lol at calling the wistful musings of the co-founder of a rightwing oppo research firm the new overton window.

WE HAVE TO ARGUE AGAINST PRIVATE OWNERSHIP OF PROPERTY....OR LOOK WHERE THE OVERTON WINDOW WILL GO!

If my aunt had a dick, she'd be my uncle.

The issue with the Democratics reflexive need to appear to be reasonable by praising ****ty people as proof their critiques of ****tier people are ideologically honest is that if we ever do impeach Trump all of these mother****ers are going to fall over themselves pledging to rebuild the country by working with Good and Honest President Pence

It's worse than that. If Trump ever goes down the MSM will give all the credit to "hero republicans" like John McCain and Ben Sasse. The Republicans are freerolling all of us in the harshest ways possible.

I think someone once used the phrase "the soft bigotry of low expectations."

Ugh, I never thought of that. I'm going to go vomit now.

This is a huge mistake. That woman is part of the IDC, which caucuses with the Republicans to prevent a Democratic majority in NY. She lies to her constituents by representing herself as a Democrat despite being anything but. Absolute silence from the Bernie people on this, too, of course.

Shameful by Ellison, someone who I had a ton of respect for, too.

Silence from Bernie about a tweet that Ellison made about a NY State Senator who might be a conservativish Democrat?

Yikes.

I didn't say from Bernie.

I said from Bernie people, many who have been super critical of the IDC (which is great).

This is really disappointing from Ellison, there's no other way to frame this.

This is much worse than just being a conservative Democrat, by the way, you should really read up on how the IDC holds NY state hostage. They also take in a huge amount of money because of the way the caucus rules work. Basically, they are ****ing awful people who screw over their voters.

Here's some analysis by a friendly source:



Just annoying how Ellison doesn't get **** for this from the progressive base.

One of the most satisfying things about Trump for the cynics of American institutions is that Trump lays bare how hollow they are. This babbling idiot slob is ostensibly in charge of the most powerful nation on Earth, and the Republican Party has lined up behind him. That should be enough to convince most people that the entire institutional and ideological apparatus which operated to get us to this position is dysfunctional in its foundations. America can't hold itself out to be a force for good in the world or have some sort of superior claim to the intellectual tradition of the West while the Burger King is our president.

But rather than do anything resembling introspection into how this happened that involves a systemic critique of American political power, liberals have largely doubled down on those empty institutions. They miss GWB because they miss the thin veneer of propriety that is provided by a president who enshrouds himself in the accouterments of legitimacy. There is no real reckoning with the fact that Trump is not only on the same spectrum as the most modern Republicans, but a fairly predictable outflow of their reactionary strategy.

The problem to the "GWB wasn't so bad" folks isn't that an immense machinery capable of endless destruction is at the whims of an ideologically hollow and functionally incompetent state, but that this one guy can't be trusted with it.

This is all really good.

And it brings up a point I've introduced a few times, that the left needs to be very careful with how they treat Trump as a singular, personal menace instead of engaging in that introspection you describe, and linking him with a fundamentally depraved and failing system. Trying to round up mainstream and bipartisan support to oust him or criticize him or whatever could so easily result in simply re-establishing George W. Bush and Mitt Romney types as the sensible middle. In fact there's seemingly a cottage industry of GOP Senators who are betting precisely this will happen.

I think the temptation to constantly belittle and deride Trump and treat him as exceptionally bad and trangressive and threatening is totally understandable but so fraught with long-term political risk. The centrists, GOP, moderate Democrats and others who have built the informal structures Trump abused and sits atop of would love nothing more than to make everyone internalize precisely that: Trump is an aberration, get rid of him and then continue with business as usual. Anyone who saw this crisis moment building saw the inherent and frankly dangerous dysfunctions of the old pre-Trump standards and should be very wary of making arguments that are ultimately servile to empowering the old guard. "Trump is exceptionally bad" instead of "symbolically but ultimately representative bad" is a subtle distinction but so critical. In the end, Trump is basically the towering example of our fast degrading system; he doesn't truly stand apart from it. Democrats are largely ersatz, lite right-wingers, and Trump a slightly off-model product of the assembly line of insane and terrible right-winger politicians.

Hmm right but what is the point of this?

bankers definitely need to start going to jail instead of fines.

Which bankers should go to jail for what?

good post

Same point as in 1933, to keep investment banks from bringing down commercial banking, to protect ordinary bank deposits, provide for a regulated, insured and low-risk banking sector separate from high risk speculation.

LDO, people shouldn't have to sweat the solvency of retail banks, insurers, etc. every time some Wall St. goon decides to bet the house on black.

Yeah I haven't seen what Ellison's response is but that one tweet made me switch to Team Perez. The IDC is a ****ing blight on Party and the state/national party not viciously primarying them in every ****ing election is a microcosm of how we got into this situation in the first place, they are the face of the Tragic Death even more than Hillary. No other Democrat should appear on stage with them with explicitly framing them as the opposition, they should be absolute pariahs.

Well, I didn't know any of that, but I suppose as someone who wanted to run the DNC Keith Ellison should have.

Nah.

Seek not the craven glory of the head shot, instead focus thine righteous aim on center of mass.

So if I were to buy an insurance policy with AIG you are telling me you think their investment banking arm should be able to take risks which threaten the solvency of their insurance division?

So either people can pay into insurance policies with no guarantee they get paid in the event of a claim, or the tax payers can be on the hook for a bailout each time?

Does AIG have an investment banking arm?

Regarding banks, basically the whole point is that deposits are used finance riskier operations that provide greater return than the interest paid on the deposits. I see no reason why those riskier operations should not include investment banking. There are regulations in place that mandate a minimum level of capital and that the bank stays solvent in all reasonable situations, I don't see why that isn't enough.

2008 crash was about $10 trillion.

I've seen at least 4 PAC ads (on MSNBC and CNN!) urging viewers to contact their Senators and tell them to support the Trumpcare bill.

Not a single peep from our side about calling Senators and urging them to do the opposite of that.

le sigh