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307 points MBCook | 18 comments | | HN request time: 1.283s | source | bottom
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Koala_ice ◴[] No.42150928[source]
I thoroughyl expect the Deparment of Government Efficiency to recommend U.S. Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) be shut down to save previous taxpayer dollars.
replies(7): >>42150990 #>>42150996 #>>42151111 #>>42151200 #>>42151375 #>>42151410 #>>42151686 #
notyourwork ◴[] No.42151375[source]
Am I the only one that is not excited about the next four years being constant banter of this nature? I loathe it. Nothing personal against your comment but the new administration hasn't even gone into office and I cannot get away from this.
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1. seanmcdirmid ◴[] No.42151411[source]
They have already announced what they are going to do, with the pro-Trump side saying he's not serious or will mellow out the plan before he takes office, and the anti-Trump side saying he will do exactly what he says he's going to do.

Basically a repeat of 2016.

replies(2): >>42151449 #>>42152130 #
2. weaksauce ◴[] No.42151449[source]
not a repeat of 2016 at all. he's got every lever of the government at his disposal. stacked supreme court, three branches of government on his side. hiring the worst people for every job possible and hiring only for fealty to him.

this will be much worse than 2016.

replies(3): >>42151562 #>>42151906 #>>42152105 #
3. stouset ◴[] No.42151737{3}[source]
You may wish to revisit your timelines. COVID-19 and the associated widespread shutdowns occurred throughout 2020 and 2021. The national debt (e.g. the thing the "money printing" goes toward) rose by a staggering $8.4T from 2017-2021 and only $4.3T from 2021-.
replies(1): >>42152023 #
4. ithkuil ◴[] No.42151814{3}[source]
Unfortunately complex systems cannot be fixed by simply going full forward in the opposite direction of a bad direction.

And yet we not only want to revert any decision that was made that we think correlates with an unhappy situation, we also want to choose people who are as different as possible from the guys we think are responsible for the unwanted status quo. So if the current politicians are serious people who talk in an articulate way we conclude that seriousness is a problem, because it's two faced. We conclude that being articulated is a problem because it's judgemental, it's a symbol of being elites.

If you conclude that serious looking articulated people are two-faced lying elites there are many alternatives in a multidimensional solution space. You could desire honest serious elites, or honest serious commoners, or many variations on the theme.

But no, we obviously want to get exactly the opposite, because that's the monodimensional thing to do! It's simpler. Let's pick the exact opposite of the people we have. Current people are too serious? Let's pick an unserious person. The current elites are too educated? Let's pick people that don't have formal education and/or that actively denigrate higher education. Etc etc.

I understand the human urge to flip tables. But if I stop thinking about it for a moment, I don't think the strategy is good. In rare cases it might be the necessary strategy, but in most cases it's destroying something that has plenty room for improvement and replace it with something that is much worse and will take even longer to improve over the previous one

replies(1): >>42151954 #
5. bena ◴[] No.42151823{3}[source]
I really can't take such hyperbolic rhetoric seriously.

I had someone try to claim we had "complete lockdown for years", which is news to me. We had one year of sporadically enforced lockdown-ish measures. Although, we did go out to eat a few times.

Hell, I bought a house during end of 2020/beginning of 2021. By the time we closed, I was back in office, we weren't wearing masks, and people didn't seem too concerned.

replies(1): >>42152489 #
6. Chance-Device ◴[] No.42151954{4}[source]
> Unfortunately complex systems cannot be fixed by simply going full forward in the opposite direction of a bad direction.

Tell that to gradient descent.

(Though the step sizes are a bit shorter than four years)

replies(1): >>42155507 #
7. ◴[] No.42152023{4}[source]
8. giantg2 ◴[] No.42152105[source]
He had both chambers in 2016 too, on similarly narrow majorities. The hiring has consistently been for allegiance. The court has changed a little. One thing you don't mention that is perhaps the biggest thing is temperance for reelection. But overall, I don't see much reason that it will be that much different from last time. Talking about things being much worse seems like an emotional statement.
9. giantg2 ◴[] No.42152130[source]
It always falls in the middle. There's a reason politicians are known as liars. Of course they won't do everything they claim on the campaign trail.
replies(1): >>42153135 #
10. ipaddr ◴[] No.42152489{4}[source]
Depends on where you lived. In some places they enforced longer lock downs and required vaccines to eat in public and this went on for years. Texas was different compared to Minnesota for example. Canada was locked down for a long time.. New Zealand too.

Congrats on the house.

11. seanmcdirmid ◴[] No.42153135[source]
Politicians bend the truth or promise what they are later unable to deliver (and often had no chance of delivering). But I think Trump usually tries to deliver on whatever he said in the campaign (like in 2016), like you can expect wide reaching tariffs in January or February (especially since half-way competent advisors, congress, and the courts are probably not going to moderate him as much this time).

Maybe make any computer purchases in December just to be safe.

replies(1): >>42153738 #
12. giantg2 ◴[] No.42153738{3}[source]
That would be pretty ironic if Trump is able to deliver more on his promises than other politicians.
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13. collingreen ◴[] No.42154297{4}[source]
Why would it be ironic? He has less regard for the political group and general stability than a more run of the mill politician and now there is explicit immunity for anything he wants to do, like when he sold classified documents but "declassified them in his mind" right before once he got caught.

We watched four years of this already, including a rally with gallows being built in the crowd being told to march on the Capitol (he claims figuratively, and everyone just misunderstood, despite all the posts and planning and travel and tour groups). Last time it was absurd news headline after headline just to distract from the other things going on. We saw some bonkers stuff that would have disqualified other candidates in the past (or at least most candidates probably thought it would).

At this point I think his promises are easier to deliver on and he doesn't care about (and has been made immune from) the consequences that usually temper a politician's ability to deliver. Tariffs, no health plan, another wall (remember when he pardoned bannon for stealing the money they raised for the wall?), "stopping the war in Ukraine" but without a free Ukraine at the end, and decimating government regulatory agencies.

The weirdest part of this narrative for me is how the supporters say he wont do what he promises and the detractors fear he will. I don't know enough history to know if that is common but it sure feels backwards to me.

replies(1): >>42155949 #
14. ithkuil ◴[] No.42155507{5}[source]
Yeah that's why the second half of my comment was the dimensionality of the space
15. giantg2 ◴[] No.42155949{5}[source]
"The weirdest part of this narrative for me is how the supporters say he wont do what he promises and the detractors fear he will. I don't know enough history to know if that is common but it sure feels backwards to me."

That's pretty common on all highly polarized topics. Happens all the time with stuff like democrat candidates and firearms seizures - supporters walking it back and detractors believing ever word.

16. seanmcdirmid ◴[] No.42159105{4}[source]
Trump is probably the first politician in history where supporters claim he isn’t going to do what he says he is going to do (“take Trump seriously, not literally!”) while his detractors claim that he is. It’s already a weird spot in history.
replies(1): >>42161226 #
17. giantg2 ◴[] No.42161226{5}[source]
That's pretty common on all highly polarized topics. Happens all the time with stuff like democrat candidates and firearms seizures - supporters walking it back and detractors believing every word.
replies(1): >>42220018 #
18. jquery ◴[] No.42220018{6}[source]
when was the last time this happened at the presidential level?