FBI's Clinton investigation widens to include public corruption concerns

Well he's a socialist and thinks simply taxing the rich will pay for everything under the sun. He doesn't seem to have a basic grasp on economics and he seems to think profit and large private industry is bad. He's stuck in some sort of New Deal mentality where he thinks the government needs to be putting people to work in lower skill jobs. Our unemployment rate is 5%. The only thing I kind of agree with him on is foreign policy, but he is anti-free trade and pro-union which is silly.

The guy lives in some sort of bubble and his policies would absolutely blow up our economy.

That said I do like the idea of drug imports from Canada, but that is basically using the free market to help cut drug prices. I buy any drugs I need from Canada and I tell everyone to do the same. It's crazy how much we pay for drugs here. I'm sure there are other things I agree with him on, but there are things I agree with Trump on too.

 

Okay buddy. You do but someone who graduated from the University of Chicago and spent 25 years in congress does't understand fiscal and monetary policy. Please.

Let me guess... You are going to pull up that WSJ article about his policies costing "18 trillion dollars".

 

I don't really care where he went to college. He's about 50 years removed from college. He has a poly sci degree from Chicago for whatever that is. I have a history degree from UT for whatever that is worth.

And buddy friend pal amigo...I'm pointing to stuff from the platform on his website. www.berniesanders.com

I wish you would have at least addressed a couple of the points I mentioned. Do you think we need a massive New Deal style economic plan that promotes relatively temporary lower skill jobs? Who is going to work these jobs? Is it the Americans going to free college? Again our unemployment rate is 5%.

Are you really pro-protectionism, pro-union, and anti-free trade?

Do you honestly feel that all of Bernie's plans can be paid for by massive tax hikes on the wealthy and corporations? Bernie berates companies for going overseas to avoid taxes. What does he think is going to happen if he taxes them more? He hasn't even come out with a tax number or plan yet that I have seen either.

He says he wants to emulate a Scandinavian type economy for the US, but doesn't really seem to understand what has made them successful and that we are extremely different from them.

http://www.politico.eu/article/bernie-sanders-denmark-sweden-norway-welfare-state/

http://www.economist.com/news/leade...-could-learn-nordic-countries-next-supermodel

He lives in some sort of socialist utopian bubble in his head.

 

Bernie is not a socialist. He just calls himself that cause he thinks it sounds cool. Either that or he doesn't know what a socialist is.

 

Good post. I am surrounded by Sanders mania in San Francisco.

Where I do agree with him:
(a) breaking up "too big to fail" banks
(b) campaign finance reform
(c) exploring a less regressive tax structure (but not going all the way to his extreme, which would never get through congress anyway).

I don't think a real "socialist" is quite right, but definitely closer to a New Deal democrat than we've seen in about 70 years.

On unions, I'm honestly conflicted. Let's look at where the labor market is heading with this 5% unemployment (which is great, at one level). You have three camps of people just based on observation and examining the data.
(1) People with "real jobs", benefits, etc. These people, including I'm blessed to say, me, work 60-80 hours a week. They may be passionate about their job and/or well-compensated, but google/apple/wallstreet/oil company/university/etc expects a **** ton of work from them. The digital realm has only made it worse in the sense of hours. We are always on call, let's face it.
(2) Gig economy people. Even tech-enabled folks fall increasingly into this arena. Everyone is free lance or contracting job to job. No benefits. No wage security. Maybe living with mom and dad a little longer.
(3) Low-wage retail/food service/etc. How many people with college degrees do you know who wait tables or make fancy coffee drinks? I know a ton.

There is a real merit to actual weekends, actual 40 hours of work, and actual vacation policies. All of those come about from collective bargaining. Without collective bargaining, I don't see how things won't slowly become more and more feudal, honestly. The 3 areas above with just become more extreme, with arena #1 becoming a smaller and smaller set of insane executive types.

Just seems like the trend, but maybe silicon valley is warping my perspective.

 

He calls himself a democratic socialist, because that is exactly what he is.

He thinks capitalism is fine, but uses socialist components in areas where capitalism is weak.

 

Great post, B-Bob (and robbie's), and I pretty much agree with all of it. I'm glad Bernie is running because he's pushing the party in a more progressive direction, but he couldn't win in the general election, in my opinion. That's a major flaw the man has, regardless of what one thinks of his positions on the various issues. With slim chance of taking back the Senate and/or the House (for reasons I won't get into here), holding the Presidency is paramount.

 

I'd also call myself some sort of socialist, but yeah there's a number of things around economics I don't agree with Bernie on. I don't like his protectionism. I don't like how his solutions tend to be solutions-by-fiat instead of leveraging market forces to deliver desired outcomes. But, I think his priorities are in the right place. If I was voting for who I think would be the best, smartest, savviest executive, it'd be Ted Cruz. He would lead us very effectively in the wrong direction. Sanders would probably lead us very ineffectively in the right direction.

I'm a type 1, except I work 40 hours. I think there are people in the corporate world like me who like to brag about how much they work, but actually keeping your hours under 50 is really not that uncommon from what I've seen. If you're doing 60-80, I suggest unionizing to get some relief from your employer's exploitative practices.

 

I'm in a union, LOL.
I'm close to 60, during the semesters especially, but I have very flexible summers to do my research in any schedule I want, so I feel very lucky.

The people who are full-time in Silicon Valley that I know? None of them are anywhere close to 40 hours a week. The Apple and Google people I know, in particular, are basically slaves to their firms.

Anyway, take them as outliers, even though their ranks are increasing, slightly. It's still true that, as a percentage, the full-time, salaried and benefited are decreasing, as I understand it. Categories 2 & 3 are rising.