USA Politics
- Thread starter Genghis Khan
- Start date
Black Wizard
Pleb Hunter
Dr. Eddies Wingman
Brighter than thousand_suns
Even something like ... the Spanish Inquisition? Nobody expects that.
In all seriousness: The outcome of the House proceedings was bleeding obvious, impeachment would happen. The outcome in the senate wil lbe equally obvious, Trump will be aquitted of the charges.
The only open question is; how will the impeachment process affect the 2020 elections? Not just the president election, but Congress? Are there any Democrat representatives who risk their seat by supporting impeachment, or any Republicans who risk theirs by not supporting it?
Also, it will be interesting to see how the Senate hearings will be. What witnesses will be heard, will Trump himself testify or will he do like Clinton and let lawyers represent him in the Senate?
Is there any other outcome of the Senate trial than "guilty" or "not guilty"? Can the Senate for example land on reprimanding the President for his actions, but saying it's not enough for his dismissal from office? Or was that only an option for the House of Representatives before deciding on impeachment?
bearfan
Ancient Mariner
I believe the Senate's only option is to remove from office or not. There could be a separate motion to censure or something like that.
I also wonder what effect it will have on the Senator's in running for office, since they should be in the Senate for the trial and not on the campaign trail.
I would think it helps the GOP a bit in the House, just due to the Dems being in the majority and they occupy more seats that tend to be pro-Trump than Republicans hold anti-Trump seats. One Dem switched parties because of this (Van Drew in NJ), so I guess they lost one seat already. But who knows how much it will matter in a year.
So, in a trial, they have multiple outcomes: they can convict, remove and disqualify Trump from running for federal office, they can convict and remove him but not disqualify him, or they can fail to find him guilty.
It's true that the Democrats hold more seats that voted for Trump in 2016 than the GOP holds seats that voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016. It's unknown if those seats will switch back when the Donald is on the ballot.
MrKnickerbocker
clap hands
Nothing's gonna happen. He's being sent to the principal's office and the principal is gonna give him a high-five and send him back to recess.
The gig economy is probably a really, really bad thing for labour overall.
bearfan
Ancient Mariner
Strongly Disagree
I think there's some places where the gig economy disruption to various industries have benefits, but overall, I am gravely concerned for the decentralization of workers and the overall stagnation of wages.
bearfan
Ancient Mariner
It makes complete sense for a lot of people .. and for some reason the State of California thinks it knows what is best. This law is going to hose a lot of people. I personally know 6 people that are either moving or quickly forming their own corporations to work around it .. because shockingly, they know what type of employment works best for them economically and for how they want to live their lives.
I think I'm becoming more of a communist, because when I see the gig economy, what I see is a way for business to remove labour costs and transfer more money to themselves while offshoring the non-payment costs of labour to the government (health care, job insurance, disability, etc).
bearfan
Ancient Mariner
I see a way for people to set their own hours, decide what projects/customers they want to work on/with, advance their skills, or just do something on the side to bring in some extra money
None of those are a problem on their own, which is why I dislike the gig economy less here - where many of the above protections are already funded by the government, and those gig economy workers are paying for them via their taxes. But in the US, where there's a strong push against funding those bonuses, it's going to have a pretty significant financial cost.
bearfan
Ancient Mariner
I guess the people at Vox can be happy now, they can qualify for those programs versus paying for that stuff through a job
Freelancers probably should be considered different to "gig economy". The real judge as to how these changes will matter are whether or not wages increase or benefits are provided.
bearfan
Ancient Mariner
California did not make that distinction ... freelance journalists, IT workers, truck drivers, many in the entertainment trades, and other professions are all getting hosed over by this. A very good example of a "one size fits all" approach taken by a group of legislatures more interested in scoring some political points versus actually understanding how this works. This will do nothing but accelerate the pace of companies leaving the state.
All part of a backlash against Uber, which ironically became a thing due to insane regulation that created giant barriers to owning a taxi (see examples of licenses selling for $500K and up) and no competition which ended up being incredibly shitty service. I took my first Uber in Vegas when we went to see the Iron Maidens due to being pissed at the cab driver that took us to that show.