6 ms·

I’m really worried that we just elected a president who clearly fixates on short term gains rather than long term planning. Biden did not mess that up, even if

I’m really worried that we just elected a president who clearly fixates on short term gains rather than long term planning. Biden did not mess that up, even if he is a one term president like Carter. It is nice to have adults in control, even if that is increasingly politically untenable.

xrd 2y ago
You said it better than I would have. Biden put a lot of smart people around him, and together they made many long term investments in states that overwhelmingly voted for Trump. He will be remembered differently than he is now.
- distortionfield 2y ago
  The CHIPS act is going to be his legacy. That and the infra bill, I think. That bill is responsible for several bridges in my area getting much needed attention from what I understand.
- benatkin 2y ago
  It’s too bad Pete Buttigieg took the risk of unreservedly supporting Kamala and lost some credibility. I guess he didn’t think that urging people to pick her as the lesser of two evils would work, but she lost anyway, and now the Democratic Party is in an awkward place.
Salgat 2y ago
What's frustrating is that a few years ago a recession was predicted, and we avoided that. But no one seems to have even mentioned it during the election. Am I just misremembering this? At least in the tech sector, lots of layoffs seemed to be attributed to the coming downturn.
- hylaride 2y ago
  Also, the US is pretty much the only developed country growing at any meaningful rate (though deficit spending is probably a large cause of that and is arguably not sustainable at the current rate). Biden was past his prime and it showed during the campaign, though.
- wumeow 2y ago
  > But no one seems to have even mentioned it during the election That’s because most Americans believe we were in a recession. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/22/poll-economy-recession-biden https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/22/poll...
  - llamaimperative 2y ago
    Even here on HN, the vibecession was in full tilt.
- seanmcdirmid 2y ago
  A lot of tech layoffs can be attributed to overhiring during the pandemic, the need to rebalance to more AI investments, and the end of low interest rates that encourage growth rather than efficiency.
- distortionfield 2y ago
  Right? Biden actually pulled off a soft landing and got inflation under control. Just couldn’t land that messaging by the time it mattered.
  - bdangubic 2y ago
    messaging is hard when prices never went down… you can’t send economist/finacial times article explaining what biden was able to pull of (albeit the raising deficit) to a farmer in oklahoma who is paying 80% more for his groceries…
    - distortionfield 2y ago
      The prices definitely did go down, just not to same levels as before. But I agree Biden failed to hit on that messaging though, and Kamala made the same mistake.
    - oh_my_goodness 2y ago
      It's not that hard to explain that prices stopped rising, which is what it means to kill inflation. Even Trump explained that point pretty clearly. After the election.
      - bdangubic 2y ago
        we’ll see how that will work in 2026 midterms :) he didn’t explain jackshit. he’ll try to play the word game which he also tried in 2018/2020 and we all know how that worked out
        deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
        oh_my_goodness 2y ago
        It will probably work out fine in the elections, because Trump's followers trust him to do right by them even while he's lying. Time will tell whether they're correct.
- datavirtue 2y ago
  You cannot predict these things.
rayiner 2y ago
Restricting immigration is a long term investment in America’s future. The golden age Americans remember from the mid 20th century is partly the result of the 1924 immigration act, which cut the foreign born population from almost 15% to under 5% by the 1960s. As relevant here Carter proposed to make it unlawful to hire illegal immigrants and to impose penalties on companies that did so: https://library.cqpress.com/cqalmanac/document.php?id=cqal77-863-26256-1200549 https://library.cqpress.com/cqalmanac/document.php?id=cqal77...
- akaru 2y ago
  Something tells me you can’t believe this nonsense you’re spewing. You’re attributing the greatest economic boom the world has ever seen, not to being the sole winner and survivor of WWII, but because the borders were tightened. You must be a troll.
  - olddustytrail 2y ago
    He's not joking. He's an immigrant himself. There is often the "pulling up the ladder" attitude from the ones who think they "deserved" their entry.
    - rayiner 2y ago
      Not at all! I think it’s worse for the country to import foreign elites, like my family, than low skill workers. Foreign elites are the people most responsible for the dysfunction in their home countries.
      - olddustytrail 2y ago
        Fair enough, I stand corrected! You think it was a mistake to allow you in and are a net negative to your country?
        rayiner 2y ago
        I think if the people of Virginia were voting in 1989 whether to allow in me and 500,000 people like me, those people would not be better off as a result of choosing immigration. - We have made their schools and jobs more competitive. We don’t have the taboo on open competition like British Americans, and don’t have the same idea of raising “well rounded” kids. My dad grew up in a village where 20% of kids died before age 5. He got out because he is a grinder. My parents socialized me to work 16 hours a day, discouraged dating, or having any hobbies that you couldn’t put on a resume, etc. I went to a STEM magnet school that went from 20-25% asian when I was there to 70% asian at the peak, and we completely changed the culture. - We have facilitated societal changes, because we don’t value individual liberty as highly but place more value on social order. We don’t value common wisdom the way British Americans do, but place more value on formal education and credentials. - We have reduced social cohesion. My family feels no personal solidarity with poor Americans. My family is economically liberal in a generic sense, but only insofar as they don’t personally have to pay more taxes.
zxcvbnm69 2y ago
[dead]
UncleOxidant 2y ago
When you compare Carter with the guy who's going to take office next month it shows how far we've fallen as a country. The previous era was already passing since about 2016, but with the death of Carter it seems like that era has died with him and it just feels very depressing.
- silisili 2y ago
  While I agree with the general sentiment, I think the same could have been said regardless of which candidate won. It feels like the left moved left, the right moved right, and instead of catering to moderates, threatening them to pick a side. Said another way, I think a young Jimmy Carter type candidate would have wiped the floor with either side this election.
  - UncleOxidant 2y ago
    > I think the same could have been said regardless of which candidate won. I don't disagree. It's a matter of degrees, though. The post-WWII era was always going to go away when everyone who remembered WWII (or were children of those who fought it) passed away. That's kind of where we are now.
  - davidw 2y ago
    "Both sides" doesn't really correspond with reality though. She made a concentrated effort to reach out to people on both sides, including the Cheneys, of all people.
    - ngcazz 2y ago
      Both sides of the right wing, the only wing.
    - potato3732842 2y ago
      Associating with Republican party establishment types like the Cheneys is a giant middle finger to far more people than it isn't.
xyst 2y ago
> short term gains For who exactly? The $1.5T tax cut (deficit spend) for billionaires was advertised as a “bill for the middle class” [1] under the assumption of idiotic “trickle down economics. Trump administration at the time even promised a “$4,000 raise” to the middle class. [2] In reality, in the short term, billionaires able to afford another stupid yacht or pad some offshore accounts. Corporations buying back their stock. In the long term, deficit spending, increasing national debt, jobs lost, cuts of public programs, and further decimation of middle class. [1] https://www.npr.org/2017/12/20/572157392/gop-poised-for-tax-victory-after-a-brief-delay https://www.npr.org/2017/12/20/572157392/gop-poised-for-tax-... [2] https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2018/04/10/donald-trump-gop-tax-cuts-wont-deliver-big-raise-column/471188002/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2018/04/10/donald-tru...

xrd 2y ago

You said it better than I would have. Biden put a lot of smart people around him, and together they made many long term investments in states that overwhelmingly voted for Trump. He will be remembered differently than he is now.

distortionfield 2y ago
The CHIPS act is going to be his legacy. That and the infra bill, I think. That bill is responsible for several bridges in my area getting much needed attention from what I understand.
benatkin 2y ago
It’s too bad Pete Buttigieg took the risk of unreservedly supporting Kamala and lost some credibility. I guess he didn’t think that urging people to pick her as the lesser of two evils would work, but she lost anyway, and now the Democratic Party is in an awkward place.

Salgat 2y ago

What's frustrating is that a few years ago a recession was predicted, and we avoided that. But no one seems to have even mentioned it during the election. Am I just misremembering this? At least in the tech sector, lots of layoffs seemed to be attributed to the coming downturn.

hylaride 2y ago
Also, the US is pretty much the only developed country growing at any meaningful rate (though deficit spending is probably a large cause of that and is arguably not sustainable at the current rate). Biden was past his prime and it showed during the campaign, though.
wumeow 2y ago
> But no one seems to have even mentioned it during the election That’s because most Americans believe we were in a recession. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/22/poll-economy-recession-biden https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/22/poll...
- llamaimperative 2y ago
  Even here on HN, the vibecession was in full tilt.
seanmcdirmid 2y ago
A lot of tech layoffs can be attributed to overhiring during the pandemic, the need to rebalance to more AI investments, and the end of low interest rates that encourage growth rather than efficiency.
distortionfield 2y ago
Right? Biden actually pulled off a soft landing and got inflation under control. Just couldn’t land that messaging by the time it mattered.
- bdangubic 2y ago
  messaging is hard when prices never went down… you can’t send economist/finacial times article explaining what biden was able to pull of (albeit the raising deficit) to a farmer in oklahoma who is paying 80% more for his groceries…
  - distortionfield 2y ago
    The prices definitely did go down, just not to same levels as before. But I agree Biden failed to hit on that messaging though, and Kamala made the same mistake.
  - oh_my_goodness 2y ago
    It's not that hard to explain that prices stopped rising, which is what it means to kill inflation. Even Trump explained that point pretty clearly. After the election.
    - bdangubic 2y ago
      we’ll see how that will work in 2026 midterms :) he didn’t explain jackshit. he’ll try to play the word game which he also tried in 2018/2020 and we all know how that worked out
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
      - oh_my_goodness 2y ago
        It will probably work out fine in the elections, because Trump's followers trust him to do right by them even while he's lying. Time will tell whether they're correct.
datavirtue 2y ago
You cannot predict these things.

rayiner 2y ago

Restricting immigration is a long term investment in America’s future. The golden age Americans remember from the mid 20th century is partly the result of the 1924 immigration act, which cut the foreign born population from almost 15% to under 5% by the 1960s. As relevant here Carter proposed to make it unlawful to hire illegal immigrants and to impose penalties on companies that did so: https://library.cqpress.com/cqalmanac/document.php?id=cqal77-863-26256-1200549 https://library.cqpress.com/cqalmanac/document.php?id=cqal77...

akaru 2y ago
Something tells me you can’t believe this nonsense you’re spewing. You’re attributing the greatest economic boom the world has ever seen, not to being the sole winner and survivor of WWII, but because the borders were tightened. You must be a troll.
- olddustytrail 2y ago
  He's not joking. He's an immigrant himself. There is often the "pulling up the ladder" attitude from the ones who think they "deserved" their entry.
  - rayiner 2y ago
    Not at all! I think it’s worse for the country to import foreign elites, like my family, than low skill workers. Foreign elites are the people most responsible for the dysfunction in their home countries.
    - olddustytrail 2y ago
      Fair enough, I stand corrected! You think it was a mistake to allow you in and are a net negative to your country?
      - rayiner 2y ago
        I think if the people of Virginia were voting in 1989 whether to allow in me and 500,000 people like me, those people would not be better off as a result of choosing immigration. - We have made their schools and jobs more competitive. We don’t have the taboo on open competition like British Americans, and don’t have the same idea of raising “well rounded” kids. My dad grew up in a village where 20% of kids died before age 5. He got out because he is a grinder. My parents socialized me to work 16 hours a day, discouraged dating, or having any hobbies that you couldn’t put on a resume, etc. I went to a STEM magnet school that went from 20-25% asian when I was there to 70% asian at the peak, and we completely changed the culture. - We have facilitated societal changes, because we don’t value individual liberty as highly but place more value on social order. We don’t value common wisdom the way British Americans do, but place more value on formal education and credentials. - We have reduced social cohesion. My family feels no personal solidarity with poor Americans. My family is economically liberal in a generic sense, but only insofar as they don’t personally have to pay more taxes.

zxcvbnm69 2y ago

[dead]

UncleOxidant 2y ago

When you compare Carter with the guy who's going to take office next month it shows how far we've fallen as a country. The previous era was already passing since about 2016, but with the death of Carter it seems like that era has died with him and it just feels very depressing.

silisili 2y ago
While I agree with the general sentiment, I think the same could have been said regardless of which candidate won. It feels like the left moved left, the right moved right, and instead of catering to moderates, threatening them to pick a side. Said another way, I think a young Jimmy Carter type candidate would have wiped the floor with either side this election.
- UncleOxidant 2y ago
  > I think the same could have been said regardless of which candidate won. I don't disagree. It's a matter of degrees, though. The post-WWII era was always going to go away when everyone who remembered WWII (or were children of those who fought it) passed away. That's kind of where we are now.
- davidw 2y ago
  "Both sides" doesn't really correspond with reality though. She made a concentrated effort to reach out to people on both sides, including the Cheneys, of all people.
  - ngcazz 2y ago
    Both sides of the right wing, the only wing.
  - potato3732842 2y ago
    Associating with Republican party establishment types like the Cheneys is a giant middle finger to far more people than it isn't.

xyst 2y ago

> short term gains For who exactly? The $1.5T tax cut (deficit spend) for billionaires was advertised as a “bill for the middle class” [1] under the assumption of idiotic “trickle down economics. Trump administration at the time even promised a “$4,000 raise” to the middle class. [2] In reality, in the short term, billionaires able to afford another stupid yacht or pad some offshore accounts. Corporations buying back their stock. In the long term, deficit spending, increasing national debt, jobs lost, cuts of public programs, and further decimation of middle class. [1] https://www.npr.org/2017/12/20/572157392/gop-poised-for-tax-victory-after-a-brief-delay https://www.npr.org/2017/12/20/572157392/gop-poised-for-tax-... [2] https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2018/04/10/donald-trump-gop-tax-cuts-wont-deliver-big-raise-column/471188002/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2018/04/10/donald-tru...