Are We Going To Keep Ignoring Biden Being Insane?

[Wes Mantooth]

(06-28-2021, 03:21 PM)Nately120 Wrote: Let me try this...honest question...who would you most want as president right now?

Not my question, but I'm going to answer it anyways...  I would have gladly voted for Tulsi Gabbard over the Orange Man.

She's not the perfect candidate for me but few if any ever are.  But I would have been willing to make concessions.  I think she could have been a nice compromise, and I think she offered a great deal more than either of the turds we were left to choose from.

[*Nately120*]

(06-28-2021, 04:10 PM)Wes Mantooth Wrote: Not my question, but I'm going to answer it anyways...  I would have gladly voted for Tulsi Gabbard over the Orange Man.

She's not the perfect candidate for me but few if any ever are.  But I would have been willing to make concessions.  I think she could have been a nice compromise, and I think she offered a great deal more than either of the turds we were left to choose from.

It's multiple choice, dagnabbit. 

[Stewy]

(06-28-2021, 03:21 PM)Nately120 Wrote: Let me try this...honest question...who would you most want as president right now?
1. Biden
2. Harris
3. Hillary
4. some liberal wildcard...how about Oprah
5.  EDIT - can't forget Bernie...let's put Bernie as an option

Well if that's the list I have to choose from, I'll take Hillary.  At least I know what she is, and what her motivations are.

[Dill]

(06-28-2021, 03:14 PM)BFritz21 Wrote: 78 isn't exactly mid-70s, but, in terms of his cognitive decline, I do wonder when, sometime in the next few years, his issues become worse and he's just all-out forgetting things and unable to think like a functioning person, if all the people defending him will say "oh, that just came on suddenly.... there were no signs of it or any way to foresee it."

I've thought about how it will go on this board when it happens because it seems inevitable. 

Will people admit that he was never mentally stable enough to be elected or will they just deflect like many in this thread have done?

Well, I won't admit that he was never mentally stable enough to be elected. 

Especially to someone who thought Trump WAS, given the latter's MUCH MORE evident cognitive decline, as evidenced in the rambling broken sentences and sudden leapfrogging from random topic to random topic in all his speeches, deflecting responsibility, calling people names, insulting allies, praising adversaries, surprising his own staff by announcing policy goals they'd never heard of, let alone vetted.  

If an elderly man sitting on a park bench next to me was suggesting the president should buy Greenland or use Nukes to stop hurricanes or research cleansers to combat aids or trust Putin over the FBI/CIA, I'd read that as cognitive decline and thank heavens he wasn't president. A Trump supporter, apparently, would not.

Biden, on the other hand, has repeatedly communicated policies in a systematic, step by step fashion. 

If you thought Trump had no cognitive issues, then it is hard to understand what you are counting as evidence thereof, beyond party affiliation.

[Dill]

(06-28-2021, 03:14 PM)Wes Mantooth Wrote: I'll try to break to down in a few reasons, where it's more digestable to read...

1.) I do not like his use "I" in his response.  ("I got them more money")

This wasn't something he passed on his own, nor is it something he worked up in his lonesome.  There had been negotiations going on for months, and they had already been some level of agreement that more funds were needed.  This took the work of a tremendous amount of people, occuring on both sides, and it took a lot of time before he was even in office.

Fwiw, this one of the many reasons I didn't like Trump either.  I don't dig the "I did", "Because of me", "I, I, I" patting on the back.  Not only do I not find it presidential, it's not even factually correct in this case.

2.) This is a continuation of the above.  What's lost in what Joe Biden did or didn't do, is that stimulus money had already been spent (twice) prior to his term.  The extra unemployment payments had been in place for around 7 or 8 months.  So it's not like he created these ideas out of thin air, they were already in place.  He (really they) simply extended it.

3.)  I find is response of "pay them more" so increiblely offensive.  It's so insensitive to those that aren't Walmart, or Kroger, or McDonalds, or Target, or any number of huge companies that can manage to make it that simple.

We're coming off of a pandemic, where small businesses have been decimated.  Many are struggling just to keep their doors open, to no real fault of their own.  And you expect at this time, of all times, to be an appropriate time for them to absorb huge increases in labor costs.

What I'm talking about here is your local mom and pop hardware store, your local music store, your family owned restaraunt.  People that are teetering on the edge of going under.  It's not so simple as them to "just pay them more".  They can hardly pay them as it is.

Fwiw, one of my best friends is in a terrible situation right now and I'd be happy to share his story as an example.  Him and his wife managed a local venue that specialized in weddings and does live music a couple days a week for about a decade.  They bought that business in Novemeber of 2019.  When I tell you they're hurting, I mean it.  They're all but screwed at this point.  To tell someone like that the answer to their current staffing issues is to take on 20-50%+ increases in labor is downright cruel.

4.) The idea of just paying more isn't even working.  There's all sorts of places that are offering way more in pay than they used to and they still can't fill these positions.  Kings Island here in town is offering like $16 bucks an hour for what used to be a $8-10 job and they can't still can't get properly staffed. 

There's hundreds upon hundreds of examples like this.  How much do they need to pay them exactly?  $20 an hours?  $25?

5.) I'm not pointing any of this out to assign blame, and to clain Biden created this mess simply by extending benefits.  This had been breweing a long time before.  But it's still a serious issue, and one that is much more deserving than the response he gave.

He attempted to provide no actual solution or explanation, and he showed zero sympathy.  IMHO, he basically spit in the faces of a lot of people who doing everything they can to make all this work, to the point of being more than generous,and still struggling to staff their business.  It's a complex problem that requires a more complex response, and it certainly would be nice if it featured some empathy as well.

tldr; I thought his comments were self-centered, intenionally simplistic in order to be dismissive of real issues, and incredibly insensitive. 

Regarding 1., wasn't part of the reason he said "I wrote it" to establish that he was for the bill in question? I don't see a disclaimer here that no one else helped.

Re: 2. I don't think he was disputing that Trump wanted to send people $2,000 checks but his party did not want to go along with it. FDR created unemployment insurance, so that kicked in of course. Not a "stimulus" measure. 

Also, work on the stimulus bill has not been equal. Much of the work of "one side" has been to get the other side to just buy in, against the wishes of their leadership, right? So you can say "both sides" were working hard, but one side was definitely working harder and leading the way.

3-4. And yet, Biden won't be "paying them more." The proposed bill has dropped $15 an hour minimum wage increase and lowered the threshold of for families getting stimulus checks and lowered unemployment benefits by 100 bucks a week. So it's not clear that "paying them more" is at the center of policy debates anymore. Those details can be lost when how-Biden-makes-us-feel centers discussion.

5. Here I think you are hanging way to much on a press conference comment, probably not aimed at small businesses. If I remember correctly, someone raised the problem of a labor shortage. Businesses could not find people to work for them. Biden offered a market solution.

Your friends in the wedding entertainment business--are they struggling because they cannot hire, or because people are not engaging them? if the latter, then I don't see how Biden's comment was spit in their faces. He, and his party, are trying harder to help them than the Republicans did. 

[Wes Mantooth]

(06-28-2021, 05:23 PM)Dill Wrote: ---Re: 2. I don't think he was disputing that Trump wanted to send people $2,000 checks but his party did not want to go along with it.

---FDR created unemployment insurance, so that kicked in of course. Not a "stimulus" measure. 

--- I mean, that's not really an accurate description what actually occured.  It's not that the Republican party was opposed to sending out checks, they were opposed to all of the stuff that was going into the bill in additon to said checks.  Simpy saying that Trump was for 2,000 checks and the party was is not at all true.

---I wasn't talking about unemployment on it's own, I'm talking about the $300 extra in relief that is being added to it.  That obviously is pandemic related and has nothing to do with what FDR put in place.  It's not hard to understand how this can affect people wanting back to work. 

A guy who was taking home, say around 400 a bucks a week on $12 an hour job, is now most likley bringing in close to $600 a week.  (225-275 in regular unemployment + $300 in extra benefits)  He now needs to find work at around 16-18/hr just to break even with what he is currently getting.  Even at over $20 an hour, a worker like this may elect to stay home rather than work for another hundred bucks a week.  (Add in transportation costs and the work itself, it's not hard to make this decision)

Fwiw, as I said earlier, I'm not looking to assign blame strictly to Joe Biden or the democrats here.  This has been brewing and the pandemic has really made a mess of things.  My point was that this is a legitimate issues that deserves a more thought out response.

[Wes Mantooth]

(06-28-2021, 05:23 PM)Dill Wrote: Here I think you are hanging way to much on a press conference comment, probably not aimed at small businesses. If I remember correctly, someone raised the problem of a labor shortage. Businesses could not find people to work for them. Biden offered a market solution.

Are small businesses not businesses?  I would argue all businesses are affected by a labor shortage and his repsonse was aimed at, and relevant to any and all of them.

His market solution was simply to pay them more.  I'm not going to go though typing out everything I did earlier but that's not really a solution for a lot of business.  1.) Some of them are paying more and they still can't properly staff their businesses.  2.) Some of them can't afford to pay more.  Many of the business have spent much of the last year closed or have seen their revenue and profits plummet.

Telling a guy that owns Jim's Hardware, who is hanging on by an absolute thread after this last year, that he simply needs to pay more is no solution at all.  He can't afford to.  And many of these people are willing to pay more than they used to but just not quite enough to fill these jobs.  (Ex: Jim used to pay workers $10/hr.  Now he's generously offering $14/hr, depsite being nearly bankrupt because of Covid.  Jim still can't find workers unless he pays even more than that.)

[Wes Mantooth]

(06-28-2021, 05:23 PM)Dill Wrote: Your friends in the wedding entertainment business--are they struggling because they cannot hire, or because people are not engaging them? if the latter, then I don't see how Biden's comment was spit in their faces. He, and his party, are trying harder to help them than the Republicans did. 

They're struggling because of all of the above, and because of everything that has occured over these last 15 months.  They're essentially ******.

The bulk of their money came from wedding receptions.  Guess what didn't happen pretty much all of 2020?  They also have a couple nights a week where they book a band and have general admission.  Guess what pretty much didn't happen all of 2020?

They've tried so many different things to stay afloat.  Once restrictions were slightly lifted they had what I guess could be best described as little fairs at their location.  A bunch of small business would set up at different tables and chairs and sell anything from baked goods to t-shirts.  They've  tried offering carryout food even though that's not something theyv'e done in the past, and no one knows them as a restaraunt.  They were approved for a PPP loan but apprarently that a drop in the bucket.  It also has to be paid back.

They're currently stuck with a ton of debt, an 8k a month mortgage on their venue, a 2nd mortgage on their house, and business still has completely returned to normal.

Now imagine all of this, all of the stress you've taken on, watching your newly bought business on the brink of collapse, and then struggling to secure workers when things open back up.  Their business was stock full of younger people working for what used to be an ok wage (line cooks, dishwashers, person worker the door) and now that wage is no longer enough to get people to work. 

Fwiw, these are two people who are both in their 40's and have spent their entire working lives in this business.  They're not rich.  They've worked their way up from cook, to seus chef, to chef, and from bartender to manager.  After years of working and saving, (and mortgaging their home) they finally decided to buy the business 6 months before Covid.

I'm sorry, but telling people like this "just pay them more" when they can't fill jobs at $14 bucks an hour is heartless IMHO.  And I know they're not alone either.  There's plenty of places just like this are that are struggling just as much.

Not everyone is a Walmart or a McDonalds.  It sure would be nice if a lot of people remembered that from time to time.

[*Nately120*]

(06-28-2021, 06:08 PM)Wes Mantooth Wrote: Not everyone is a Walmart or a McDonalds.  It sure would be nice if a lot of people remembered that from time to time.

We just seem to be on a slow march towards everyone working for giant corporations or running businesses where they only hire a few family members.  It's almost like a return to the old sustenance farming days where people need to have 10 kids because they can't afford to pay strangers to work for them.

Biden will tell your friends to offer higher wages to get employees and Trump and his cohorts will tell them that they shouldn't have wasted so much money on fancy coffee and smart phones.  Help probbaly ain't on the way.  Then again, I'm a cynic who has given up and works for peanuts for the government war machine. My job requires a college degree and a very clean background check and I make less than the new burger flipping rate...so it goes.

[CarolinaBengalFanGuy]

Personally I think not working during all this because you're getting paid enough to do nothing is a stupid strategy in the long term. I might be wrong but lets say 2 people are going for a new job. One person took their unemployment check for the past 15 months another worked during that same period of time. All other things being equal wouldn't the company be more likely to hire said person that was working the past year?

[*Nately120*]

(06-29-2021, 02:41 AM)CarolinaBengalFanGuy Wrote: Personally I think not working during all this because you're getting paid enough to do nothing is a stupid strategy in the long term. I might be wrong but lets say 2 people are going for a new job. One person took their unemployment check for the past 15 months another worked during that same period of time. All other things being equal wouldn't the company be more likely to hire said person that was working the past year?

Right, these are prime days for people to prove how hard working they are. Keep in mind that the notion that America is the land where people sit and home and get paid to do nothing has been a major talking point for generations, though. 

[CarolinaBengalFanGuy]

(06-29-2021, 07:13 AM)Nately120 Wrote: Right, these are prime days for people to prove how hard working they are. Keep in mind that the notion that America is the land where people sit and home and get paid to do nothing has been a major talking point for generations, though. 

I don’t double people could continue to sit at home and make some income as they have done for a long time now.

[*Nately120*]

(06-29-2021, 01:16 PM)CarolinaBengalFanGuy Wrote: I don’t double people could continue to sit at home and make some income as they have done for a long time now.

Im not sure what you are saying or if double was supposed to be doubt. 

[CJD]

No one's ignoring it, I don't think.

Biden is a creepy and weird dude and, in my opinion, isn't really fit to be President of the United States.

He was still the better choice in November though.

The most powerful position in the country and, arguably, in the top 5 most influential positions in the world, and the choices were an old, mentally declining doofus who has been part of some of the worst bills and decisions during his tenure as a Congressman and an old, racist, mentally declining psychopath who will cheat everyone on anything if he knows he can make a dollar off of it and who is not interested in the difference between fact and fiction.

We're in a pretty pathetic state, at the moment.

[BFritz21]

(06-29-2021, 03:50 PM)Crazyjdawg Wrote: No one's ignoring it, I don't think.

Biden is a creepy and weird dude and, in my opinion, isn't really fit to be President of the United States.

The left is definitely ignoring it.  The left-wing media is definitely ignoring it.

(06-29-2021, 03:50 PM)Crazyjdawg Wrote: No one's ignoring it, I don't think.

Biden is a creepy and weird dude and, in my opinion, isn't really fit to be President of the United States.

He was still the better choice in November though.

The most powerful position in the country and, arguably, in the top 5 most influential positions in the world, and the choices were an old, mentally declining doofus who has been part of some of the worst bills and decisions during his tenure as a Congressman and an old, racist, mentally declining psychopath who will cheat everyone on anything if he knows he can make a dollar off of it and who is not interested in the difference between fact and fiction.

We're in a pretty pathetic state, at the moment.

What in his presidency did he do that matched any of those descriptions?

[BmorePat87]

Dan Bongino is a thrice failed political candidate who got trashed by colleagues when he tried to suggest during his elections that he had secrets on Obama because of his past as a secret service agent.

The only reason he has a job as a talking head is because conservative audiences love hearing people validate their baseless conspiracy theories, which that former infowars contributor is more than happy to do.

Nothing about this loser warrants the time or attention of any poster here.

[CJD]

(06-29-2021, 04:15 PM)BFritz21 Wrote: The left is definitely ignoring it.  The left-wing media is definitely ignoring it.

Well this particular incident is not really newsworthy. Weird guy is being weird doesn't usually grab headlines. 

I think everything in this world will make a lot more sense to you if you stop expecting people to do things that are against their own best interest. CNN or MSNBC reporting about Biden being creepy doesn't make them money, so why would they do it? Democrats and moderates don't care about this because they agree that, even if Biden was completely worthless, he's still better than Trump.  Everyone already knows he's creepy. If they reported this, people would turn off their TV.

Which, incidentally, is not what news networks want their viewers to do.

 This is only making the news among right wing people because they have a hate boner for Biden and will froth at the mouth over, literally, anything he does. 

Quote:What in his presidency did he do that matched any of those descriptions?

We've been over this too many times, Brad.

If you want a really, really, really quick example, when he was "stopping the steal," he asked for donations from his supporters who, obviously, were eager to provide them.

Well, he had a little button in the donation screen that, if you didn't unclick it, made the donation recurring. He literally scammed his own supporters.

He also didn't use that money in the way he claimed ("stopping the steal") and instead just used it to pay off his campaign debts, if I remember correctly.

Very similar to what his former staffer, Steve Bannon, (allegedly) did when he scammed Trump supporters out of their money under the pretense that he'd build the wall.

Trump sucks.

Admitting it will free you.

[*Nately120*]

(06-29-2021, 04:15 PM)BFritz21 Wrote: What in his presidency did he do that matched any of those descriptions?

In Ohio at a rally recently Trump was reading from a teleprompter and said that we sent a man from Ohio to a plant.  He eventually corrected himself and said planet...which the moon is not, and blanked on the name of the man who walked on the moon.  I'm sure in 3.5 years when he's running for president he'll make more sense.

Oh, and he's the president of law and auto.  That'll be nice when my insurance rates get too high.

[Wes Mantooth]

(06-29-2021, 04:24 PM)Crazyjdawg Wrote: Well, he had a little button in the donation screen that, if you didn't unclick it, made the donation recurring. He literally scammed his own supporters.

I did not know this.  I'm not sure how I missed it but yeah, that's a pretty good example of a scumbag.

[CJD]

(06-29-2021, 04:48 PM)Wes Mantooth Wrote: I did not know this.  I'm not sure how I missed it but yeah, that's a pretty good example of a scumbag.

Yea, Trump is a textbook scumbag. That was just an example off the top of my head. If I actually went looking for examples, I can only imagine what I'd find.