Just So We're Perfectly Clear, There Will Be No Wall. Ever. This Is Why.

[Vanyali]

I wish I knew what Trump had that caused such a loyal base to form. He's not charismatic, he's not a good speaker, he's really not even a good businessman (seriously, look at some pre-election documentaries on Trump). He came from a privileged background, he doesn't speak for the common man...I just don't get it. I know this is off-topic but the lengths people will go to to completely deny reality and count a clear loss as some kind of win is astonishing to me.

We have a President that not once, but twice has caused a government shutdown to get what he wanted and twice caved and didn't get what he wanted. Yet still people hold on to this grand notion that it's not over, that he's got the situation under control, that his promises are still coming.

Because he's a poor guy's ideal rich guy fantasy. Loud and brash and no one tells him to knock it off or they'll ban him from the store because he has the money to walk over them and everyone knows it.

[Breccia]

It's a little late now, but, apparently 14,000 IRS workers got the same cold during the Trump Shutdown.

[Slybak]

This is a weird thing to just do and he's not the first person to claim we should just do it.

If Obama had asked for $5.7 billion to fix infrastructure, install the nation's first high speed rail system, or hell put funds towards expanding Obamacare it would have been met with metaphorical pitchforks and torches.

But now they hide behind the it's such a small amount of the total budget we should totally just let the man child do what he wants!

Obama wanted to divert $75 billion from the bailout fund in order to help homeowners directly affected by the mortgage crisis instead of throwing it into the parasitic maw of Wall Street, and the response from conservatives was to form the Tea Party.

Rick Santelli, a former fucking hedge fund manager and commodities trader, called it Communism and every shitkicking nostril sore in the country donned a tricorn hat and set off to march on the Capital in order to stop the government from helping them out instead helping the banks that screwed them. The Republican party is 2% evil and 98% stupid.

[Breccia]

Lawsuit brought by federal workers continues. Ending the Trump Shutdown did not stop the lawsuit brought for starting it in the first place.

[roboscorcher]

We have been winning nonstop for almost 3 years now, you can have a field goal.

Jeezy991's alt-history book.

Repeal and Replace: We replaced it!
The shutdown: Trump is on video saying he would do own it himself, but it's clearly the dems' fault for pushing a bill that we were passing last year!
Numerous Trump Campaign convictions: oh those were outsiders. But they're also being framed!!!

[-aiko-]

Yea he should have rammed it through like Obama did in 2013 with healthcare after his shutdown.

So he got what he wanted through?

[Rasulis]

The country could do worse than having Nancy Pelosi as president. She is ruthless, efficient, hard working, good organizer and, based on current event and past achievements, she is also a great negotiator.

Anybody remember when in 2008 Bush’s Treasury Secretary, Henry M. Paulson Jr., bent down on one knee as he pleaded with Nancy Pelosi not to “blow it up” by withdrawing her party’s support for the Bail Out Plan package over what Ms. Pelosi derided as a Republican betrayal. Republican betrayal referred to John Boehner last minute declaration that his caucus could not support the plan to allow the government to buy distressed mortgage assets from ailing financial companies.

We are talking about Hank Paulson, the man who was once, at Goldman Sachs, compared to God.

From Investment Dealers Digest in September 2001:

At Goldman Sachs' holiday party at New York's Jacob Javits Center last December, Bette Midler used an old joke to poke fun at the firm's chairman and chief executive officer, Henry Paulson.

Her story began with a gathering of top Goldman pros in heaven. As Midler described it, equity chief Tom Tuft, strategist Abby Joseph Cohen, and a number of other top executives were standing at the pearly gates when "suddenly the biggest limo they'd ever seen drove by and on the door it said: Hank Paulson's Limo. Surprised, Tom Tuft looked to St. Peter. 'They didn't tell us Hank Paulson was coming.'

"Oh,” answered St. Peter, “That's not Hank Paulson, that's God. Sometimes, he thinks he's Hank Paulson.”

[Shadowferal]

Yea he should have rammed it through like Obama did in 2013 with healthcare after his shutdown.

You mean there's no wall...

[Rasulis]

Yea he should have rammed it through like Obama did in 2013 with healthcare after his shutdown.

Your hated Nancy Pelosi did that. The executive branch and Senate Democrats were ready to give up on the healthcare package.

[Dhrizzle]

You just gonna pretend like Brexit didn't happen?

Brexit hasn't happened yet, and it hasn't been a win for conservatives or anyone really apart from the privileged few who can make a profit from the shit-show.

[Kiri]

Sorry for replying days later, been sick and busy. I think it’s a bit cynical to view positive experiences of government policy as being hoodwinked. I also think it’s unreasonable to expect any policy to have a positive impact on everyone. It may be ideal, but it’s not grounded in reality. Taking the Trump tax cuts as an example, I know that the corporate tax cuts were framed as being tax cuts for the rich, but real non rich people do work for corporations and experienced pay raises and bonuses as a result. I hardly think corporate enterprise is always in the best interests of people, but they’re not always a net negative either. The economy really is humming along quite nicely. That’s a net positive. How much you want to give Trump policies credit I guess is up to you.

It's not about having a positive impact on everyone is what I am saying. I am saying it needs to be aggregated - the good and the bad.
Take your tax cuts for example. It is not just about the rich getting tax cuts and that potentially benefiting employees as well. This is not just a gift of sorts and we debate the distribution. In order for to generate a net aggregate evaluation, you need to look at multiple facets here.

1) Opportunity costs: Even if you just assume that money is given out without any cost, then you have to look at what else could be done. Can cutting taxes for the rich have a positive impact on the economy? Possibly. But is utilizing the theoretical money for that really the best use of it? Other policies could have a much better effect on the economy overall. But those policies cannot be adopted, if the money is already bound elsewhere. To illustrate, just assume that you have 10 thousand dollars to give away to help your local community. What is the better use of that money, give it all to someone who is already rich and hope he does not just put it in the bank, or to give ten people who have fallen on really hard times a grand each to get back on their feet? That's just one example, but if you only look on the former option, it still appears positive, even if it is not optimal.

2) The actual cost: But the above assumes that there is no cost at all from the policy. Going back to the tax cut - that is not free money. The US is in massive debt and keeps accumulating more. It runs a deficit. It has costs from policies, which are paid for by the income, mostly tax revenue.
As such, cutting taxes means reducing your revenue. The Republicans claim that the tax cuts pay for themselves, i.e. that reducing the rate on the wealthy will cause them to spend/invest more, ultimately pushing the economy higher, so that you can earn a higher tax revenue at a lower rate. They claim we are on a specific part of the Laffer curve, which plots that, but so far there is not much evidence of that. The economy is humming along, sure. But does tax revenue increase overall? So far, projections do not seem to indicate as much.
Hence, the tax are, at least right now, a net loss overall for government funding. Now, since the government is so big and complex, it is a bit hard to see direct cause and effect. But, heavily simplified: if the government earns less, then there are usually two options to pursue:
a) Spend less. I.e. cut programs like subsidies or services for the poor, Medicaid, all that kind of stuff. Cutting the taxes for Bill Gates can cause a single mom in New York no longer having access to a daycare center for her kids. But since that link is not directly obvious, it is too often ignored when one only looks at the explicit effects of a policy.
b) Take on more debt. That is what politicians like to do the most in such cases. It's basically shifting the burden into the future, hoping that the economy will improve even more till then, so that it is no problem. If it does not improve though, then later generations have to suffer from less government spending.

3) The temporal axis: The effect of a policy needs to be considered over time as well, and long-term effects need to be considered. Do the positive effects of the tax cuts last longer than the negative ones? Vice versa? Just because the economy is humming along quite nicely right now does not mean it will in a year.

[Slybak]

You know I am mad when I spend more than 30 seconds arguing with communists.

*Ben Shapiro's annoying voice* "This is why Pelosi won."

[Everwake]

What he should have done from the beginning was ask for just enough money to build some barriers at "problems locations", then gradually get more money to build more barriers as more "problem locations" appeared (at the discretion of someone sympathetic to his agenda). He might have been able to sneak much of his wall in over ten years if he had been patient.

[Zaydin]

You just gonna pretend like Brexit didn't happen?

Brexit is shaping up to be a massive disaster for the UK because, in a shocking turn of events (/s), Leavers lied to their supporters about how easy and painless it would be for the UK to do and wouldn't negatively impact them at all.

Sounds rather familiar.

[Skroe]

lol. The Alt Reich is melting down.

[Mekkle]

lol. The Alt Reich is melting down.

should i know who Mike Cernovich is?

[Skroe]

should i know who Mike Cernovich is?

Big time Alt Right internet guy. One of the movement's main voices. A total nut job.

[Edge-]

should i know who Mike Cernovich is?

Alt-right social media pundit, IIRC. He's always around spinning conspiracy theories and shit.

[Mekkle]

Big time Alt Right internet guy. One of the movement's main voices. A total nut job.

I that explains a bit actually, thanks.

[tyrlaan]

I that explains a bit actually, thanks.

A more recent exploit of his was effectively tricking Disney to fire James Gunn over decade+ old tweets that Gunn had already dealt with publicly in the past by drudging them back up and peddling them across the internet as if this was a new thing/discovery.