JD Vance seems a difficult politician to pigeon hole.
On the one hand he gets labelled “far right”. And yet his views on abortion and marriage equality are not far out of line with the private views of a number of prominent British MPs (not least, it is said, a recent leader of the Lib Dems).
The “childless cat lady” quote is crass in print of course. But is made in the context of supporting the nuclear family and the drastically declining birth rate. And there can’t be too many “far right nationalists” in seemingly happy mixed race marriages?
Now I dont share his most notable social positions. But it seems to me the labels applied to him say far more about the big shift in the Overton Window of European observers and US coastal liberals than it does him. I just wish there was more of an attempt to think through such ideological differences than throw around words such as insane, Nazi or far right. His one child one vote policy for example, doesn’t obviously sound like the brainchild of someone who seeks less democracy.
JD Vance is not a difficult politician to pigeon hole. He's an opportunist who will say whatever he thinks people want to hear to get elected and get paid, and right now that means espousing extreme MAGA views.
"... an opportunist who will say whatever he thinks people want to hear to get elected ..."
JD Vance says people with children should have more votes. The more children you have the more votes you should have.
Insane.
I haven't listened to the video but I don't think the idea is insane at all - children are the future.
The big difficulty is how you deal with the reality of so many parents being separated. Suppose you could give each parent half a vote per kid?
I briefly had three children but none of them are alive now. Would I get the extra votes despite my children not being the future?
I can't think how painful that be, and am so so sorry for your loss.
It gets a bit raw in discussions like this I have to confess. The assumption that childless adults are voluntarily in that position and have an absence of empathy or interest in the future. Usually Tories like Leadsom and sundry other right wingers on here.
Even where it is voluntary I don't think it indicates a lack of concern for what happens in the future.
A concern for the future is one of the reasons I don't have children.
Yes there is that line of thinking. Or a lifestyle/job/circumstances not conducive. Or a rejection of expectations. Or many other reasons.
To have children is the more usual choice but it's not inherently more virtuous than not.
Virtue is a human conception. No children, no humans, no virtue.
Phenomenalist gibberish. The Platonic Form of Virtue exists eternally and independently.
I actively dislike the idea of giving parents additional votes. The effect, though, is interesting. It essentially means that people aged 25 to 50 have twice the voting power as currently - because those the people (mostly) with underage kids.
JD Vance seems a difficult politician to pigeon hole.
On the one hand he gets labelled “far right”. And yet his views on abortion and marriage equality are not far out of line with the private views of a number of prominent British MPs (not least, it is said, a recent leader of the Lib Dems).
The “childless cat lady” quote is crass in print of course. But is made in the context of supporting the nuclear family and the drastically declining birth rate. And there can’t be too many “far right nationalists” in seemingly happy mixed race marriages?
Now I dont share his most notable social positions. But it seems to me the labels applied to him say far more about the big shift in the Overton Window of European observers and US coastal liberals than it does him. I just wish there was more of an attempt to think through such ideological differences than throw around words such as insane, Nazi or far right. His one child one vote policy for example, doesn’t obviously sound like the brainchild of someone who seeks less democracy.
His statement that he would have acceded to Trump's request not to certify the vote on Jan 6, for example, sounds precisely like that.
And, whatever else is going on, that really ought to (ahem) trump every other consideration.
JD Vance says people with children should have more votes. The more children you have the more votes you should have.
Insane.
I haven't listened to the video but I don't think the idea is insane at all - children are the future.
The big difficulty is how you deal with the reality of so many parents being separated. Suppose you could give each parent half a vote per kid?
I briefly had three children but none of them are alive now. Would I get the extra votes despite my children not being the future?
I can't think how painful that be, and am so so sorry for your loss.
It gets a bit raw in discussions like this I have to confess. The assumption that childless adults are voluntarily in that position and have an absence of empathy or interest in the future. Usually Tories like Leadsom and sundry other right wingers on here.
Even where it is voluntary I don't think it indicates a lack of concern for what happens in the future.
A concern for the future is one of the reasons I don't have children.
Yes there is that line of thinking. Or a lifestyle/job/circumstances not conducive. Or a rejection of expectations. Or many other reasons.
To have children is the more usual choice but it's not inherently more virtuous than not.
Virtue is a human conception. No children, no humans, no virtue.
But this doesn't mean everyone has to breed. It's a macro requirement.
JD Vance says people with children should have more votes. The more children you have the more votes you should have.
Insane.
I haven't listened to the video but I don't think the idea is insane at all - children are the future.
The big difficulty is how you deal with the reality of so many parents being separated. Suppose you could give each parent half a vote per kid?
I briefly had three children but none of them are alive now. Would I get the extra votes despite my children not being the future?
I can't think how painful that be, and am so so sorry for your loss.
It gets a bit raw in discussions like this I have to confess. The assumption that childless adults are voluntarily in that position and have an absence of empathy or interest in the future. Usually Tories like Leadsom and sundry other right wingers on here.
Your loss is indescribably awful. My sister lost a young son to drowning - then brain damage - then he died a few years later. I think only now - three decades later - is she kind of reconciled to it. Sort of
So your story is that times three? I believe there is a purpose in the universe and to that extent I believe in “god” - the unity of all consciousness - but my word he sometimes moves in evilly mysterious ways
JD Vance says people with children should have more votes. The more children you have the more votes you should have.
Insane.
I haven't listened to the video but I don't think the idea is insane at all - children are the future.
The big difficulty is how you deal with the reality of so many parents being separated. Suppose you could give each parent half a vote per kid?
I briefly had three children but none of them are alive now. Would I get the extra votes despite my children not being the future?
I can't think how painful that be, and am so so sorry for your loss.
It gets a bit raw in discussions like this I have to confess. The assumption that childless adults are voluntarily in that position and have an absence of empathy or interest in the future. Usually Tories like Leadsom and sundry other right wingers on here.
Your loss is indescribably awful. My sister lost a young son to drowning - then brain damage - then he died a few years later. I think only now - three decades later - is she kind of reconciled to it. Sort of
So your story is that times three? believe there is a purpose in the universe and to that extent I believe in “god” - the unity of all consciousness - but my word he sometimes moves in evilly mysterious ways
Thank you. In all three cases it was very early and in many ways expected after the first. A fault in our stars.
"Portuguese town beloved by Byron turning into ‘amusement park’
People living in Sintra — once hailed as the most delightful town in Europe — say mass tourism has turned it into a ‘tourist hell’ amid calls for ‘guerrilla action’"
..In October 2009, McAfee promoted him to chief technology officer and executive vice president. Six months later, McAfee accidentally disrupted its customers' operations around the world when it pushed out a software update that deleted critical Windows XP system files and caused affected systems to bluescreen and enter a boot loop. "I'm not sure any virus writer has ever developed a piece of malware that shut down as many machines as quickly as McAfee did today," Ed Bott wrote at ZDNet...
Here's a modest proposal for the new government's Health and Business Secretaries.
It's hypothesised that the new obesity drugs might bankrupt the health services of several western countries - to the extent that some are suggesting that governments actually but the pharmas that produce them, not entirely tongue in cheek:
To get a fair deal on Wegovy, buying Novo Nordisk might not be Medicare’s worst option https://www.statnews.com/2024/07/23/wegovy-medicare-medicaid-costs-why-not-buy-manufacturer-novo-nordisk/ Medicare and Medicaid are facing a familiar quandary: how to provide coverage for new weight loss drugs with price tags that could effectively bankrupt the federal government’s health care budget while simultaneously ensuring continuous coverage for all other health care services used by millions of Americans.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced in March 2024 that it would cover Wegovy (semaglutide), a new and expensive weight loss medication, for beneficiaries with cardiovascular disease and obesity. Efforts by the U.S. House of Representatives could nudge CMS to cover it more broadly for people with obesity alone.
That would have a huge cost impact. Wegovy’s current list price in the United States is $1,349 per month. Medicare spending on this class of drugs, called GLP-1s, has increased from $57 million in 2018 to $5.7 billion in 2022, while Medicaid spending for these drugs increased from $383 million to $1.8 billion in that time period. A report by the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) estimates that treating even half of Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries with obesity would cost $166 billion per year, nearly the cost of total spending on all prescription drugs in 2022 ($175 billion).
In contrast, the United Kingdom pays $92 per month and Denmark (where Novo Nordisk is headquartered) pays $186 per month. In an analysis one of us (M.B.) conducted with several colleagues, the estimated manufacturing costs for a biosimilar Wegovy would be no more than $13 per month — one-hundredth the selling price. That’s far from a fair deal for Medicare and Medicaid...
Do we think Americans are slowly realising just how screwed up is their healthcare system?
Wegovy costs around $150 out where I live. At those sort of prices, it makes every sense for half the population to be on it, given the amount of future disease that could be prevented by people losing weight.
Perhaps the best subject for bipartisan legislation in the US, would be to allow Medicare and Medicaid to negotiate with the pharma companies, with regulation of marketing and advertising practices on the other side so there’s both stick and carrot.
Expect the media companies, who get more than half their advertising income from the sector, to be quite vociferously against the idea.
Are Reform trying to sound respectable, following the Nigel's maiden speech?
This is a good Q&A from my MP Lee Anderson, and the Health Secretary about our local hospital - which is highly rated. There's a bit of political prickle, but also useful information. https://x.com/LeeAndersonMP_/status/1815723186920526001
I didn't realise the PFI involved renaming the hospital after a bakery business. Innovative way to get private sector investment in.
Heh.
Yep - a bakery business. There was a series of mills on the River Maun with 'royal connections'; the area is known as the Dukeries as there are a lorra-lorra dukes. The King's Mill here is in the Domesday Book.
If you ask me I'll tell you that the "Kingsmill" bread brand is named after it, but I may be exaggerating a little; Allied Bakeries are in the general area, but I'm not sure how much history they have. And there are perhaps a few other "King's Mill"s.
The hospital started as a WW2 facility for wounded Usonians.
JD Vance seems a difficult politician to pigeon hole.
On the one hand he gets labelled “far right”. And yet his views on abortion and marriage equality are not far out of line with the private views of a number of prominent British MPs (not least, it is said, a recent leader of the Lib Dems).
The “childless cat lady” quote is crass in print of course. But is made in the context of supporting the nuclear family and the drastically declining birth rate. And there can’t be too many “far right nationalists” in seemingly happy mixed race marriages?
Now I dont share his most notable social positions. But it seems to me the labels applied to him say far more about the big shift in the Overton Window of European observers and US coastal liberals than it does him. I just wish there was more of an attempt to think through such ideological differences than throw around words such as insane, Nazi or far right. His one child one vote policy for example, doesn’t obviously sound like the brainchild of someone who seeks less democracy.
Bryan Taylor-Cohen was debating Piers Morgan on that. I make it 2-1 or 1-2 depending on your view.
Comments
Think Boris Johnson.
If it shouldn't, why not?
So your story is that times three? I believe there is a purpose in the universe and to that extent I believe in “god” - the unity of all consciousness - but my word he sometimes moves in evilly mysterious ways
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ce58p0048r0o
Who the actual fuck is running Crowdstrike?
NEW THREAD
https://www.thetimes.com/world/europe/article/portuguese-protesters-battling-tourist-hell-call-for-guerrilla-action-327vp3x7c
"Portuguese town beloved by Byron turning into ‘amusement park’
People living in Sintra — once hailed as the most delightful town in Europe — say mass tourism has turned it into a ‘tourist hell’ amid calls for ‘guerrilla action’"
..In October 2009, McAfee promoted him to chief technology officer and executive vice president. Six months later, McAfee accidentally disrupted its customers' operations around the world when it pushed out a software update that deleted critical Windows XP system files and caused affected systems to bluescreen and enter a boot loop. "I'm not sure any virus writer has ever developed a piece of malware that shut down as many machines as quickly as McAfee did today," Ed Bott wrote at ZDNet...
New Thread (and it's from me)
Wegovy costs around $150 out where I live. At those sort of prices, it makes every sense for half the population to be on it, given the amount of future disease that could be prevented by people losing weight.
Perhaps the best subject for bipartisan legislation in the US, would be to allow Medicare and Medicaid to negotiate with the pharma companies, with regulation of marketing and advertising practices on the other side so there’s both stick and carrot.
Expect the media companies, who get more than half their advertising income from the sector, to be quite vociferously against the idea.
Yep - a bakery business. There was a series of mills on the River Maun with 'royal connections'; the area is known as the Dukeries as there are a lorra-lorra dukes. The King's Mill here is in the Domesday Book.
If you ask me I'll tell you that the "Kingsmill" bread brand is named after it, but I may be exaggerating a little; Allied Bakeries are in the general area, but I'm not sure how much history they have. And there are perhaps a few other "King's Mill"s.
The hospital started as a WW2 facility for wounded Usonians.
This is BTC's clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=guoILFhA-Po