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I applaud ambitious efforts and I'm open to raising taxes for the very rich (albeit easy for me to say down here in the middle class), but AOC doesn't strike be

I applaud ambitious efforts and I'm open to raising taxes for the very rich (albeit easy for me to say down here in the middle class), but AOC doesn't strike be as competent in the slightest (although as her supporters are so fond of rationalizing, she's not the least competent public official). She has charisma, which is an important leadership quality, but not much else as far as I can tell. Certainly not the person I want leading the charge on climate change.

AnimalMuppet 8y ago
Or on tax reform.
rhegart 8y ago
I agree with raising taxes, maybe not through income tax as it’s shown it often can decreases revenue and capital flight etc. and I support high brackets in the $10M range and up. Many people think 100k is rich and 400k is extremely rich but taxing that further I’m sure will decrease revenue. I support things like a tax on digital advertising. This is a tax that wouldn’t slow growth or harm the econo,y really and impacts mostly those with extremely high capital investments. Facebook, Google help our economy a lot but they don’t have that many jobs in relation to profits. A 10% tax on digital advertising would eat marginally into their profits but their profits rise 25% a year so not too bad. That would raise around $15-$20B a year by 2020. Imagine how doubling the subsidies for solar and EVs would do for renewables and EVs.
Daishiman 8y ago
How relevant is this actually? Legislators make the law but it's the bureaucrats, who are the real specialists in crafting the details of legislation that are actually relevant. Competent politicians aren't competent because they're knowledgeable in every possible topic, but because they surround themselves with subject matter experts.
- zozbot123 8y ago
  > Competent politicians aren't ... they surround themselves with subject matter experts. ¿Por qué no los dos? Is Ocasio-Cortez surrounding herself with subject-matter experts?
  - lghh 8y ago
    She's been in Congress for a whole 4 days. I'm sure by the time any legislation was starting to be written there will be subject matter experts in the room.
    - LyndsySimon 8y ago
      I have zero doubt that legislation for this session is pretty much already complete. Sure, there'll be things that come up during the session, but legislators already have their priorities set going in, and it'd be silly not to have the work already done and have the bills ready to go.
- LyndsySimon 8y ago
  > It's the bureaucrats, who are the real specialists in crafting the details of legislation that are actually relevant. In my experience, it's often just "interested parties". I'm thinking of multiple cases where political advocacy groups I've worked with have drafted a bill proposal and taken it directly to state-level legislators seeking to have them sponsor it. In every case, they either refused or submitted the bill as-is without modification. In one case, that means that an Arkansas law was actually drafted by a 16-year-old (me). That one was relatively minor in the grand scheme of things, but still :)
gkoberger 8y ago
Why do you believe she's not competent? She seems to be competent. Secondly, isn't empathy, vision, ambition and an ability to rally people incredibly important for a politician? Politicians aren't supposed to know everything, but rather work with appropriate experts and aides.
- rhegart 8y ago
  She really isn’t competent. Watch any interview she gives or her discussing anything really. But that doesn’t matter. We don’t need everyone to be competent, if she can get a message out to young people and her following she can raise awareness and tilt voters to policies further to what she wants. She is extremely charismatic and that’s an important skill in itself. It’s like playing with fire because she would make a terrible lead lawmaker on everything, but she absolutely is doing a fantastic job raising awareness
  - dragonwriter 8y ago
    > She really isn’t competent. Watch any interview she gives or her discussing anything really. Not seeing it. I've spent some time working in a (state, not federal) legislative office and have a political science degree (specialized in pragmatics of US politics.) I've seen some of her interviews. I don't see anything that indicates that she would be incompetent as a legislator. Could you explain the basis for your assessment?
    - AnimalMuppet 8y ago
      Well, a number of her interviews seem to show her not having a very good grasp on basic facts. The branches of the US government. How much the military spends. Fairly basic stuff. Now, this could be that she's not good at interviews, and feels the need to keep talking to appear competent. She could know far more, and just be unable (yet) to bring it out in front of the cameras. But to me, she comes off as talking without knowing. That scares me in someone who can write legislation.
    - hello_newman 8y ago
tdb7893 8y ago
The reason I like her is that she is passionate for a lot of the values I am pasaionate for. It's like with an engineer, you get the right person then you can always train them on the job if they need to learn things. I was very naive when I started as an engineer and everything turned out okay, it's not like she is the president or even a senator.
tracker1 8y ago
I'm not... I've seen enough government operations that you cannot convince me that additional taxation is necessary vs. reducing excess spending and bureaucracy.
- weberc2 8y ago
  That’s fine. I sympathize with that position too.
- goalieca 8y ago
  Haha. You will never be convinced the. There’s been ample examples of austerity and cutbacks and government audits at all levels of government in all countries. This libertarian ideal of wasteful spending and government mismanagement is kind of a dumb one. Things are actually pretty well done unless the politicians are corrupt. But if corrupt politicians are the problem then the solution is to fix the corrupt politicians. Every large organization (public or private) has waste the same way every large computer system has waste. Management is complex and there’s simply no way to optimize all resources in real-time. In software we may lament some of the bloat but we generally accept it as a necessary evil. In places where performance is extra valuable we profile and optimize the path. Well the same thing happens in government and corporations. Government of Ontario spends a good chunk of money on grants to health care system researchers to incrementally make things better and the system is doing really well considering how underfunded parts of it are.
  - tracker1 8y ago
    I've seen $80k phone systems denied, while $180k systems get approved... I've seen fixed telecom rates nearly 5x what private businesses pay. I've seen contracts burn through cash only to cancel projects after billions have been spent. I've seen $100 office chairs denied, and $580 chairs ordered instead... because of anything from approved vendor lists, to just plain shifts in corruption. In the end, it all sucks a lot. These are just off the top of my head. I'm not saying there aren't things that do run relatively effectively... I will also say there is gross overspending at all levels. For the most part, the military could be cut to a fraction of the current size without much lost. A lot of the rest could be made up by shifting IP registration costs, and reducing protectionism. There's plenty of fat to trim...

AnimalMuppet 8y ago

Or on tax reform.

rhegart 8y ago

I agree with raising taxes, maybe not through income tax as it’s shown it often can decreases revenue and capital flight etc. and I support high brackets in the $10M range and up. Many people think 100k is rich and 400k is extremely rich but taxing that further I’m sure will decrease revenue. I support things like a tax on digital advertising. This is a tax that wouldn’t slow growth or harm the econo,y really and impacts mostly those with extremely high capital investments. Facebook, Google help our economy a lot but they don’t have that many jobs in relation to profits. A 10% tax on digital advertising would eat marginally into their profits but their profits rise 25% a year so not too bad. That would raise around $15-$20B a year by 2020. Imagine how doubling the subsidies for solar and EVs would do for renewables and EVs.

Daishiman 8y ago

How relevant is this actually? Legislators make the law but it's the bureaucrats, who are the real specialists in crafting the details of legislation that are actually relevant. Competent politicians aren't competent because they're knowledgeable in every possible topic, but because they surround themselves with subject matter experts.

zozbot123 8y ago
> Competent politicians aren't ... they surround themselves with subject matter experts. ¿Por qué no los dos? Is Ocasio-Cortez surrounding herself with subject-matter experts?
- lghh 8y ago
  She's been in Congress for a whole 4 days. I'm sure by the time any legislation was starting to be written there will be subject matter experts in the room.
  - LyndsySimon 8y ago
    I have zero doubt that legislation for this session is pretty much already complete. Sure, there'll be things that come up during the session, but legislators already have their priorities set going in, and it'd be silly not to have the work already done and have the bills ready to go.
LyndsySimon 8y ago
> It's the bureaucrats, who are the real specialists in crafting the details of legislation that are actually relevant. In my experience, it's often just "interested parties". I'm thinking of multiple cases where political advocacy groups I've worked with have drafted a bill proposal and taken it directly to state-level legislators seeking to have them sponsor it. In every case, they either refused or submitted the bill as-is without modification. In one case, that means that an Arkansas law was actually drafted by a 16-year-old (me). That one was relatively minor in the grand scheme of things, but still :)

gkoberger 8y ago

Why do you believe she's not competent? She seems to be competent. Secondly, isn't empathy, vision, ambition and an ability to rally people incredibly important for a politician? Politicians aren't supposed to know everything, but rather work with appropriate experts and aides.

rhegart 8y ago
She really isn’t competent. Watch any interview she gives or her discussing anything really. But that doesn’t matter. We don’t need everyone to be competent, if she can get a message out to young people and her following she can raise awareness and tilt voters to policies further to what she wants. She is extremely charismatic and that’s an important skill in itself. It’s like playing with fire because she would make a terrible lead lawmaker on everything, but she absolutely is doing a fantastic job raising awareness
- dragonwriter 8y ago
  > She really isn’t competent. Watch any interview she gives or her discussing anything really. Not seeing it. I've spent some time working in a (state, not federal) legislative office and have a political science degree (specialized in pragmatics of US politics.) I've seen some of her interviews. I don't see anything that indicates that she would be incompetent as a legislator. Could you explain the basis for your assessment?
  - AnimalMuppet 8y ago
    Well, a number of her interviews seem to show her not having a very good grasp on basic facts. The branches of the US government. How much the military spends. Fairly basic stuff. Now, this could be that she's not good at interviews, and feels the need to keep talking to appear competent. She could know far more, and just be unable (yet) to bring it out in front of the cameras. But to me, she comes off as talking without knowing. That scares me in someone who can write legislation.
  - hello_newman 8y ago

tdb7893 8y ago

The reason I like her is that she is passionate for a lot of the values I am pasaionate for. It's like with an engineer, you get the right person then you can always train them on the job if they need to learn things. I was very naive when I started as an engineer and everything turned out okay, it's not like she is the president or even a senator.

tracker1 8y ago

I'm not... I've seen enough government operations that you cannot convince me that additional taxation is necessary vs. reducing excess spending and bureaucracy.

weberc2 8y ago
That’s fine. I sympathize with that position too.
goalieca 8y ago
Haha. You will never be convinced the. There’s been ample examples of austerity and cutbacks and government audits at all levels of government in all countries. This libertarian ideal of wasteful spending and government mismanagement is kind of a dumb one. Things are actually pretty well done unless the politicians are corrupt. But if corrupt politicians are the problem then the solution is to fix the corrupt politicians. Every large organization (public or private) has waste the same way every large computer system has waste. Management is complex and there’s simply no way to optimize all resources in real-time. In software we may lament some of the bloat but we generally accept it as a necessary evil. In places where performance is extra valuable we profile and optimize the path. Well the same thing happens in government and corporations. Government of Ontario spends a good chunk of money on grants to health care system researchers to incrementally make things better and the system is doing really well considering how underfunded parts of it are.
- tracker1 8y ago
  I've seen $80k phone systems denied, while $180k systems get approved... I've seen fixed telecom rates nearly 5x what private businesses pay. I've seen contracts burn through cash only to cancel projects after billions have been spent. I've seen $100 office chairs denied, and $580 chairs ordered instead... because of anything from approved vendor lists, to just plain shifts in corruption. In the end, it all sucks a lot. These are just off the top of my head. I'm not saying there aren't things that do run relatively effectively... I will also say there is gross overspending at all levels. For the most part, the military could be cut to a fraction of the current size without much lost. A lot of the rest could be made up by shifting IP registration costs, and reducing protectionism. There's plenty of fat to trim...