American Politics VII: Virginia Reel

[Ifreann]

Yeah, green energy companies they should just use the huge amounts of wealth they've accrued over the centuries to bribe the government into letting them operate.

I mean it'd be kinda funny and poetic if the fossil fuel lobby who've been trying to keep our country perpetually stuck in the 70s suddenly got upstaged by a green energy lobby. I mean sure, yeah, lobbying is bad but fuck it would be hilarious to see the coal and oil industries beaten at their own game.

It would be funny, but it's not remotely possible. Green energy can't fund a lobbying effort because the thing they need to lobby the government about is being allowed to operate, i.e. the thing they need to do to make the money they would spend on lobbying.

[Kowani]

this is, for the record, not how money works

but also, yes, these programs were mostly promised during the campaign trail and remain overwhelmingly popular
88% support for drug price negotiation, 90% support for Medicare expansion to include vision/hearing/dental, 66% for lowering the Medicare enrollment age
63% for free community college
The paid family leave proposals are extremely popular even among the GOP
65% for the Civilian Climate Corps

like there are things here you could probably attack if you tried but the vast majority of the bill (the parts we have polling for) are very popular

Unfortunately, the popularity of different measures is not the main determinant of how American politics works or what the government does.

If history is a guide, all the GOP has to do is pick apart the reconciliation bill and find 1-2 unpopular provisions, then just campaign on that.

issue salience and time!
if they could do that, they would have done so already-this has been on the table for months
but they can't find an issue that's both unpopular and sticks in people's minds enough to poison the bill-especially when there's no convenient black man to attach it to
hence why they attack the bill as a whole

[Shrillland]

Lobbying should be banned altogether but...I kinda agree with this point. They need to start lobbying too.

A lobbying ban sounds great in theory because one's mind always goes to evil oil execs and the like but there are times when lobbying isn't only justified but even life-saving.

In 2016 the DEA wanted to ban kratom and in doing so would have killed thousands and ruined hundreds of thousands of lives. Parents with fibromyalgia who could finally play with their kids at the park, recovering addicts who stayed clean from opioids for years thanks to this wonderful plant, all the pain patients left suffering due to the overcorrection of the opioid crisis that even left some terminal cancer sufferers without adequate pain meds, and people like me, thanks to this plant my depression has been manageable for the last six years, I no longer engage in self-destructive behavior, without it I might be abusing hard drugs or wind up in a psych ward.

Stopping that ban wouldn't have been possible without lobbying.

That's why I'm not opposed to lobbying or "special interests". When you stop and think about your situation as a person, you are likely part of at least five of those special interest groups that you often lambast.

[Outer Sparta]

A lobbying ban sounds great in theory because one's mind always goes to evil oil execs and the like but there are times when lobbying isn't only justified but even life-saving.

In 2016 the DEA wanted to ban kratom and in doing so would have killed thousands and ruined hundreds of thousands of lives. Parents with fibromyalgia who could finally play with their kids at the park, recovering addicts who stayed clean from opioids for years thanks to this wonderful plant, all the pain patients left suffering due to the overcorrection of the opioid crisis that even left some terminal cancer sufferers without adequate pain meds, and people like me, thanks to this plant my depression has been manageable for the last six years, I no longer engage in self-destructive behavior, without it I might be abusing hard drugs or wind up in a psych ward.

Stopping that ban wouldn't have been possible without lobbying.

That's why I'm not opposed to lobbying or "special interests". When you stop and think about your situation as a person, you are likely part of at least five of those special interest groups that you often lambast.

The problem largely is with corporate lobbying and dark money interests that basically outnumber everyone else like 10:1.

[Corrian]

Lobbying should be banned altogether but...I kinda agree with this point. They need to start lobbying too.

A lobbying ban sounds great in theory because one's mind always goes to evil oil execs and the like but there are times when lobbying isn't only justified but even life-saving.

In 2016 the DEA wanted to ban kratom and in doing so would have killed thousands and ruined hundreds of thousands of lives. Parents with fibromyalgia who could finally play with their kids at the park, recovering addicts who stayed clean from opioids for years thanks to this wonderful plant, all the pain patients left suffering due to the overcorrection of the opioid crisis that even left some terminal cancer sufferers without adequate pain meds, and people like me, thanks to this plant my depression has been manageable for the last six years, I no longer engage in self-destructive behavior, without it I might be abusing hard drugs or wind up in a psych ward.

Stopping that ban wouldn't have been possible without lobbying.

Okay, ban corporate lobbying then maybe? But yeah, I agree, not all lobbying is actually bad.

[Saiwania]

It would be funny, but it's not remotely possible. Green energy can't fund a lobbying effort because the thing they need to lobby the government about is being allowed to operate, i.e. the thing they need to do to make the money they would spend on lobbying.

Green energy sector has still made profits despite any obstacles, because it works. Plus if solar and wind doesn't have enough spare money to lobby, nuclear power could perhaps align with it naturally, even if nuclear power isn't the cleanest. Nuclear fission is carbon free, but produces radioactive waste/byproducts that have to be contained or repurposed. Still a good option in the sense that the downside can be managed whilst the upside is compelling if none of the other options for green energy aren't intermittent.

[Shrillland]

A lobbying ban sounds great in theory because one's mind always goes to evil oil execs and the like but there are times when lobbying isn't only justified but even life-saving.

In 2016 the DEA wanted to ban kratom and in doing so would have killed thousands and ruined hundreds of thousands of lives. Parents with fibromyalgia who could finally play with their kids at the park, recovering addicts who stayed clean from opioids for years thanks to this wonderful plant, all the pain patients left suffering due to the overcorrection of the opioid crisis that even left some terminal cancer sufferers without adequate pain meds, and people like me, thanks to this plant my depression has been manageable for the last six years, I no longer engage in self-destructive behavior, without it I might be abusing hard drugs or wind up in a psych ward.

Stopping that ban wouldn't have been possible without lobbying.

Okay, ban corporate lobbying then maybe? But yeah, I agree, not all lobbying is actually bad.

Alas, it would require an Amendment to say that corporations aren't people. The people want it, the Republican Party does not, so it can't get ratified.

[Kowani]

In Pennsylvania, a ban on lobbyist gifts fails again

In late January of last year, shortly before the coronavirus pandemic arrived in force, the head of the Pennsylvania state Senate, Jake Corman, took a trip to the Bahamas, where he attended a conference at an oceanside luxury hotel. The trip was sponsored by the Pennsylvania Bar Association for its mid-year meeting, and it wasn’t disclosed until this past May, when Corman, a Republican, reported the trip’s value at $3,828, part of the over $8,500 he received last year in gifted travel.

Pennsylvania is one of eight states that allow lawmakers to accept unlimited gifts of any value, including from lobbyists and others seeking to influence government. According to a summary of state statute from the National Conference on State Legislatures, the sole prohibition in the commonwealth is an explicit quid pro quo—say, an official promising a vote in exchange for a gift. Otherwise, elected officials are only required to disclose gifts worth $250 and up, or transportation and hospitality worth $650 and up, in broad terms, in annual statements of financial interest to the State Ethics Commission.

For decades, advocates for good government in Pennsylvania have pressed to pass a law establishing a gift ban in the state, to curb lobbyist influence and defuse the appearance of impropriety. Gifts of tickets to sports events and concerts are common, as are corporate donations to community events sponsored by politicians. In 2016, state Rep. Eli Evankovich reported a nearly $6,000 trip to New Zealand paid for by the country’s Parliament, while state Rep. Angel Cruz jetted to a December event in Hawaii.

Recent reports from the legislature indicate that only a small fraction of the gifts lawmakers receive from lobbyists are being disclosed. In October 2019, a House Government Oversight Committee report found that in 2018, lobbyists disclosed spending nearly $1.5 million on gifts, but only $39,262 was identified in reports from lawmakers—less than 3% of the total. In 2017, the discrepancy was even more glaring: over $1.65 million worth of gifts given and only $32,318 reported. The committee was then chaired by Republican Rep. Seth Grove.

This summer, activist group MarchOnHarrisburg continued its campaign for the legislature to pass a bill that would strengthen restrictions on gift-giving to increase trust in government. Group leaders tell Sludge that passing gift ban legislation is supported by Republican leaders in the state House and some in the state Senate, where it has floundered in the past.

However, this week, the chair of the House State Government Committee—Rep. Grove, whose previous committee issued the analysis of gift giving—did not put the bill on the agenda for the September 14 public hearing on lobbying reform and disclosure, indicating it still faces an uphill climb to a full vote in the chamber. Witnesses at the hearing discussed a package of bills put forward by House Speaker Bryan Cutler, a Republican, which included items such as prohibiting campaign consultants from concurrently being registered lobbyists. But legislators on the committee did not address the gift ban, and MarchOnHarrisburg members said that Grove would not commit to placing the bill they support on a future agenda.

Rabbi Michael Pollack, executive director of MarchOnHarrisburg, told Sludge that if the group is stymied in key committees, they will continue with protests like the ones over the past few years that have kept up pressure for a gift ban. “We’re disappointed—what the committee proposed is incredibly weak, less than the bare minimum. Anything that doesn’t include a gift ban isn’t real ethics reform,” Pollack said. “Chairman Grove has told us half a dozen times that he’s for the gift ban, but the lobbying reforms they’re pitching are making it easier for lobbyists to do business.” [...] Executive branch officials have been subject to a gift ban from lobbyists since 2015, when Governor Tom Wolf, a Democrat now in his second term, signed an order and called on the legislature to follow suit. [...] The Senate version of the legislation supported by MarchOnHarrisburg, Senate Bill 401, would bar public officials and employees from taking gifts from lobbyists or other people who seek official action from them, limit gifts of value like travel and entertainment, and cap gifts at $50 maximum value, with no more than $250 able to be accepted during a year. Introduced in March by Republican state Sen. Lisa Baker and referred to the State Government Committee, the Senate bill currently has seven bipartisan cosponsors—though not yet Senator David Argall, chair of the committee, who has not yet moved it.

Currently, the process to review a Pennsylvania lawmaker’s gift reports for past years is to search the individual’s name and review their Statement of Financial Interest form’s entries on Line 11, for gifts from a single source that add up to $250 or more per year, and Line 12, for transportation, lodging, and hospitality from a single source that add up to $650 or more per year.

At the June protest, Jamaal Henderson, a member of ACT UP and the Pennsylvania Poor People’s Campaign, addressed those gathered, saying, “Every time you come up here, you always hear that one party is blocking the other one. There comes a time when we have to realize, this is not a partisan issue. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a Republican or a Democrat, nobody wants to see corruption in their government… at the end of the day, whatever you’re standing for, gifts are getting in your way.”

“When corporate bill mill ALEC sponsors legislation, it gets fast-tracked through the House and the Senate and becomes law,” MarchOnHarrisburg organizer Rachel Murphy said at the protest. “They’re being lobbied by corporations and getting gifts too… it is our right to say, ‘You have failed us for 20 years by refusing to pass this reform that we all agree on.’” [...] Pollack said that a state house insider told him of the gift ban bill, “You all might be marching to pass it, but every single lobbyist in the city is marching against it.”

[The Jamesian Republic]

Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) becomes the first sitting congressman to explicitly embrace the Great Replacement conspiracy theory

the ride never ends

Why this fuck is still in Congress is a ridiculous thing in itself.

What in the name of Jesus is the “Great Replacement Theory.” I’d rather just have someone explain it to me rather than go crazy from looking it up.

[Shrillland]

Why this fuck is still in Congress is a ridiculous thing in itself.

What in the name of Jesus is the “Great Replacement Theory.” I’d rather just have someone explain it to me rather than go crazy from looking it up.

The idea that non-whites will one day replace whites in the developed world and that it's the duty of all white people to keep it from happening. It's oversimplified, but it's the basic thesis.

[Madrinpoor]

What in the name of Jesus is the “Great Replacement Theory.” I’d rather just have someone explain it to me rather than go crazy from looking it up.

The idea that non-whites will one day replace whites in the developed world and that it's the duty of all white people to keep it from happening. It's oversimplified, but it's the basic thesis.

It's just insane nativism.

[North Washington Republic]

Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) becomes the first sitting congressman to explicitly embrace the Great Replacement conspiracy theory

the ride never ends

Why this fuck is still in Congress is a ridiculous thing in itself.

Because the motherfucker is a sociopath that engages in sex trafficking of minors.

[Kowani]

Expanding the Child Tax Credit!

House Democrats don’t just want to expand their signature Child Tax Credit payment program, they also want to redefine what it means to be someone's child.

As part of their sweeping reconciliation plan, they are proposing to overhaul, for the first time in almost a generation, the legal definition of a child that’s used to claim the hugely popular break. But that's not as simple as it sounds, and implementing it could become a bureaucratic nightmare.

Lawmakers want to make the definition more expansive, so that more people can claim the benefit worth up to $3,600 per child. They’re proposing to dump long-standing rules requiring a child to be a relative of the person taking the credit.


Instead, they want to award the money to whoever is caring for the child, regardless of whether they’re related.

That’s designed to be more flexible and to accommodate people in a wider variety of living situations — researchers say hundreds of thousands of kids are currently ineligible for the benefit because they live with, say, a family friend.

"Nobody can claim kids who are being raised by someone who is not a close relative — those kids just get cut off from the break entirely,” said Jacob Goldin, a former Treasury official who now teaches at Stanford University’s law school.

But some warn what Democrats are proposing would be complicated and difficult for the already beleaguered IRS to enforce.

It could also be confusing to taxpayers because lawmakers would not change the definition of a child used for other tax benefits such as the Earned Income Tax Credit — forcing people to navigate multiple tax definitions of a child. But Democrats are also proposing a number of changes in how the credit program would work, one of most significant of which deals with the definition of a child.

Lawmakers have periodically battled over how to define children for tax purposes, which affects people seeking not just the Child Tax Credit, but also the EITC, a dependent care break and head-of-household filing status.

Congress hasn’t made major changes in the area though since 2004, when, amid complaints the tax code had too many conflicting definitions of a child, lawmakers tried to create a more uniform standard.

The current rules recognize that not every child lives in a traditional nuclear family and don’t require someone to be a parent in order to take the credit. But they stipulate the child must be a relative, with a list of accepted relations that includes sons, daughters, foster children, brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews and grandchildren, among others.

The child also must live with the person claiming the credit for more than half the year.

But there has been growing attention to those left out of that formula.

People at the bottom of the income ladder — the main target of Democrats’ Child Tax Credit initiative — are more likely to have idiosyncratic living situations, researchers say. About 330,000 kids don’t qualify for the monthly payments because they live with a cousin or neighbor or someone else the IRS says isn’t a close relative, Goldin estimates.

“The kids who get excluded under the current relationship test are a lot of the kids who would benefit most from receiving the financial benefits of the CTC,” he says.

Beginning in 2023, House Democrats would drop that rule. In its place, they’d require people claiming the benefit to be someone who provides uncompensated care for a child, including supervising their daily activities. That would also include maintaining a “secure environment” in which the child lives; arranging for their medical care; and being involved in "financial and other support" for education "or similar activities of the individual.”

In addition, a child would no longer have to live with someone for more than half a year to qualify. Under Democrats’ plan, that residency requirement would be calculated monthly, so children would only have to live with a person for more than half a month to qualify for that month’s payment.

Some children live different places over the course of a year, and Democrats’ plan would allow multiple people to take the credit for the kid, although not at the same time.

Lawmakers would also have the IRS set up a system to settle disputes when more than one person claims the same child.

A spokesperson for Ways and Means Committee Chair Richard Neal (D-Mass.) did not respond to requests for comment.

[Kilobugya]

Progressives already said they will vote down the bill if they don’t get their way. They are not blameless here.

That's only because they know very well that once the "bipartisan" bill is passed, the "moderates" will torpedo anything else. So they can't allow that to happen. And passing only the "bipartisan" bill won't change much compared to passing nothing.

[Page]

progressives don't need to do anything
we have the numbers-the problem is with a small group of conservative democrats (ranging from 3-9) trying to sink the entire thing
go yell at gottheimer and rice

Progressives already said they will vote down the bill if they don’t get their way. They are not blameless here.

Progressives are to blame but for literally the opposite reason.

[Great Algerstonia]

I think all of our problems can be solved by simply giving people more hugs

[Lady Victory]

I think all of our problems can be solved by simply giving people more hugs

I think all our problems can be solved through revolution.

[Page]

I think all of our problems can be solved by simply giving people more hugs

I think all our problems can be solved through revolution.

¿Por qué no los dos?

[San Lumen]

I think all of our problems can be solved by simply giving people more hugs

I think all our problems can be solved through revolution.

I think it could be solved if we our leaders worked together and stop treating each other like the enemy.

[Washington Resistance Army]

I think all our problems can be solved through revolution.

I think it could be solved if we our leaders worked together and stop treating each other like the enemy.

Genuinely impossible when they have such wildly differing worldviews and no existential threat (ie the USSR) to Other.

[Tarsonis]

I think it could be solved if we our leaders worked together and stop treating each other like the enemy.

Genuinely impossible when they have such wildly differing worldviews and no existential threat (ie the USSR) to Other.

Sure we do, but even that is subject to political whims. Like in 2012:

Romney (R): "Russia is a geopolitical foe and rival."

Obama (D): "Bruh, the Cold War is over."


and 2016:

Trump (R): "Russia is cool."

Clinton (D): "Russia is trying to destabilize our democracy and destroy us!!"


Its gotten to the point where we can't even agree on who our enemies are. If one side says one thing, the other side has to take the opposite. no matter what it is. Cause it's not about governing, it's about winning.

[San Lumen]

I think it could be solved if we our leaders worked together and stop treating each other like the enemy.

Genuinely impossible when they have such wildly differing worldviews and no existential threat (ie the USSR) to Other.

up until Obama get elected we were able to do it.

[Washington Resistance Army]

Genuinely impossible when they have such wildly differing worldviews and no existential threat (ie the USSR) to Other.

up until Obama get elected we were able to do it.

Fuck no we couldn't, it was falling apart at least since Clinton and you can make an argument that it was already beginning even earlier than that. Obama's presidency is just when the façade dropped and we stopped pretending we were countrymen.

[Tarsonis]

up until Obama get elected we were able to do it.

Fuck no we couldn't, it was falling apart at least since Clinton and you can make an argument that it was already beginning even earlier than that. Obama's presidency is just when the façade dropped and we stopped pretending we were countrymen.

I'd say 2004 is when the facade dropped.

[Ifreann]

I think all our problems can be solved through revolution.

I think it could be solved if we our leaders worked together and stop treating each other like the enemy.

Yeah, Democrats just need to work with Mitch McConnell, then America will be great again.