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Biden Is Building a 'Superstructure' to Stop Trump From Stealing the Election
(www.rollingstone.com)
this post was submitted on 24 Mar 2024
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politics
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This statement is, as far as I can tell, simply made up. Here's a quantitative comparison of what they were already doing or wanting to do, versus the plan after the climate bill.
Good luck with that. Pop quiz: Which industry gives a fuck of a lot of money to congress? Follow-up question, in order for something that's a good idea to become law, does it have to (a) go through congress or (b) nothing further, being president means you get everything you want with no other branch of government involved?
It's common knowledge that the climate bill is not nearly enough action. But, it's also clear to me looking at it that (a) it was extremely impressive to be able to get that amount of climate improvement through the current US government to become law, and (b) giving Biden shit for it because the rest of government blocked him from doing more, seems almost guaranteed to weaken his ability (or anyone else's) to do more with a second term.
This whole mythology that "well we have to give Biden a hard time over the climate, because he's already attempting to do a lot but more action is needed, and if Trump wins and reverses every small bit of progress anyone's been able to make then that's just the price of environmental success" is, to me, not very sensible. It's like shooting allied soldiers to help win World War 2. It's like not bringing a parachute because you're really really sure you don't want your plane to crash. It doesn't make any fucking sense.
Here's a good summary of why he might have done that.
To me, "does he care about the climate?" boils down to, what has he done for the climate, and the best way to measure that is with the emissions impacts of his actions.
Doing more and blocking more development projects on top of that sounds like a great idea, yes.
Glad we're in agreement that it's good to have an American president who's finally doing good things instead of just neoliberal horror! Yes, it's nice. I would like to see more of these things happen.
You mean like releasing more oil from the reserve than every other president combined?
His actions are clearly not for climate advocacy, but rather using American tax dollars to enhance profits of his largest donors.
As for the school loans, the point there is a central accusation: he doesn’t do enough. He does just enough to mollify you while with the other hand funneling money into corporations.
I am gonna use this thread as a testbed for a little AI moderation tool for observing who is operating in good faith within the discussion.
I've given you a little constructive criticism on your overall debate strategy in one of the other threads, if you're interested to hear it.
As with a lot of things you're saying, this one seems to be simply made up. The reality is actually the complete opposite -- Biden is spending literally trillions of dollars on things like the climate bill and student loan forgiveness, and funding it by raising taxes on corporations. His budget for 2025 is set to do more of the same. By way of example, Amazon went from having a $1.2 billion tax credit to now paying $3 billion per quarter after Biden's 2022 corporate tax reforms.
It is interesting, you accuse me of arguing in bad faith.
Yet do nothing about blatant insults, blatantly bad faith accusations- and indeed engage them here. (how else am I to interpret the threat of AI mod tools?)
Further you mention your mod status, to what end? Chill the conversation?
And mentioning “AI Tools”/ presumably programmed by you or somebody in such a manner as to confirm your own bias.
I disagree with you. I think Biden is beholden to his corporate donors.
However, I hold nothing but contempt to those who engage in such forms of “persuasion”, and especially those who also hold authority.
I am acting in bad faith? Get a mirror. How else am I suppose to take that comment? Or any one else here?
As for his track record on student loans… student loans are themselves part of the problem. They’re subsidizing the very problem. while private colleges/universitoes jack the cost of tuitions and public 4 year universities to follow behind.
If you think the trillions being funneled into student debt are actually a solution and not part of the very problem, think again. Schools- particularly private universities- have zero reason to address the core problem; they got paid their unaffordably high tuition. The loan servicers have no reason to address the problems- they too are getting paid.
Meanwhile, they failed to have loans forgiven- frequently by fraudulent means- yet they’re not being reprimanded (never mind facing a criminal investigation,).
As long as the loan forgiveness exists. As long as easy-to-get loans are available, schools will continue to raise costs.
You might say “oh, but they sued to stop it”, and yes. They did. They sued because of the difference between Making a lot of money, and making even more money. (And republicans sued because they’re republicans.)
Student loan forgiveness doesn’t solve the core problem- in fact, it justifies the core problem. (That is, greedy private schools jacking rates because they can.).
Was it necessary and appropriate for Biden to act? Yes. Absolutely. But it’s far from a solution. It’s like slapping a tourniquet on an arterial laceration - yes you have to stop the bleeding; but you can’t just leave the tourniquet on there. You have to go to the emergency room and deal with the giant cut before the lack of blood flow cause the limb to be lost.
Same goes with the EV subsidies mentioned by another user. Did they really make EVs affordable, or were they unaffordable in the full knowledge those subsidies exist? (EV subsidies have existed off and on for quite a while now.)
As for the tax rate on Amazon… last year they reported just shy of 150 billion in profit. They’re a company valued at 2+ trillion dollars. The way you’re trimming it makes the 36 billion seem large. It’s literally pocket change, and they benefit greatly from the infrastructure spending and significant other government spending.
Also, to address another point- as far as policy is concerned he has a very long history in government; he’s a very large figure in how we got here in the first place. He’s been in federal office for longer than I’ve been alive. The only reason he now gives a damn about climate is because his base demands it of him.
Same goes for Gaza. He’s a self-avowed Zionist. The only reason he’s now critical of what Israel is doing is it’s untenable to not be critical, and I don’t even know wtf he’s doing on immigration and border security.
Accusations of expecting him to manage things that are the jobs of congress is idiotic when he also takes credit for things like the Infrastructure act. He wants to take credit for their the good parts he can take credit for the bad, too, or for defending things that are literally his DoJ’s job to defend.
I can’t think of a single area where he’s not done a half-assed job. Don’t get any of this wrong, Trump would be worse in every aspect. Biden, however isn’t the guy that’s going to save us.
Edit:
That links to a reply to somebody else... if that advice was meant to me... I missed it. But this reply should address why I don't think "his record is amazing" on school debt forgiveness. Federal school loans is a very large part of why tution has ballooned as much as it has. Forgiving school loans that should have been forgiven decades ago- including when he was Obamma's VP, and including when he was a Senator- per the contractual agreement in the loan... is the bare minimum of effort. the only people made whole here are the crooks.
I am not a mod here; I think you have me confused with someone else. Have I given you the impression that I'm unable to argue for myself without resorting to asserting some sort of authority? I actually think this kind of disagreement is good for the discourse; I just think it would also be good to have a separate place that wasn't subject to shouty bad faith people clogging up the comments in quite so high a number.
Your whole student loan analysis I'll more or less agree with overall, and to some extent with its application to other domains. I do think if someone's artery is cut that you should usually put a tourniquet on. It seems like Biden's been putting tourniquets on, and the other group has been trying to fistfight him for doing even that much, and trying to go through the accident victim's pockets and threatening bystanders. And they have weapons. And, somehow, he managed to get some important tourniquets on even so.
You're making a completely valid presentation of why the patient isn't yet "fine" after the tourniquet. But going further from there to "I don't see why I should support the tourniquet guy over the give-me-his-wallet-and-empty-your-own-pockets-while-we're-at-it people" doesn't make a lot of sense to me.
Yes, it’s a challenging environment. No question there.
The problem is he’s incapable of doing what needs to be done. Holding Trump up as an excuse for not finding the person who can (or rather people,) is also exactly how we got here. To continue the analogy, the wound is festering, we’re about to die if the proverbial leg not removed.
Biden is either incapable or unwilling, probably incapable; at a certain point you’ve done everything you can and need to step back or you become part of the problem.