Tariffs Catch-All

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ZenMode said:
Could that also have something to do with the population doubling since 1960.

The fact that there has been GDP growth doesn't mean that it's the most GDP growth we could have had.
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The GDP in 2024 was about 54 times higher than in 1960. Adjust for doubling of the population and it falls to a 2700% gain. Oh dear.

It is a truism that our imaginations can always dream of things being better than they are. In any event, it certainly wasn't trade holding back the U.S. Let's do a chart for a country with high tariffs attempting to replace imports with domestically produced goods.

Argentina GDP Growth Rate 1961-2025 | MacroTrends

Annual percentage growth rate of GDP at market prices based on constant local currency. Aggregates are based on constant 2010 U.S. dollars. GDP is the sum of gross value added by all resident producers in the economy plus any product taxes and minus any subsidies not included in the value of the...
www.macrotrends.net www.macrotrends.net

Argentina's GDP has increased by about 300% since 1960. As its population has also doubled, it's been clocking in at 1/18 of the US growth. Remember: Trump's policies are almost exactly the Argentine policies from the 1950s and 1960s that produced such an economic catastrophe.
 
superrific said:
1. If you count the people on this board as people I know, then absolutely. Many posters here have described how they have been fucked by DOGE cuts. And keep in mind, it would be worse but for the "bureaucrats" who have been blocking the lawless DOGE behavior.

2. Your point about the age of the ATC system cuts against you. It's been working since the 1970s. And it just stops working now? Is that a pure coincidence? Or was it because Trump fired the people who are needed to make it work.

It's almost as if people were trying to tell Trump that he was making a huge mess:


Oh. That's what being anti-business-as-usual means for Trump. It means fucking up the things that Americans have been able to take for granted for decades. You know, business as usual.

3. You mooks are so addicted to your fox-fueled outrage that you have lost touch with everything good about America. There are things that need fixing, absolutely 100%. I have ideas about that myself. But I can at least appreciate the things that work well. That's because I know things -- and knowing things, I can respect other people who know different things and use that knowledge to a desired end.

You, knowing nothing, can appreciate nothing.
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I agree that the freezing of funding, especially for businesses that contracted with the US, wasn't a good thing. It could have been handled differently and maybe the ATC situation has been made worse by cuts. I don't know. But the panic regarding the "hatchet" DOGE cuts was widespread. With the exception of some hurt by funding freezes, which wasn't a headcount cut, has there been any significant impact to federal government services? Have social security checks stopped going out? Have students been unable to attend college due to issues with student loans? Has there really been anything significant that warranted the panic?
 
ZenMode said:
I agree that the freezing of funding, especially for businesses that contracted with the US, wasn't a good thing. It could have been handled differently and maybe the ATC situation has been made worse by cuts. I don't know. But the panic regarding the "hatchet" DOGE cuts was widespread. With the exception of some hurt by funding freezes, which wasn't a headcount cut, has there been any significant impact to federal government services? Have social security checks stopped going out? Have students been unable to attend college due to issues with student loans? Has there really been anything significant that warranted the panic?
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Well, most of the cuts that people were afraid of have been blocked, so that is what has prevented a lot of the bad stuff people panicked about from happening.
And, the cuts are only a couple months old so it may take a while for some of the bad stuff to materialize.
But, it is estimated that 3 to 4 million additional deaths (including tens of thousands of children) will occur in the next year as a result of cuts to USAID. I guess we shall see.
 
ChileG said:
Well, most of the cuts that people were afraid of have been blocked, so that is what has prevented a lot of the bad stuff people panicked about from happening.
And, the cuts are only a couple months old so it may take a while for some of the bad stuff to materialize.
But, it is estimated that 3 to 4 million additional deaths (including tens of thousands of children) will occur in the next year as a result of cuts to USAID. I guess we shall see.
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Those deaths will be to brown people in 3rd world countries. MAGAts and Bo-siders are good with that.
 
ZenMode said:
I agree that the freezing of funding, especially for businesses that contracted with the US, wasn't a good thing. It could have been handled differently and maybe the ATC situation has been made worse by cuts. I don't know. But the panic regarding the "hatchet" DOGE cuts was widespread. With the exception of some hurt by funding freezes, which wasn't a headcount cut, has there been any significant impact to federal government services? Have social security checks stopped going out? Have students been unable to attend college due to issues with student loans? Has there really been anything significant that warranted the panic?
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1. Many of the DOGE cuts have been blocked. Those blocks might only be temporary and in some cases are almost certain to be.
2. The "severance" period for the people who accepted Elon's "please leave" offer hasn't expired yet. So they are still getting paychecks, for the time being.
3. Has there been any significant impact to government services? Let's see:

UPDATED | What's Closed, Canceled Around The National Park System (parks)
Local scientists, fisheries and weather forecasters feeling impact of NOAA cuts (fisheries and weather reports)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2025/05/11/trump-government-operations-halt-funding-cuts/ (EPA)

among many many other effects. I'm not doing all the research for you. What you're displaying again is your insistence that your life experience is complete. If you don't experience something, it must not exist or it must be overblown. It's your constant refrain.
 
superrific said:
1. Many of the DOGE cuts have been blocked. Those blocks might only be temporary and in some cases are almost certain to be.
2. The "severance" period for the people who accepted Elon's "please leave" offer hasn't expired yet. So they are still getting paychecks, for the time being.
3. Has there been any significant impact to government services? Let's see:

UPDATED | What's Closed, Canceled Around The National Park System (parks)
Local scientists, fisheries and weather forecasters feeling impact of NOAA cuts (fisheries and weather reports)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2025/05/11/trump-government-operations-halt-funding-cuts/ (EPA)

among many many other effects. I'm not doing all the research for you. What you're displaying again is your insistence that your life experience is complete. If you don't experience something, it must not exist or it must be overblown. It's your constant refrain.
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I don't think your link shows what you think it shows.

Were some campsites closed temporarily? Yes. Were they all closed due to cuts? Not even close.

The first one listed is Great Smokey Mountain Park. I put in dates for early June and every campsite was available. Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Tennessee - Recreation.gov

Arches National Park has all kinds of tours available and the Fiery Furnce is giving out permits: Fiery Furnace Permits - Arches National Park (U.S. National Park Service)

Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park, according to their calendar, has events every single day between now and October when they close for the winter. Special Events and Ranger Programs - Black Canyon Of The Gunnison National Park (U.S. National Park Service)

I could go on, but probably don't need to.

My life experience has nothing to do with it. I'm just asking if there have been reports of any serious issues?
 
ZenMode said:
Your melanin obsession is noted.
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You are literally the only person here who ever talks about melanin. I'd say you're the one who is obsessed. The rest of us are smart enough to understand that race isn't really about skin color. It's about so much more than that.
 
superrific said:
You are literally the only person here who ever talks about melanin. I'd say you're the one who is obsessed. The rest of us are smart enough to understand that race isn't really about skin color. It's about so much more than that.
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"Those deaths will be to brown people in 3rd world countries."

Where do you believe the brown skin that Zoo_View referenced comes from?

1A0A0976-1-1024x683.jpg
 
ZenMode said:
I don't think your link shows what you think it shows.
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It shows that cuts to park service employees has resulted in decreased services. It's not always "permanently closed." Maybe you noticed that some of the entries read like this: "Closed M-T due to staff shortages." There was a lot of that.

I'm not going to argue with you about specific parks or details. Not all the closures are DOGE related. Duh. But some are, and that has impacted service, and it's not just me who is saying that. The google search produces a lot of results.

And of course you didn't address the other factors.
 
ZenMode said:
"Those deaths will be to brown people in 3rd world countries."

Where do you believe the brown skin that Zoo_View referenced comes from?
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Anyone remotely familiar with the history of racism in the US knows of the one-drop rule. It wasn't skin color that made one a Negro. It was ancestry. Likewise with Mexicans. That the skin color is different makes the racism readily available and observable, and once upon a time it was the primary distinction. By once upon a time, I mean like 2 centuries ago. Racism stopped being moored to skin color when white Southerners realized they needed justifications for slavery, and pivoted to the "slaves are weak-minded, irresponsible beasts." It then became about those stereotypes with skin color merely being a proxy.
 
superrific said:
Anyone remotely familiar with the history of racism in the US knows of the one-drop rule. It wasn't skin color that made one a Negro. It was ancestry. Likewise with Mexicans. That the skin color is different makes the racism readily available and observable, and once upon a time it was the primary distinction. By once upon a time, I mean like 2 centuries ago. Racism stopped being moored to skin color when white Southerners realized they needed justifications for slavery, and pivoted to the "slaves are weak-minded, irresponsible beasts." It then became about those stereotypes with skin color merely being a proxy.
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Just to prove that it was all science and no sentiment, recall they had this.


The "Pocahontas Exception" refers to a provision within Virginia's Racial Integrity Act of 1924 that allowed individuals with a certain degree of American Indian ancestry (specifically, one-sixteenth or less, and no other non-Caucasian blood) to be legally classified as white.
 
superrific said:
Anyone remotely familiar with the history of racism in the US knows of the one-drop rule. It wasn't skin color that made one a Negro. It was ancestry. Likewise with Mexicans. That the skin color is different makes the racism readily available and observable, and once upon a time it was the primary distinction. By once upon a time, I mean like 2 centuries ago. Racism stopped being moored to skin color when white Southerners realized they needed justifications for slavery, and pivoted to the "slaves are weak-minded, irresponsible beasts." It then became about those stereotypes with skin color merely being a proxy.
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Everything you said may be true and is almost entirely irrelevant in a functional discussion about race. One need only search for "brown skin" on this site to see that skin color is THE focus. The same is true when you watch cable news opinion shows.

This is a completely disingenuous move on your part, IMO.
 
superrific said:
1. Many of the DOGE cuts have been blocked. Those blocks might only be temporary and in some cases are almost certain to be.
2. The "severance" period for the people who accepted Elon's "please leave" offer hasn't expired yet. So they are still getting paychecks, for the time being.
3. Has there been any significant impact to government services? Let's see:

UPDATED | What's Closed, Canceled Around The National Park System (parks)
Local scientists, fisheries and weather forecasters feeling impact of NOAA cuts (fisheries and weather reports)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2025/05/11/trump-government-operations-halt-funding-cuts/ (EPA)

among many many other effects. I'm not doing all the research for you. What you're displaying again is your insistence that your life experience is complete. If you don't experience something, it must not exist or it must be overblown. It's your constant refrain.
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Pushback and a blizzard of lawsuits are the only way to handle Trump's tyranny and deliberate destruction of the US government and infrastructure.

60% of the new jobs and GDP created since WWII are related to federal R&D investment. Research and education are the biggest ROI of virtually any expenditure by federal and state governments. I calculated approximately a 50:1 ROI for flagship public higher education spending in Texas.
 
ZenMode said:
Everything you said may be true and is almost entirely irrelevant in a functional discussion about race. One need only search for "brown skin" on this site to see that skin color is THE focus. The same is true when you watch cable news opinion shows.
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This is going to blow your mind, but there's such a thing as metonym. Sometimes we use the word proxy. As ChatGPT puts it:

"using skin color to define racial identity is a kind of metonym—specifically, it’s metonymic shorthand where a physical trait stands in for a broader, socially constructed category."

You're confusing the shorthand for the concept. It's not that different from the way we talk about "big men" in basketball. There is obviously so much more than height that separates players, and even their play style, but "big man" is a shorthand to refer to the collection of traits we associate with tall players.

Of course, it's not that skin color is unrelated to race. It's just that race is so much more about skin color, even if we use skin color words as shorthand because other formulations are wordy. You would hoot and holler at a formulation like, "racial identities based on societally imposed feelings and perceptions of inferiority, often due to skin color or assumptions about skin color." So we say dark-skinned for brevity.
 
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