Rant BEGIN: Dean Preston is a maniac in my personal experience having talked with him on the street while he was first campaigning -- before he served his first term. He laughed wildly at something frank and simple that I said, when he tried to talk to me about how he was so cool and how people should vote for him. I basically said no I don't want to talk to you and that I was busy. I remember it being an out of place kind of thing as if he sort of didn't care that I was busy? It was odd. Should I be happy that he laughed at me for being myself? Anyhow, Preston is is not someone who I have any reason to trust. END
San Francisco politics are complicated. There is a lot of appeasing and stuff that's done for show, to try and and curry favor from the various highly ideological and disunited, often impractical population segments. Getting nothing done while complaining about it seems to be an art in my opinion that ... what is it, city council, participates in. Boldly proposing impossible plans or shutting things down.
Just because ex-mayor Breed vetoed something doesn't mean that the moneyed rich are THE PROBLEM. SF during Breed's term had a lot of negative growth as the pandemic, extremely cheap fentanyl plus a very aggressive fentanyl user base, and work from home making ghost towns out of business and mixed business/residential neighborhoods, strangulated city operations, making for an extra stressful operations challenge for the mayor's office in my opinion.
This article is under-researched and / or highly opinionated, in my opinion.
The article could be much better, if it were more factually accurate about "conclusions" and less biased towards any particular political goal. I do like the the article is overtly biased and is not hiding its bias.
For Pete's sake. Yes, that's what it means. We aren't using the global communist wordbank to describe domestic democrat politics in the United States. If that were true, "the People" would take on a much different meaning as well. As would the Middle Class, and much else. GMAB.
There is no for Pete’s sake. A one party state has a precise commonly accepted definition which applies everywhere. There is no other definition in the USA which would make California one.
The fact that the current Republican propaganda would make the USSR blush in how they consistently misuse terms doesn’t magically change that.
It doesn't. It's a common turn of phrase meant to describe a State in which one party is assured to be elected in any given election.
You can't wish it away nor make an autistic proclamation of "precision" over language use and meaning. "Applies everywhere"... hilarious. Says who? Perhaps my definition "applies everywhere". What now?
In reality, how language works is that the definition of such phrases is defined by customary use. And the customary use very much includes the definition that I described.
How phrasing is widely used, in practice, is the "accepted" way that language meaning works.
I' hate to do this, but you keep arguing, Do you have a clinical Master of Science in a communication discipline? I do. I'm familiar with the underlying academic theories of language, especially as applied to communication issues. I'm right and you're wrong.
I was using the term "one-party state" metaphorically. I thought that would be obvious.
In any case the demographics in California are now such that it is close to impossible for a Republican governor to be elected.
Which means that Dem politicians are now only really accountable to the people of influence in their own party, not so much the general public.
And they have an entirely different set of interests to the general public.
It doesn't matter what your political persuasion, a "one-party state" is in nobody's interest.
For example if politics was not so dysfunctional in California you might have had a competent mayor in LA and the Palisades would still be standing....
He's been deploying the National Guard to cities in peacetime, And the National Guard helped with the Palisades response. I'm sure he could deploy them to rake the forest floor.
It actually seems strange he has not; he sounded so confident in that approach on the campaign trail.
The longer we let SF be run by the ultra rich the worst it will get. Maybe when all the rich leave it will finally it rock bottom and the people will be able to pass the reforms needed to get the city back on the right track.
More rich people tightly correlate with a broad increase in quality of life for everyone. Almost everyone trusts them more than anything that approaches a revolutionary government (the "soon to be rich" government).
The rich having their ways and driving everyone else out is one way to create an area full of happy people. The problem is, you're just not counting the people who were screwed over by that strategy.
You can't bar anyone from cities. You can't bar them just like they can't bar you. It isn't policy that's driving anyone out. It's pricing, which is above the control of any one person or even group of people.
Some people will be forced out due to pricing. The local economy of every city is going to be unworkable at some income floor. The more expensive the city, the higher the floor.
If that floor is higher than what you make, it doesn't mean that no poor people live in SF. It just means that they feel poor even at a relatively higher income.
To illustrate, 80k per year is still a decent income in some towns. But it is definitely poor in NYC.
Being a port city and better education also tightly correlates to better local QOL
Will go with the more generally applicable statistical narrative than the empty idea a minority benefiting from biased political policy create all value.
> if the government could provide something like a universal basic income for unemployed people when the economy was flatlining, could they not afford it during boom times
What happened when the government started writing stimulus checks? Assets inflated greatly. Meme coins became a thing and scammy crypto currencies and JPEGs shot up. Some people were paid more in benefits than they made working prolonging inflation. About 68% of unemployed workers received benefits that were greater than their lost earnings [0]. Pretty soon the stock market was about 20% higher than it was pre-covid.
If you were to ask economists or anyone with a basic grasp of reality how the stock market should react with a global pandemic and shutdown, most would say it should adjust down, not shoot up 20% from pre-pandemic levels. It was obviously the money printing. To be fair, the money printing wasn't 100% given to people directly, but nearly $2 trillion was income assistance and direct payment [1] and other measures had similar effects in that they resulted in money in people's pocket, more than they had lost. That money fueled the asset bubble.
Fast forward a few years, and the result was double digit inflation that we're still working through. Not a resounding win as the dem-socialists would have you believe.
> "Could we have a Zohran in San Francisco?”
I'm pretty sure San Fransisco has many of the same policies Zohran promotes like rent control and soft on crime like social workers rather than police, drug legalization and acceptance of "minor" shoplifting. They also have some of the highest tax rates in the country. Combined city and county sales tax rate is 8.625% + an additional 12.3% for CA [2]
The article mentions free buses and tax on vacant properties, but is that the biggest problem? Bus fares? I feel like this whole post is an incredible exercise in gaslighting.
> Congress passed an expansive relief package with an unprecedented $600-per-week supplement for jobless workers. The goal was to replace their wages so they could survive the economic lockdown.
> As a result, though, many people may now be eligible for substantially more money while unemployed
According to your source, "Some people were paid more in benefits than they made working" was only true for the very poor.
The link to shitcoins is dubious. It strikes me like the 21st century equivalent of complaining how folks spent money on nice cars.
Why did the stock market go up 20% relative to pre pandemic levels? Have another explanation? Who was buying these shit coins? Where did the money come from?
It really doesn't matter if it was the "very poor". I guess inflation doesn't matter if it's caused by very poor people people spending more
> Why did the stock market go up 20% relative to pre pandemic levels? Have another explanation? Who was buying these shit coins?
These are rhetorical questions and frankly kind of silly. You're implying that the poorest, unemployed Americans temporarily receiving $600/wk caused the creation of shitcoins. There are so many leaps and bounds and no context. So no, I can't offer you another explanation.
So my explanation is stock market bump and nft/meme coins coincided with checks going out and unemployment benefit bump.
Also personal savings rate jumped to 30% during that time due to covid stimulus. Your retort is some moral argument about it doesn't feel right because poor people.
You're not having a serious conversation so I'm going to bow out. Reconsider the facts and put your moral indignation aside
Rant BEGIN: Dean Preston is a maniac in my personal experience having talked with him on the street while he was first campaigning -- before he served his first term. He laughed wildly at something frank and simple that I said, when he tried to talk to me about how he was so cool and how people should vote for him. I basically said no I don't want to talk to you and that I was busy. I remember it being an out of place kind of thing as if he sort of didn't care that I was busy? It was odd. Should I be happy that he laughed at me for being myself? Anyhow, Preston is is not someone who I have any reason to trust. END
San Francisco politics are complicated. There is a lot of appeasing and stuff that's done for show, to try and and curry favor from the various highly ideological and disunited, often impractical population segments. Getting nothing done while complaining about it seems to be an art in my opinion that ... what is it, city council, participates in. Boldly proposing impossible plans or shutting things down.
Just because ex-mayor Breed vetoed something doesn't mean that the moneyed rich are THE PROBLEM. SF during Breed's term had a lot of negative growth as the pandemic, extremely cheap fentanyl plus a very aggressive fentanyl user base, and work from home making ghost towns out of business and mixed business/residential neighborhoods, strangulated city operations, making for an extra stressful operations challenge for the mayor's office in my opinion.
This article is under-researched and / or highly opinionated, in my opinion.
The article could be much better, if it were more factually accurate about "conclusions" and less biased towards any particular political goal. I do like the the article is overtly biased and is not hiding its bias.
California politics are what you get in any one-party state which California is as a result of immigration/demographic change.
Politicians rise to the top not on the basis of accountability and the contest of ideas, but due to political favors and backroom deals.
Its how you get someone like Gavin Newsom.
One party being favoured by the majority of the population doesn’t make a state a one party state even if you yourself don’t like said party.
If the republican had an agenda Californian found suitable and worthy, they would vote for them. They do have candidates at all elections.
Have we already forgotten The Governator?
Yes, that's what it means.
No, that’s not what it means. The USSR and China are exemple of one party states. There is literally only one party allowed.
California has multiple legitimate candidates at each elections.
For Pete's sake. Yes, that's what it means. We aren't using the global communist wordbank to describe domestic democrat politics in the United States. If that were true, "the People" would take on a much different meaning as well. As would the Middle Class, and much else. GMAB.
There is no for Pete’s sake. A one party state has a precise commonly accepted definition which applies everywhere. There is no other definition in the USA which would make California one.
The fact that the current Republican propaganda would make the USSR blush in how they consistently misuse terms doesn’t magically change that.
It doesn't. It's a common turn of phrase meant to describe a State in which one party is assured to be elected in any given election.
You can't wish it away nor make an autistic proclamation of "precision" over language use and meaning. "Applies everywhere"... hilarious. Says who? Perhaps my definition "applies everywhere". What now?
In reality, how language works is that the definition of such phrases is defined by customary use. And the customary use very much includes the definition that I described.
How phrasing is widely used, in practice, is the "accepted" way that language meaning works.
I' hate to do this, but you keep arguing, Do you have a clinical Master of Science in a communication discipline? I do. I'm familiar with the underlying academic theories of language, especially as applied to communication issues. I'm right and you're wrong.
I was using the term "one-party state" metaphorically. I thought that would be obvious.
In any case the demographics in California are now such that it is close to impossible for a Republican governor to be elected. Which means that Dem politicians are now only really accountable to the people of influence in their own party, not so much the general public. And they have an entirely different set of interests to the general public.
It doesn't matter what your political persuasion, a "one-party state" is in nobody's interest. For example if politics was not so dysfunctional in California you might have had a competent mayor in LA and the Palisades would still be standing....
It's really unfortunate that fire burned on President Trump's watch.
Even more so that he doesn't govern the local fire services.
He's been deploying the National Guard to cities in peacetime, And the National Guard helped with the Palisades response. I'm sure he could deploy them to rake the forest floor.
It actually seems strange he has not; he sounded so confident in that approach on the campaign trail.
Yep...cleaning up the mess left behind by dysfunctional Democrat politics....
The longer we let SF be run by the ultra rich the worst it will get. Maybe when all the rich leave it will finally it rock bottom and the people will be able to pass the reforms needed to get the city back on the right track.
More rich people tightly correlate with a broad increase in quality of life for everyone. Almost everyone trusts them more than anything that approaches a revolutionary government (the "soon to be rich" government).
The rich having their ways and driving everyone else out is one way to create an area full of happy people. The problem is, you're just not counting the people who were screwed over by that strategy.
That's not happening and there is no strategy.
You can't bar anyone from cities. You can't bar them just like they can't bar you. It isn't policy that's driving anyone out. It's pricing, which is above the control of any one person or even group of people.
Some people will be forced out due to pricing. The local economy of every city is going to be unworkable at some income floor. The more expensive the city, the higher the floor.
If that floor is higher than what you make, it doesn't mean that no poor people live in SF. It just means that they feel poor even at a relatively higher income.
To illustrate, 80k per year is still a decent income in some towns. But it is definitely poor in NYC.
Being a port city and better education also tightly correlates to better local QOL
Will go with the more generally applicable statistical narrative than the empty idea a minority benefiting from biased political policy create all value.
got hit with a pop-up that said my device had a virus halfway through this otherwise interesting read. Good luck
I didn't. Maybe you have a virus.
> if the government could provide something like a universal basic income for unemployed people when the economy was flatlining, could they not afford it during boom times
What happened when the government started writing stimulus checks? Assets inflated greatly. Meme coins became a thing and scammy crypto currencies and JPEGs shot up. Some people were paid more in benefits than they made working prolonging inflation. About 68% of unemployed workers received benefits that were greater than their lost earnings [0]. Pretty soon the stock market was about 20% higher than it was pre-covid.
If you were to ask economists or anyone with a basic grasp of reality how the stock market should react with a global pandemic and shutdown, most would say it should adjust down, not shoot up 20% from pre-pandemic levels. It was obviously the money printing. To be fair, the money printing wasn't 100% given to people directly, but nearly $2 trillion was income assistance and direct payment [1] and other measures had similar effects in that they resulted in money in people's pocket, more than they had lost. That money fueled the asset bubble.
Fast forward a few years, and the result was double digit inflation that we're still working through. Not a resounding win as the dem-socialists would have you believe.
> "Could we have a Zohran in San Francisco?”
I'm pretty sure San Fransisco has many of the same policies Zohran promotes like rent control and soft on crime like social workers rather than police, drug legalization and acceptance of "minor" shoplifting. They also have some of the highest tax rates in the country. Combined city and county sales tax rate is 8.625% + an additional 12.3% for CA [2]
The article mentions free buses and tax on vacant properties, but is that the biggest problem? Bus fares? I feel like this whole post is an incredible exercise in gaslighting.
[0] https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/many-americans-are-gett...
[1] https://www.covidmoneytracker.org/
[2] https://cdtfa.ca.gov/taxes-and-fees/rates.aspx
> Congress passed an expansive relief package with an unprecedented $600-per-week supplement for jobless workers. The goal was to replace their wages so they could survive the economic lockdown.
> As a result, though, many people may now be eligible for substantially more money while unemployed
According to your source, "Some people were paid more in benefits than they made working" was only true for the very poor.
The link to shitcoins is dubious. It strikes me like the 21st century equivalent of complaining how folks spent money on nice cars.
Why did the stock market go up 20% relative to pre pandemic levels? Have another explanation? Who was buying these shit coins? Where did the money come from?
It really doesn't matter if it was the "very poor". I guess inflation doesn't matter if it's caused by very poor people people spending more
> Why did the stock market go up 20% relative to pre pandemic levels? Have another explanation? Who was buying these shit coins?
These are rhetorical questions and frankly kind of silly. You're implying that the poorest, unemployed Americans temporarily receiving $600/wk caused the creation of shitcoins. There are so many leaps and bounds and no context. So no, I can't offer you another explanation.
So my explanation is stock market bump and nft/meme coins coincided with checks going out and unemployment benefit bump.
Also personal savings rate jumped to 30% during that time due to covid stimulus. Your retort is some moral argument about it doesn't feel right because poor people.
You're not having a serious conversation so I'm going to bow out. Reconsider the facts and put your moral indignation aside
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/data/PSAVERT
The stock market increase and crypto spike all happened a long time before any sort of pandemic-related stimulus took effect