Quantumfreakonomics
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User ID: 324
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
Not at short range, but this was a pretty far shot. The bullet would be going much slower than muzzle velocity when it hits.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
Security for the sitting president is insane. I remember being stuck on a freeway onramp for 15 minutes while they completely cleared the road for the presidential motorcade. This level of security is incredibly expensive and disruptive. It's very difficult to secure all sightlines to a public area.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
You need decent cognitive skills to draw blood on such a well-guarded target. The takes calling the shooter a retard are, well, retarded. We've seen what it looks like when mentally ill people try to assassinate Trump. It's pathetic.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
You don't want to print "Donald Trump shot" unless you know that Donald Trump was in fact shot. The known facts are exactly what was printed. The reader can make the inference just as well as the editor.
So like, if you believe Trump really is this massive threat to democracy, why wouldn't a patriotic American try to shoot him? A few possible reasons:
- Someone else just as bad or worse would step up.
Unlikely tbh. Nobody else commands the same personal loyalty from the Republican base. The party would likely devolve into squabbling like the Alexandrian empire.
- Assassinations are always bad for deontological reasons.
Also highly questionable. Would it have been a bad idea to shoot Hitler in 1933? Stalin in 1924?
This seems to be a highly counterintuitive conclusion, but is it? If someone is a threat, you eliminate them. Is the solution more explicit probabilistic thinking? If Trump has a 90% chance of ending American democracy, then maybe the right move is to shoot him. If he only has a 10% chance, maybe deontological considerations dominate?
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
Kamala is the only person with democratic legitimacy to replace Biden. Everybody knows that the one job of the vice president is to take over if the president dies or quits. Everyone who voted for Biden had that understanding.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
Spending this amount of money on incarceration is a policy choice. It could very easily be brought down to $35 a day, if not lower.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
The governor is out of the country on business, and the president is asleep at the wheel. Apparently, utility companies just won’t prep for emergencies or stage equipment without executive officers breathing down their neck.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
Has Biden or the White House made a statement on the hurricane? A major metropolitan area is completely shut down. No power, spotty cell service. I guess the gulf coast having hurricanes is all “part of the plan”, so nobody cares.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
Trump has plot armor. I cannot believe how goddamn lucky the guy is. "'This Will Be The End Of Trump’s Campaign,’ Says Increasingly Nervous Man For Seventh Time", was published eight and a half years ago. Just when it seemed like the walls were finally closing in, he gets bailed-out by a double whammy of the Supreme Court's immunity ruling and his opponent publicly going senile. Losing in 2020 might actually end up in his benefit, because now he gets to control the Republican Party for 12 years instead of just 8.
I keep seeing ads from Democrats that lead with the idea of "protecting democracy". Are they trying to convince independents and Republicans, or are they trying to convince themselves? A Trump victory (especially if he wins the popular vote) would be a democratic ratification of Jan 6. It would be a rejection of the charges against Trump. If Trump wins 2024 bigger than ever before, the entire big-D Democrat philosophy collapses in on itself in a tapestry of self-reference paradoxes. A Trump victory is not only figuratively unthinkable, but literally unthinkable.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
I don't think I've ever actually mailed a physical letter in my entire life. I'm sure it's not too hard, but one can imagine 80IQ or low-motivation people screwing it up.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
Mister President, you can't sleep here. This is the rest room.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
Liberals read. Conservatives watch tv. All of Scott's excuses make perfect sense if the only information one gets from the political sphere is text. I suppose he had good reasons to doubt the credibility of all those people who said Biden was senile, I remember many of them claiming that Hillary was about to keel over in 2016 too.
What he apparently didn't do was watch the clips.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
I can’t imagine him capstoning his career by stepping over a black woman.
It is her turn after all.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
Biden's political instincts are stronger than many give him credit for.
This was the main reason I was hesitant to call him senile. Closing the border was a smart move. It neutralizes one of Trump's strongest arguments for moderates. It could be that his aging brain can't handle the bandwidth of spoken conversation. Maybe we need to put Biden in a Stephen Hawking chair for his own good. We could even give him his old voice back via AI.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
Fundamentally, the idea is that Congress does not have authority to regulate the constitutional exercises of the presidential office. The constitution is above any statute, so any statute which infringes upon the president’s ability to do his job is unconstitutional by that very fact (when applied to the president).
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
This rests under the assumption that the power of Congress, "to make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces," trumps (heh) the president’s role as “commander in chief of the army and navy of the United States.” The opinion spends ample time dispelling the notion that congress can regulate the president’s article 2 powers. Why do you assume that regulations on what kind of orders the president can issue acting in his constitutionally mandated role as commander in chief are constitutional? You say this has been litigated, but where? Who would have article 3 standing?
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
I had that idea too, but it didn't seem to make any sense. No one would think the big swing in odds on June 27 occurred before the debate, but it is conceivable that one would think that it happened as a result of the debate reactions, not the debate itself. Indeed, this thread seems to be about the distinction between the debate itself, and the reaction to the debate.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
No? I'm pretty sure it dumped after the, "if... we finally beat Medicare," line.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
I find it odd how reluctant Democrats are to defend the concept of democracy. Of course they say how important democracy is, but do they ever explain why? Their rhetoric assumes the correctness of democracy, as though it is an end in itself and not simply a means to an end.
Is this cope? Crimestop? Much like other taboo topics, thinking too hard about the issue leads to the possibility that deeply-held convictions could be wrong. You can't build your argument for democracy out of the wisdom of crowds. Half of the population will demonstrably vote for Donald Trump. Either you're wrong about the wisdom of crowds, or you're wrong about Trump. You can make an argument that democracy is good. You can make an argument that Donald Trump is bad. But it is quite hard to make an argument that democracy is good and that Donald Trump is bad at the same time.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
You can describe almost any attempt to seize power this way. The Reichstag Fire Decree was just some esoteric lawfare to force a debate about the dangers of communists. Nobody thought the 12th amendment was vague prior to 2020.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
"Bad debate nights happen. Trust me, I know. But this election is still a choice between someone who has fought for ordinary folks his entire life and someone who only cares about himself. Between someone who tells the truth; who knows right from wrong and will give it to the American people straight — and someone who lies through his teeth for his own benefit. Last night didn’t change that, and it’s why so much is at stake in November. joebiden.com"
Obama is the one man who could have made the switch happen. If he had tweeted, "Biden must go," Biden would be gone. He has decided not to tweet that. Biden will not be removed.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
who the fuck is running the country today while Biden is apparently unable to carry a conversation?
My guess: To the extent that the United States Government needs anyone running it, it is being run by whoever is in the room with Biden at any given moment. Biden himself acts not so much as decision maker, but as a magical talisman, granting whoever is nearest to him authority over government decisions.
Quantumfreakonomics
1yr ago
Nate Silver thinks it was because they wanted to leave time for Biden to recover if the debate goes bad. I will never doubt him again
Multiple shooters?
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