Vice Presidential Debate Ryan VS Biden

[Spoonist]

So a question to US board members.

Was that really seen as some sort of fierce or otherwise heated debate by us standards?
I get all this comments that X slammed or X attacked or X whatever comments as if this was.
But to me that was really really tame compared to most of the world average when it comes to these things.

[Block]

Yes. We don't get the shoe throwing brawls that you see in some of the South East Asian countries, or the attempts to publicly humiliate the opponent like in the UK. For whatever reason showing any real emotion is considered unpresidential.

[Skywalker_T-65]

What Block said...for an American debate this was rather intense.

[SirNitram]

Well, the right wing media's strategy is clearly on view now for this.

1) Biden Laughed, So He Loses. RNC even has a video up on Biden laughing. Of course he was laughing! Ryan's nonsense is hilarious to those acquainted with reality.

2) Blame The Moderator. Wah, Biden wasn't called out for interrupting Ryan's lies.

3) Biden Didn't Smile And Nod When Ryan Lied. So it's so UNCIVIL. Get these dainty flowers their fainting chairs already..

[Skywalker_T-65]

The sheer STUPID coming out of the Reps lately is mind-boggling...anyone even marginally aquainted with their brain knows that Biden stomped Ryan from here to China.

[Alkaloid]

It's not that much different from the Dems claiming Obama won his debate vs Romney, or claiming that he deliberately performed poorly to lure Romney into giving the campaign lots of tasty sound bites to use against him later. At this stage I suspect all the people actually talking about it already know which side they support and will claim there side won the debate if the candidate came on stage dressed in a clown suit and performed a Benny Hill routine instead of talking.

[whackadoodle]

How does anyone watch that and call it a win for Ryan!?

One guy I talked to said that all that smiling and laughter from Biden was to cover his frustration.

Of course this very same guy also has the fucking nerve to claim that small business owners "create WEALTH" for the people under their employ. I didn't know that working at minimum wage while the business owner reaps most of the profits for himself constituted being wealthy. Shit, I make more than minimum wage, so I must be one wealthy motherfucker.

Hmm. My wife is a small business owner. Her two employees make over minimum wage. She makes much less ($800 per month). Meanwhile, expenses are paid and start-up debts are paid down. This bullshit about small-business owners lighting up Cuban cigars with $100 bills needs to stop.

[Block]

How does anyone watch that and call it a win for Ryan!?

One guy I talked to said that all that smiling and laughter from Biden was to cover his frustration.

Of course this very same guy also has the fucking nerve to claim that small business owners "create WEALTH" for the people under their employ. I didn't know that working at minimum wage while the business owner reaps most of the profits for himself constituted being wealthy. Shit, I make more than minimum wage, so I must be one wealthy motherfucker.

Hmm. My wife is a small business owner. Her two employees make over minimum wage. She makes much less ($800 per month). Meanwhile, expenses are paid and start-up debts are paid down. This bullshit about small-business owners lighting up Cuban cigars with $100 bills needs to stop.

Yeah I don't get how you can think small business owners DON'T create some form of wealth for their employees Lucifer. Most do, and very very few make 250k+ from their businesses.

[Sea Skimmer]

Generally if you make near 250,000 dollars or more you incorporate anyway, divorcing the issue of small business income from personal income tax rates in the first place. This is also legally much safer for the small business owner as his or her personal assets are no longer exposed to the same liability. US state laws on how easily one can incorporate vary wildly though, which is bad.

[Block]

Generally if you make near 250,000 dollars or more you incorporate anyway, divorcing the issue of small business income from personal income tax rates in the first place. This is also legally much safer for the small business owner as his or her personal assets are no longer exposed to the same liability. US state laws on how easily one can incorporate vary wildly though, which is bad.

Yeah but you can still make a personal income of over 250k from a small business that's incorporated if you have huge profits and no real expenses like a hedge fund.

[Sea Skimmer]

So? The whole republican, and even more then a few Dem's argument normally is that income taxes on 250,000 dollar incomes must be low to avoid killing small business jobs, but if the business and its expenses are incorporated then that real argument no longer holds water. The personal income is now 100% profits, and the business can write off all its expenses separately.

[Simon_Jester]

Hmm. My wife is a small business owner. Her two employees make over minimum wage. She makes much less ($800 per month). Meanwhile, expenses are paid and start-up debts are paid down. This bullshit about small-business owners lighting up Cuban cigars with $100 bills needs to stop.

Our definition of "small business" needs a lot of work. It includes everything from your wife to little law and engineering firms that turn out a hell of a lot more money, and a bunch of other things in between and on the side.

Sort of like how "democratic" tends to mean whatever you want it to mean (Democratic People's Republic of West Kadgradistanski), "small business" is a term that means whatever you want in American politics. Alas.

[Darth Lucifer]

Hmm. My wife is a small business owner. Her two employees make over minimum wage. She makes much less ($800 per month). Meanwhile, expenses are paid and start-up debts are paid down. This bullshit about small-business owners lighting up Cuban cigars with $100 bills needs to stop.

Yes, seeing as how they're illegal in the United States.

[Darth Lucifer]

Yeah I don't get how you can think small business owners DON'T create some form of wealth for their employees Lucifer. Most do, and very very few make 250k+ from their businesses.

That depends on how you define wealth. In the strictest sense of the word, of course not and I never said that, but I concede your point.

[CaptainChewbacca]

Isn't a 'small business' some arbitrary distinction like 'fewer than 49 salaried employees' or something close?

[Vendetta]

How does anyone watch that and call it a win for Ryan!?

One guy I talked to said that all that smiling and laughter from Biden was to cover his frustration.

Of course this very same guy also has the fucking nerve to claim that small business owners "create WEALTH" for the people under their employ. I didn't know that working at minimum wage while the business owner reaps most of the profits for himself constituted being wealthy. Shit, I make more than minimum wage, so I must be one wealthy motherfucker.

So essentially retards think that Ryan won?

I think the actual truth is more that the US political scene is so calcified and tribal that the majority of people only use the debates to confirm their preexisting biases. They will, essentially, always say that their guy won, and since there's no way to independently assess how the candidates have done at persuading anyone who is actually open to persuasion, no-one can say otherwise.

The media of course, no matter its politics, wants you to believe that the race is close because that's good theatre, and good theatre means more page impressions, newspaper sales, and nightly news viewing figures.

If there's a part of the US electoral process that isn't hopelessly broken and useless I haven't seen it yet. (Not that we have it much better here, of course.)

[Simon_Jester]

It's gotten to the point where something like 40-45% of American voters (maybe slightly less on the Democrat side) sincerely believe that the opposition party is actively trying to destroy America and five more years of their policies would leave us in irreversible decline. And where the permanent horse-race coverage of the election has put off so many people that half of Americans don't even bother being American voters; they're burned out to where they don't even try and identify their own best interests.

EDIT: So instead of there being a lot of 'persuadable' people, there's a lot of 'turned-off' people who aren't really keeping an eye on things, and view both parties as interchangeably mediocre (or just bad). If they bother to follow the coverage and vote, these people are easily influenced by superficial things like "Biden looked rude" or "Obama looks dignified." If they had strong opinions that made them think about the issues, they'd probably have already chosen a side.

[Irbis]

It's gotten to the point where something like 40-45% of American voters (maybe slightly less on the Democrat side) sincerely believe that the opposition party is actively trying to destroy America and five more years of their policies would leave us in irreversible decline.

Sad thing is, half of them may be right. Ok, not irrewersible decline, but huge damage that will take generations to recover.

Anyway, out local newspapers printed bites on Democrats demanding Biden take Obama's place in the next two debates as he is obviously better opponent (and supposedly can take over president's duties being VP if he was not available). Is there any truth to it or just some twisted gossip?

[Channel72]

It's gotten to the point where something like 40-45% of American voters (maybe slightly less on the Democrat side) sincerely believe that the opposition party is actively trying to destroy America and five more years of their policies would leave us in irreversible decline. And where the permanent horse-race coverage of the election has put off so many people that half of Americans don't even bother being American voters; they're burned out to where they don't even try and identify their own best interests.

A lot of the "both parties are the same" crap basically comes down to the fact that most voters just don't understand the relevant issues involved, and the Democrats just suck at communicating the issues anyway. The whole debate between Democrats and Republicans can basically be distilled down to "government spending should stimulate the economy" vs. "corporations will stimulate the economy if you just leave them alone."

Doesn't anyone remember FDR - probably the best president of the 20th century - and how he got us out of this mess the first time it happened? (Hint: it wasn't less government spending.)

Yeah, I know it's ancient history at this point, but the media is constantly comparing the 2008 economic crisis to the 1930s. But we never hear about how they actually fixed the economy back in the 1930s. Yeah, World War 2 obviously helped, but FDR basically established himself as the archetypal big-spending Democrat, and instituted all kinds of government programs, like Social Security and the FDIC, which we basically take for granted now. As long as we're comparing the current crisis to the Great Depression, maybe Democrats would do well to remind everyone that it was the Democratic party philosophy that got us out of the first Great Depression.

[Mr Bean]

It's gotten to the point where something like 40-45% of American voters (maybe slightly less on the Democrat side) sincerely believe that the opposition party is actively trying to destroy America and five more years of their policies would leave us in irreversible decline. And where the permanent horse-race coverage of the election has put off so many people that half of Americans don't even bother being American voters; they're burned out to where they don't even try and identify their own best interests.

A lot of the "both parties are the same" crap basically comes down to the fact that most voters just don't understand the relevant issues involved, and the Democrats just suck at communicating the issues anyway. The whole debate between Democrats and Republicans can basically be distilled down to "government spending should stimulate the economy" vs. "corporations will stimulate the economy if you just leave them alone."

Doesn't anyone remember FDR - probably the best president of the 20th century - and how he got us out of this mess the first time it happened? (Hint: it wasn't less government spending.)

Yeah, I know it's ancient history at this point, but the media is constantly comparing the 2008 economic crisis to the 1930s. But we never hear about how they actually fixed the economy back in the 1930s. Yeah, World War 2 obviously helped, but FDR basically established himself as the archetypal big-spending Democrat, and instituted all kinds of government programs, like Social Security and the FDIC, which we basically take for granted now. As long as we're comparing the current crisis to the Great Depression, maybe Democrats would do well to remind everyone that it was the Democratic party philosophy that got us out of the first Great Depression.

To quote Paul Krugman, what do you think WWII was? Private sector spending? Heck no, WWII brought us out of the depression with massive goverment spending after large goverment spending of the new deal.