DocWatts

Great news; apparently the $15 minimum wage legislation that Democrats introduced to Congress includes a mechanism to Index the Minimum Wage to the Median Wage of the country. Which would mean that it would be updated to account for inflation, and this same battle won't have to be fought again in ten to fifteen years. https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/26/democrats-reintroduce-15-minimum-wage-bill-with-unified-control-of-congress.html

The filibuster needs to be nuked from orbit by the Democrats, using any avenue that presents itself. While in theory it presents a check on the power of the majority, in practice it basically holds all national legislation hostage to obstructionism by Bad Faith Actors representing a minority of Americans as well as the financial incentives of Special Interests.

Marxists that rigidly cling to 19th century economic theory, despite the massive changes that have taken place over the last 150 years, will then wonder why there isn't a shared class consciousness between someone making minimum wage working at Wal-Mart and living off from food stamps, and someone making $65,000 a year as a software engineer at Microsoft. On a qualitative level there's a world of difference between these two examples, and to reduce everything down to an owner and a worker class is to miss huge and important distinctions in the lived experiences of people. I swear, people who cling rigidly to Marxist economic theory are the mirror reflection of Libertarian Free Market evangelists.

The Comedy just writes itself... GOP Congresswoman blamed deadly forest fire on Jewish space laser https://www.google.com/amp/s/m.jpost.com/american-politics/marjorie-taylor-greene-blamed-deadly-forest-fire-on-rothschild-inc-657130/amp?fbclid=IwAR3jJS1-JJncNOuz6WiW9aeTU0nE640uRaYpbUmYOg_FJUZPNkh2H22iIZA

In practice, anyone complaining about reverse racism directed at whites is almost certainly harboring implicitly racist attitudes and beliefs, or at the very least using it as a smokescreen to push for an ethnocentric worldview. Some things are ridiculous enough that it's okay to dismiss them out of hand...

@SOUL I suppose my point is that politicians and legislators don't operate in a vacuum, there's a larger cultural context that politicians have to work within. How the Left, in a broader cultural context, conducts itself matters. If the Left is seen by the rest of the Culture as being unreasonable, it's going to make it harder for Progressives to get elected, and to be effective once in office. The only way that social change is going to happen is to build a broad base of support for the policy platform we would like to see enacted. That's exactly how things like marijuana legalization and gay marriage came to be accepted; the Left was successful in making itself seem reasonable to the rest of the Culture, to the point where these issues are no longer controversial to most people. If we want things like Police Reform to happen, it has to be pitched in a way that's not scary to people in middle America. People like Bernie realize this, but not everyone ln the Left does. Your point about algorithm bubbles that lead to echo chambers is of course true, but how these bubbles interact with the rest of the culture matters. If the rest of the country associates Leftists with its most radical and extreme elements, then the social policies that the Left advocates for are going to be significantly hindered. The easier it is for people to make a caricature of you, the harder time you're going to have selling them on your ideas. So, Pragmatic Idealism ftw.

The negativity of which I was referring to was directed at people outside of the political apparatus, with unreasonable expectations for what someone working within our political system should be able to accomplish. The catalyst for my earlier thought was seeing people complain that legislation mandating that a $15 minimum be phased in over four years, rather than going in to effect immediately; while also ignoring that the Bill would also eliminate the sub-minimum wage for tipped workers and disabled people. Yeah that's not ideal, but it goes a long way in fixing a serious problem. Contrast that attitude with that of actual policy makers themselves, who know that they have to work with moderates in order to have any chance at getting legislation passed. I'd argue that Bernie has been using this in a highly effective way to move the policy platform of the Democratic Party to the Left. Would he be in the position of considerable influence he's in now if he'd burned all his bridges by obstinately refusing to work with people that didn't share his democratic socialist ideals? Think of it another way; if Moderates in the Democratic Party get shit on by the Left no matter what they do, what motivation is for them to put any effort in to be better? By all means criticize when it's warranted, but also give due credit when appropriate as well. Game Denial, or demanding purity within a corrupt political system, is a good way to build up unrealistic expectations while getting nothing accomplished. When what we should be working on is changing the Rules of the Game. I'm fully behind organizations like Wolf-PAC which are looking to do just that, but in the mean time we'll be far better off doing the best we can with the system that's in place.

It's not about being 'nice' for its own sake, it's about not alienating people who might otherwise be sympathetic towards the types of policies and reforms we would like to see enacted. You're right that Progressive Policy proposals tend to be broadly popular, but if politics were just a matter of having better policy positions, the Republican Party would have gone the way of the Whigs and the US wouldn't be the only industrialized Democracy without a Universal Healthcare system. Let's also make sure to differentiate between Individuals that support egalitarian policy but in a more cautious way, and Institutional Obstructionism due to conflicts of interest. It would behoove us to be more understanding and patient with the former, while continuing to Call out the latter.

I can't be the only one who feels bad for these people, when it's so evident how blatantly they've been emotionally manipulated by Bad Actors that couldn't give two shits about them.

Which is why it's not worth engaging Bad Faith Actors on the Right, for the reasons you outline; if someone has no interest in solving any of the issues that we care about, then yeah, it's a waste of time. The problem is when you begin drawing false equivalencies between Centrists or Liberals and the Right, for the reason that the former (Centrists and Liberals) tend to be much more amenable to making progress on things like wealth inequality, climate change, racial inequities, etc. What we should realistically be shooting for is to move the Overton Window to the Left, and make it so that Progressive Ideas become more and more acceptable in main stream political discussions. The way this is done is by making a compelling case that our ideas are reasonable, and by being willing to work with others within the system. Why do you think Bernie Sanders has been so successful? Do you think he'd be one of the most powerful people in the US Senate right now if he'd run as an Independent, and made a point of alienating the very people he'd need to work with in order to get anything accomplished? Or is it that he had enough Wisdom to know that the path of least Resistance for effecting change is to work within the system in order to change the rules of the Game.

Literally every political identity in existence has the capacity to adopt a victim mentality, whether justified or not. Yeah Leftist movements have been treated like shit at many points through history, but that doesn't give us the right to act like bullies and jerks ourselves (this is coming from someone highly sympathetic to democratic socialism, for what its worth). The context of my post was specifically in regards to the moralizing I sometimes see that drives a wedge between The Far Left and potential Liberal or Centrist Allies. It's completely counter productive, and only serves to make people draw false equivalencies between The Far Left and the Far Right. If we want to convince people that our ideas are worth taking seriously, it's on us to show that we're the ones being reasonable, and part of that includes means being able to engage with other people acting in Good Faith that we just happen to disagree with on some things. That doesn't mean engaging with Bad Faith actors on the Right, but it does mean not alienating people you could potentially work with to make progress on a variety of issues.

Okay then, here's my hot take. Probably not a radical viewpoint here, but certain people will take it that way: People on the Far Left need to chill the fuck out and stop demonizing Liberals and Centrists, and learn to play nice with other worldviews and perspectives in order to get anything accomplished. Seriously, the amount of moralizing from elements of the online Left feels like a mirror image of the same high horse that Libertarians ride into conversations on, and only serves to make Progressive ideas seem unreasonable to everyone else.

Legislation that would make Washington DC 51st state introduced to Senate https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/washington-dc-51st-us-state-senate-b1793590.html For those outside of the US, Washington DC has roughly the same population as the state of Alaska (around 700,000), but no Voting rights within the House or Senate. The practical effect of statehood for DC would be to add two seats to the Senate which come from an area that's overwhelmingly Democratic. As such, Republicans will be vehemently opposed to this (though they'll of course couch their opposition in Constitutional terms supported by antiquated arguments from the Founding Fathers that are no longer relevant in modern times).

This is maybe a fifteen or thirty minute drive away from the picture below, taken from Gross Pointe, a rich suburb that lies on the border of Detroit.

Is that really so surprising in a country where the division of both Wealth and Social Capitol is so extraordinarily uneven? We have some of the best research institutions in the world, yet if you drive to an elementary school in a neighborhood twenty minutes away you'd be forgiven for thinking you'd crossed the border into a developing country. If anything, this speaks to huge developmental imbalances within American society and institutions

Unless I'm completely misremembering, I believe it was A Theory of Everything, though I don't have a print copy offhand to find the exact quote. It was in the section where he was discussing examples of the Mean Green Meme and drops Bernie Sanders name when coming up with examples.

Insightful guy, but clearly suffering from some of the Boomeritis that he describes in his work, through his demonization of Green. Just off the top of my head, when talking about the Mean Green Meme in one of his books, of all of the countless examples of dysfunctional Green he could have brought up... he mentions Bernie Sanders of all people. While I still respect Wilber for his body of work, he's also clearly out of touch with the times.

I'm guessing they'll run a slightly more respectable scumbag with a veneer of professionalism this time around. Plenty of examples from fiction they could turn to for proofs of concept:

I know some of the Left are upset that the $15 an hour minimum wage increase would set in gradually over four years rather than increasing all at once, when to me it seems like a necessary compromise to give small businesses time to adjust. The larger issue is that the increase doesn't include a provision to update the minimum wage according to the Inflation Index on a yearly basis, which means having to fight this same battle over and over again every ten to fifteen years.

@Consilience Not sure if either of these apply in your case, but people over a certain income threshold ($87k) as well as people who were claimed as a dependent on someone else's tax return were not eligible for the last round of stimulus checks.

I'd disagree; things like Medicare for all, defunding the police, and eliminating the Senate filibuster are actual points of contention between Progressives, Liberals, and Centrists within the Democratic Party. Raising the minimum wage is something that most of the Democratic Party is on board with. That said, there's not a chance in Hell of Republicans supporting this, which is why budget reconciliation is the only feasible way this could pass.

That's great news. Though it will live or die depending on whether it can be passed through the Budget Reconciliation process, because Republicans will certainly nuke this from orbit with the filibuster if it has to go through the usual channels...

Breakdown of the $1.9 Stimulus Package Biden has proposed : https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/14/biden-stimulus-package-details-checks-unemployment-minimum-wage.html - Direct payments of $1,400 to most Americans, bringing the total relief to $2,000, including December’s $600 payments - Increasing the federal, per-week unemployment benefit to $400 and extending it through the end of September - Increasing the federal minimum wage to $15 per hour - Extending the eviction and foreclosure moratoriums until the end of September - $350 billion in state and local government aid - $170 billion for K-12 schools and institutions of higher education - $50 billion toward Covid-19 testing - $20 billion toward a national vaccine program in partnership with states, localities and tribes - Making the Child Tax Credit fully refundable for the year and increasing the credit to $3,000 per child ($3,600 for a child under age 6)

I'm mostly active in the Society and Politics section, and one of the most useful things about this forum is getting a variety of different perspectives about world events, and having some of my viewpoints challenged in thoughtful ways. Occasional Trump Cultist aside, this forum has been great at having productive and respectful discussions on a variety of issues. In my day to day life (even before Covid) I've had very limited opportunities to interact with people from other countries, so discussing things with people outside of America has been engaging and valuable.

@Preety_India I'll preface this by saying that this is also a somewhat Reductionist account for the problems facing Society, but as opposed to Marx's 150 year old theory, this is at least more representative of the world we now live in. The Precariat : General term for people living in postindustrial economies who possess low Social Capitol, and are subjected to a precarious socio-economic existence - Most people working in Service Industry jobs such as Retail, who don't make a living wage and possess little to no job security - People who still work in formerly middle class blue collar jobs (like coal mining or truck driving) which are quickly becoming obsolete, and who are facing the looming threat of losing their livelihoods - People who provide vital services (home care workers, teachers) whose work isn't rewarded by the market, and who typically work for low wages (if in the private sector), or are aren't given the tools and support to do their jobs (public sector workers like teachers). - These people provide the base of support for populist movements both on the Left and the Right The Consumptariat : Refers to people who may or may not be well off economically, but who don't possess the Social and Informational Capitol to contribute in a meaningful and fulfilling way to Postindustrial society. Their role is instead reduced from one of participation to passive consumption. - Older people who the digital revolution has passed by. (Think of your grandparent who doesn't know how to use a Computer, and needs help logging on to facebook, and then proceed to share fake news articles because they don't know any better). - People who are in a position of financial stability due to reaping the rewards of the old, pre-digitized system, but whose skills are no longer those that are required to secure a comfortable existence - People lacking media literacy, and who consume media passively and uncritically. Fox News viewers are the most obvious example that come to mind. - Includes most toxic aspects of materialist consumer culture. Includes people who are driven to consume and display material wealth as a measure of social status, but who aren't contributing to postindustrial culture in any meaningful way - Can include people whose cultural norms are threatened by the direction society is heading in - There is a lot of overlap with the Precariat, but can include people who are financial well off that are nonetheless excluded from participation in society The Netocrats (aka the postindustrial aristocracy): Refers to people who possess the cultural capitol to thrive in a Postindustrial economy - Software engineers, digital artists, social media influencers, venture capitalists. People working in skilled trades that can't be outsourced or automated. - People who are tech and media savvy, and are in a position to contribute to the cultural environment, rather than just being a passive consumer - People who have the skillset and cultural capitol to enjoy a secure existence in a postindustrial, digitized economy - People whose cultural norms aren't threatened by the direction that society is heading in Precariat wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precariat#:~:text=In sociology and economics%2C the,portmanteau merging precarious with proletariat. Brief description of The Consumptariat https://books.google.com/books?id=auBiDwAAQBAJ&pg=PT285&lpg=PT285&dq=Consumptariat&source=bl&ots=t1lplU1E87&sig=ACfU3U3c_tS9eRapqfM7QpzZehStK0oyTQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiC8LyqqrfuAhU5AZ0JHTgOBlAQ6AEwA3oECAMQAg#v=onepage&q=Consumptariat&f=false Netocrat wikipedia article : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netocracy