inflatable balloon of him made for a rally or something once that had her 2 cent wealth tax on it in the form of two pennies for his collar. It's a meme in niche leftist circles now as "Big Structural Bailey"

Centre, centre-left, far-left, they're political terms that derive their meaning from context. It makes no sense to act like the context does not matter, and that you could say that capitalist-friendly vs. capitalist-critical vs. non- or anti-capitalist can specifically delineate the differences between centre, centre-left and far-left. Bernie Sanders is the most left-wing politician in the US senate, and the most left-wing presidential candidate from the Democrats in forever. In the US context, Sanders is far-left. Even in a European context, Sanders would still be somewhere between left and far-left. That's not wrong per se. Warren is quite the typical social democrat, from a European context. Sanders certainly stands to the left of that. In the US context, Warren is somewhere between centre-left and left. 

Not many Europeans like to say this, because we don't want to ruin the leftist narrative that is emerging in the US, but our healthcare stopped being as free as it was, our college tuition stopped being as free and subsidized as it was, our education isn't as good anymore, our taxes have been reduced enormously, etc. We've had our fair share of neo-liberalism, and places like Denmark and Sweden can no longer be called social democratic anymore by your own definition. European countries do have universal healthcare, but health insurance is usually privatized. We have good pension systems, but the retirement age has been increased to around 70 in most countries or is gradually being increased towards that age. In Sweden, the inheritance tax was abolished (!) and the wealth tax was abolished (!). The corporate tax rate is 21,4% in Sweden, 22% in Denmark, going down to 22.5% in the Netherlands, you get my point. Wealth inequality is, in fact, bigger in Sweden than in the US.

[Gov Hooka 8,008]

8 minutes ago, Luc said:

Wealth inequality is, in fact, bigger in Sweden than in the US.

Not true.

https://data.oecd.org/inequality/income-inequality.htm

Sweden has a Gini coefficient of .28 and the US has .39

 

[ItWasntLaauv 6,392]

Byyyyyyyye!!!!! 

[Economy 52,861]

15 minutes ago, Luc said:

Centre, centre-left, far-left, they're political terms that derive their meaning from context. It makes no sense to act like the context does not matter, and that you could say that capitalist-friendly vs. capitalist-critical vs. non- or anti-capitalist can specifically delineate the differences between centre, centre-left and far-left. Bernie Sanders is the most left-wing politician in the US senate, and the most left-wing presidential candidate from the Democrats in forever. In the US context, Sanders is far-left. Even in a European context, Sanders would still be somewhere between left and far-left. That's not wrong per se. Warren is quite the typical social democrat, from a European context. Sanders certainly stands to the left of that. In the US context, Warren is somewhere between centre-left and left. 

Not many Europeans like to say this, because we don't want to ruin the leftist narrative that is emerging in the US, but our healthcare stopped being as free as it was, our college tuition stopped being as free and subsidized as it was, our education isn't as good anymore, our taxes have been reduced enormously, etc. We've had our fair share of neo-liberalism, and places like Denmark and Sweden can no longer be called social democratic anymore by your own definition. European countries do have universal healthcare, but health insurance is usually privatized. We have good pension systems, but the retirement age has been increased to around 70 in most countries or is gradually being increased towards that age. In Sweden, the inheritance tax was abolished (!) and the wealth tax was abolished (!). The corporate tax rate is 21,4% in Sweden, 22% in Denmark, going down to 22.5% in the Netherlands, you get my point. Wealth inequality is, in fact, bigger in Sweden than in the US.

I honestly get the feeling a lot of Americans think the rest of the developed world is a lot more socialist than it actually is when they make comments like "Bernie is not that far left by international standards"

 

I think a big issue in the US is a huge military budget (I applaud Bernie for wanting that reduced btw) and it takes a lot of money that could be spent elsewhere in social services not available

 

The healthcare system specifically also is a very inefficient for profit system that costs so much and has terrible general coverage

 

When it comes to things like taxes, Corporate taxes, income taxes, capital gains taxes etc, most Nations are not as far left relative to the US as many Americans think. A little bit yes but not significantly

 

I don't know if I ever mentioned this to  @ItsTommyBitch but our top income tax bracket is actually lower than the US (33% vs 37%), Our Corporate taxes are also lower than the US (15% vs 21%) although different loophole rules and States/Province taxes make it hard to make a true proper comparison 

 

Before Trumps tax cuts and Trudeau's hikes (Conservatives before him had top bracket at 29%) our gaps were even bigger

 

At least in terms of redistribution... The US is not significantly more to the right than many Nations...

 

The lack of services I think stems more from #1 poor healthcare system they have because Universal is way cheaper than insurance for profit based #2 military budget taking too many resources

[PartySick 172,545]

35 minutes ago, Marilyn MonHoe said:

I sent you a whole bunch of Sanders gifs PartySick, don’t let me down 

As soon as I have the time to go back and bookmark them I'll make you proud

[Whispering 18,865]

This sounds like that sexual harassment mess in Bernie’s campaign. Warren needs to get this Nevada office cleaned up and back on track.

Sounds like the money is starting to slow down for candidates that aren’t making headway. This is what happens during primary season in a big field. 

Warren is still my top choice at the moment, but I have a couple of other candidates I like that I might vote for if they are more in the running by the time my state rolls around. 

[Luc 4,776]

7 hours ago, Gov Hooka said:

Not true.

https://data.oecd.org/inequality/income-inequality.htm

Sweden has a Gini coefficient of .28 and the US has .39

 

That's income inequality.

 

See wealth inequality here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_wealth_equality

Sweden has a gini of 0.865, the US 0.852

It's for different reasons, but an important point to make. If we're saying that the US needs to make up for all of the wealth inequality that already exists, and thus needs to impose a wealth tax of 8%, to get 'near' countries like Sweden, then you're pretty much saying something that's wrong. Sweden has more wealth inequality, and Sweden has no wealth tax and no inheritance tax. Europe is not as socialist as it used to be, anymore. And in fact, democratic socialism tends to lead to more wealth inequality because the middle class doesn't need to save for future hospital bills and such anymore.

[ItsTommyBitch 12,640]

I thought I had responded, but now my response is gone and I'm not rewriting all of it because it was rather long, so I'll try to be sort of brief for once, but no promises  

Wealth inequality and income inequality are obviously different. A wealth tax is just one means of addressing overall economic inequality, all of which however has the potential for serious harm to a society in macro and uniform ways (lower life expectancy, less happiness/more despair, increased social tension, crime, etc.) even though they may take shape uniquely to the society impacted.

he case for the #s of a wealth tax isn't about conforming to a pre-existing model, that's literally just a means of explaining in shorthand  for average and low information (usually) Americans who have no idea of what leftist politics or economics look like beyond the disparate realities of Venezuela and the Nordic Model  Obviously the concept of the Nordic Model as its been immortalized doesn't capture the complexity of current reality, so I apologize if it seems like I am trying to minimize neoliberalism's globalness and impact ... I have no belief that Europe is a magical socialist utopia of perfection...

That is to say, please excuse me for not going out of my way to asterisk* every claim for footnotes of clarification - no snark intended  This is obviously a subject that is written about in books, theses, dissertations of vast sizes and Many many things are simplifications. For that reason, I am not saying "we need to copy the nordic model to the tee, because only then will we be able to call our politics "left" as opposed to "center-left" or anything like that. IDGAF to be frank what % wealth tax is or isnt used where or how when I think of political identity, my entire case was trying to say that it's not about the #s at all.

The first bit seemed unnecessary to me, knowledge and language are as you say contextual. That's why I picked a specific context to make my point and try to ground things around. I picked that definition just for simplicity's sake. I personally prefer to look at the history of leftist politics holistically and make the case for finding commonalities in the expression of leftist politics and socialism's role in it rather than rely on the words of one or two dead academics to define it for us.  It's just a useful jumping off point.

[Lilmonzter 2,864]

All jump off the sinking ship 

[Petie Estie 5,707]

this primary has been so annoying. she took responsibility and they're working on addressing the concerns. Another warren controversy that looks bad but is actually fine. I'm glad bernie is winning because people's inability to think for themselves and read primary sources tanked Warren. 

[Mister G 10,512]

18 hours ago, JusKeepBreathin said:

Her supporters can rally behind Buttigieg if she bows out. 

I see them splitting between Bernie, Biden and Pete. Not sure about the 60/40 split @HorusRa2 mentioned. I know people here in Delaware that are big supporters of Biden and Warren, so chances are dependent on who drops out first. I foresee Warren and Biden supporters going full circle if one of them doesn’t make it further.

[Petie Estie 5,707]

16 hours ago, Gov Hooka said:

It's always hilarious to me when people don't support Bernie because of his supporters... As if one should determine their candidate based on the behavior of that candidate's supporters instead of their policies...  And then compare his admittedly passionate and at times rabid subsection of his base to Trump's. The differences couldn't be any more different.  One is completely made up of racists, xenophobes, etc... The other is just a bunch of over zealous passionate Chads and Brads that I personally find annoying but considering my gay poc identity, I feel safe around them. Cant say the same for Trump supporters. 

comparing bernie to trump is really annoying. But I think it's a legitimate concern if you don't want even more of America to turn into whatever online Bernie discourse is. 

[Maleficent 6]

18 hours ago, StarstruckIllusion said:

I smell the end yup! It’s just a mess of epic proportions. 

I used to stan her so much but she just wasn’t it at the end. Maybe if the centrist didn’t jump out... 

so when will the avi change 

[Buddy 5,686]

I don't see her dropping out until after Super Tuesday 

I don't think she expects to get more than second and third in NH, NV, or SC. And she will probably will get second or third.