Anyone trading on the stock market?

[jmervyn]

Superdave, if you are the owner of a large chain of stores and one of your stores is operating at a net loss, you don't keep the store open just because "you can afford it". That's what's referred to as flushing your money down the toilet. So it doesn't matter if they were part of a larger retailer or if they were just a small mom and pop shop. The effect is the same.

Socialists always assume that the bourgeoise exist simply to be exploited, and subsequently crucified. They objectify and dehumanize those who they imagine to be unfairly withholding supposedly unearned wealth from them, as seen with the demand to have no rent during this Wuhan Flu lockdown insanity.

Makes it easier to ignore what sending Trump voters to concentration camps really says about themselves, after all.

That's also why Progressives are generally thieves & cheats when it comes to their own wealth; they don't consider themselves to be those who they hate so very, very deeply. Because they CARE more, natch. So it's okay if they lie, cheat, & steal, because they're morally superior to those filthy conservatives.

 

[Noodle]

I feel so terrible for those poor Kroger people, obviously struggling to afford workers (although much smaller Trader Joe's has voluntarily increased workers' salaries by $4/hour and seem to be fine.) https://www.freep.com/story/money/b...ader-joes-employees-thank-you-pay/4371624001/

But Kroger is clearly in a bad hole and can't afford any increases, evidenced by their most recent quarterly earnings release:

"Kroger Reports Third Quarter 2020 Results and Raises Full-Year 2020 Guidance​

Third Quarter Highlights

- Identical Sales without fuel grew 10.9%

- Digital sales grew 108%

- EPS of $0.80; Adjusted EPS of $0.71, up 51% compared to prior year

- Operating Profit of $792 million; Adjusted FIFO Operating Profit of $871 million, up 33% compared to prior year" https://www.prnewswire.com/news-rel...raises-full-year-2020-guidance-301185645.html

Perhaps Kroger could have better afforded to pay their workers if they hadn't racked up almost $115 million in penalties since 2010, including $70,000,000 for fraud, $24,199,308 for employment discrimination, $3,303,244 for wage and hour violations, and $1,466,028 for labor relations violations. https://violationtracker.goodjobsfirst.org/parent/kroger

Really inspires a great deal of confidence in their commitment to their employees. Or perhaps they view their employees as resources which exist simply to be exploited, and subsequently crucified. Perhaps they objectify and dehumanize those who they imagine to be unfairly withholding cheap labor.

 

[Noodle]

Socialists always assume that the bourgeoise exist simply to be exploited, and subsequently crucified. They objectify and dehumanize those who they imagine to be unfairly withholding supposedly unearned wealth from them, as seen with the demand to have no rent during this Wuhan Flu lockdown insanity.

Makes it easier to ignore what sending Trump voters to concentration camps really says about themselves, after all.

That's also why Progressives are generally thieves & cheats when it comes to their own wealth; they don't consider themselves to be those who they hate so very, very deeply. Because they CARE more, natch. So it's okay if they lie, cheat, & steal, because they're morally superior to those filthy conservatives.

Your talent for ridiculous assertions completely bereft of any supporting evidence remains unparalleled. Do tell us more about how anyone slightly to the left of actively hunting homeless for sport is a socialist and how 100% of socialists "always" act in concert and never disagree about anything. That sure sounds reasonable. Also, please detail these mythical concentration camps for Trump voters. I personally find it hard to believe that camps to house 74 million people could have gone unnoticed until now, but here we are. Perhaps their existence is being guarded by Rep. Greene's space Jews and their wildfire laser?

 

[Vang]

Sorry, but it's not a lie at all - the issue is how one defines hunger. In America, there essentially is none, as defined by the same metric used for foreign nations - it's just that how many people are actually willing to take their family to the local soup kitchen (or God forbid, Christian missionary group) to get a meal? Using school lunch programs as a metric is deeply flawed; those monies are simply used by the family for different purposes because they know they can get their kids fed breakfast & lunch by the Gov't.

Again, I'm not giving you grief about your statements, but the plain fact (as mentioned in a couple of the secondary citations) is that Americans are told to obsess over how bad they have it, to the point that foreign nations use the propaganda to tell their own oppressed populations that at least they don't have it as bad as those oppressed by the Capitalists in America do.

I'm not talking articles. I'm talking real life, boots on the ground. Go talk to your school districts. Do you know a lot of school districts send home a "doggie bag on Fridays" so the kids can eat on the weekends? And I'm talking rural/middle class school districts, not just inner city ones. If you ever worked with low income families there is a lot of problems, but saying that kids don't go hungry is false and is ignorance at very least. I'm talking kids and teenagers which don't get to choose where any money the family makes goes too.

"Using school lunch programs as a metric is deeply flawed; those monies are simply used by the family for different purposes because they know they can get their kids fed breakfast & lunch by the Gov't." ----Are you serious? Maybe they are using it to keep electric and a roof over there head, get out of the news channels and go talk to your school districts and see the real situation.

Here how about you wander over to a low income area and tell me where the grocery store is? Wait, there isn't one. There is a corner store which jacked up the prices of food because EBT/Snap covers them. So yeah that food stamps does fine for a family in a decent area, but in a rural area or urban area to where one can't actually get to it and that box of mac'n'cheese went from Aldi cost of 50cents a box or at a major chain of ~1.00 to 2-3.

You can toss me articles but the fallacy is that they don't cover all areas and some are better than others, but the truth of the matter is simple: There are food insecurities among the youth and if there wasn't why would all these programs exist? (hint: They wouldn't)

Saying walk down to a soup kitchen also isn't a feasible thing depending on time of year and distance and age of children and some areas

I'm not here to argue and I'm going to leave it at that guys, I come here to play Diablo and talk Diablo and somehow a discussion about WallstreetBets and investing got derailed into some messed up political thread, and I digress kids not having food is not a political thing. My family and I are upper middle class and my kids don't go without, but I work in a field directly with students and local school districts as well as speak from actual experience dealing with my agency and families; and like you I grew up in poverty and remember a lot of times not having electric or food in the house, sometimes food was more important than electric. If you only read about it your only getting part of the story regardless of the source or type (news, peer-reviewed study, etc)

 

[superdave]

I'm not here to argue and I'm going to leave it at that guys, I come here to play Diablo and talk Diablo and somehow a discussion about WallstreetBets and investing got derailed into some messed up political thread

Is this your first visit?

 

[Glurin]

Your talent for ridiculous assertions completely bereft of any supporting evidence remains unparalleled. Do tell us more about how anyone slightly to the left of actively hunting homeless for sport is a socialist and how 100% of socialists "always" act in concert and never disagree about anything. That sure sounds reasonable. Also, please detail these mythical concentration camps for Trump voters. I personally find it hard to believe that camps to house 74 million people could have gone unnoticed until now, but here we are. Perhaps their existence is being guarded by Rep. Greene's space Jews and their wildfire laser?

Funny thing about concentration camps. No matter what evidence is provided, the general public never acknowledges their existence until their socialist/fascist government finally collapses and somebody physically drags them to one and forces them to look at the hell they helped create.

Several progressive representatives are out there right now seriously talking about creating reeducation camps for Trump supporters. The democrat party is right now launching secret McCarthyism style investigations against political opponents who won't fall in line. We already saw them outright fabricate evidence to impeach the last president, not to mention they are currently violating the constitution and rule of law by impeaching a former president. Biden right now is creating a Ministry of Truth to combat "dangerous misinformation" and another committee to alter the structure of the court system so it always favors his agenda. They already literally rewrote the dictionary to support their claims. We've already seen all the major modern information centers shutting down opinions that don't perfectly conform to the party message by classifying them as "hate speech" or "incitement".

Have you not learned any history? Have you not read any books or seen any movies? This is how the fall of a free nation always happens, in both fiction and non-fiction. This is how dictators seize power. People like to think it only happens through a military coup, but the truth is many come to power as elected, self proclaimed champions of the people, and they are by far the more dangerous type.

 

[Vang]

Is this your first visit?

In off-topic? yep.

 

[superdave]

In off-topic? yep.

What you just witnessed is the rule and not the exception.

 

[superdave]

Funny thing about concentration camps. No matter what evidence is provided, the general public never acknowledges their existence until their socialist/fascist government finally collapses and somebody physically drags them to one and forces them to look at the hell they helped create.

Several progressive representatives are out there right now seriously talking about creating reeducation camps for Trump supporters. The democrat party is right now launching secret McCarthyism style investigations against political opponents who won't fall in line. We already saw them outright fabricate evidence to impeach the last president, not to mention they are currently violating the constitution and rule of law by impeaching a former president. Biden right now is creating a Ministry of Truth to combat "dangerous misinformation" and another committee to alter the structure of the court system so it always favors his agenda. They already literally rewrote the dictionary to support their claims. We've already seen all the major modern information centers shutting down opinions that don't perfectly conform to the party message by classifying them as "hate speech" or "incitement".

Have you not learned any history? Have you not read any books or seen any movies? This is how the fall of a free nation always happens, in both fiction and non-fiction. This is how dictators seize power. People like to think it only happens through a military coup, but the truth is many come to power as elected, self proclaimed champions of the people, and they are by far the more dangerous type.

Whole lotta crazy right there folks.

 

[zemaj]

You know, on re-read of this whole political tangent that has happened, it occurs to me that just about everyone who has made a point, has a valid arguement. You know what would be the actual, full-blown best damned thing that could happen? If we could acknowledge each others points, and work out a reasonable solution. A *gasp* compromise? Am I hallucinating? Possibly, but I swear I didn't do it on purpose (this time).

Seriously. Good points all around, and I'm really disliking how polarized my comment was. I'm bad about that, I do the 'devil's advocate' bit a lot when I see one side of an equation under-represented and basically get ganged up on. But enough about my shortcomings, that's a entirely different thread unto itself.

We need to disagree at length to get to the bottom of the issues, but goddamn people, can a small group of reasonably intelligent people not fall to the divisive bullshit that we are immersed in daily? Can you not see that, yeah, minimum wage as it stands is bullshit, but just jacking up the numbers without addressing underlying issues is just going to make it in fact far worse? Can we not see that of course poverty is a real issue, but it isn't going to be solved by yelling our own trite opinions of whos fault it is at each other? Of course we all live in amazingly grand conditions compared to the utter hellholes of the world, but we can still do better for all of us. Also, yes, some people bring it on themselves, of course, and no, it isn't our job to 'rescue' them, and until such a time as they can see that and in fact want help overcoming thier own issues its amazingly condescending to think that they just need YOUR super-special help to 'deliver' them.

I'm just getting so damned sick of this, everywhere I go it's all the same. Anyone with any strong feeling to either side of the equation just snaps at the other side, and no one seems to have any interest in even trying to see any opinion other than thier own. Damn it people, unity WILL save us, division IS killing us. COMPROMISE, and come up with something better instead of being more concerned with how gloriously 'right' you are in your own precious opinion. COMPROMISE, no, by definition you don't get everything you want, but you get some of it, and so does the other side, and EVERYONE BENEFITS.

Especially in political/societal discussion, and made especially apparent by the actual basis of this thread, the damned systems are set up to pit us against each other by the elites while all of us peasants suffer for it and we are just falling for it, over and over and over again. They control the media, all of it, and they feed you just what they want you to hear, guaranteed by thier algorithms to keep you pissed off at the 'other side'. It's disgusting, and I'm getting so frayed over it all... I'm willing to bet any one of us has far more in common with any other one here than differing, and it's just more and more of this same shit, too busy fighting over our own differences to realize that while we face off against each other, we are all getting stabbed in the back. We all need to get on the same damned page, or we will never get anywhere...



Fuck it, imma go play video games, listen to angry music, and think exasperated thoughts until I'm too tired to keep my eyes open... keep on hating, the system depends on it.

*thumbs & fingers all around*

 

[superdave]

A *gasp* compromise? Am I hallucinating? Possibly, but I swear I didn't do it on purpose (this time).

Maybe this time will be different eh?

You don't compromise with people that think that many kids in school wouldn't really be hungry if they lost the only meal they get during the day. That if we increased the minimum wage the poors would just waste the extra $ on designer shoes. That the liberals are going to send fellow Americans to re-eduction camps/concentration camps.

You can't change them by arguing on the internet, but you can point out their hypocracies and their evil beliefs to others.

 

[Glurin]

Especially in political/societal discussion, and made especially apparent by the actual basis of this thread, the damned systems are set up to pit us against each other by the elites while all of us peasants suffer for it and we are just falling for it, over and over and over again. They control the media, all of it, and they feed you just what they want you to hear, guaranteed by thier algorithms to keep you pissed off at the 'other side'. It's disgusting, and I'm getting so frayed over it all... I'm willing to bet any one of us has far more in common with any other one here than differing, and it's just more and more of this same shit, too busy fighting over our own differences to realize that while we face off against each other, we are all getting stabbed in the back. We all need to get on the same damned page, or we will never get anywhere...

That's a fine sentiment, but how exactly do you compromise with someone who has already decided you are a racist bigot not worth listening to before they ever even hear your argument? Where is the middle ground with someone who believes you don't even have the right to speak your mind? Someone who defines fascism as "you" and without even the slightest hint of self awareness defines unity as "shut up and do what I tell you"?

Where do you even start? Does anyone know? Because I sure as hell don't.

That is the situation everyone even slightly on the right side of the spectrum finds themselves in today. We don't even agree on the fundamentals anymore. Freedom of speech, freedom of religion, the right to privacy, innocence before guilt, the right to a fair trial, etc. FFS, those things used to be their rallying cry. But now god forbid you ever tweeted something that even hinted at being favorable to the "wrong" candidate. Facts don't work. Logic doesn't work. They openly deny science while proclaiming themselves the sole, unquestionable authority on the subject. And they've already taught our children that 2 + 2 = whatever you feel it does. Is there anything left that isn't crying about hurt feelings?

 

[Glurin]

Back to the original topic, looks like gamestop is down to about $50 now. Looks like it's fizzling out, which is understandable given that the original goal has been accomplished. CNBC's headline on the subject today is somewhat telling though:

"GameStop falls 42% more despite easing of broker restrictions, down more than 80% this week"

Speaks to me of a lack of understanding on what exactly the driving force was behind the sudden rally. Everyone knew that stock was going to take a tumble after a certain deadline had been reached. Pretty much nobody was buying that stock expecting it to just keep going up indefinetly. Easing restrictions that were put in place to protect the big hedge funds after the damage has been done wasn't going to change that.

 

[jmervyn]

Your talent for ridiculous assertions completely bereft of any supporting evidence remains unparalleled. Do tell us more about how anyone slightly to the left of actively hunting homeless for sport is a socialist and how 100% of socialists "always" act in concert and never disagree about anything. That sure sounds reasonable. Also, please detail these mythical concentration camps for Trump voters. I personally find it hard to believe that camps to house 74 million people could have gone unnoticed until now, but here we are. Perhaps their existence is being guarded by Rep. Greene's space Jews and their wildfire laser?

When I say "socialist" I mean "socialist", and "fascist Progressive" is a subset of "socialist". If you haven't noticed, the Democrat Party is remarkably cohesive and does an excellent job of purging dissent from its ranks; the GOP, not at all. Furthermore, the Democrat Party never has to answer for its routine rampant anti-semitism, racism, treason, yadda yadda while the GOP has to hound anyone displaying even slightly offensive with extreme prejudice.

If you can't recognize that, or worse (as I strongly suspect is the case) believe that's because the Democrats are good & the GOP are evil, there's not much point in further discussion.

You may recall back in the day that I would argue *against* Smeghead, playing the moderate. I'm playing the conservative far more frequently, but do you really imagine it's play-acting? Or could, just MAYBE, roughly 40% of the Democrats have turned into fascists over the last 10 years, and you didn't realize it because you like the cut of their jib?

Glurin already answered the concentration camps issue, but I'll expound. It reinforces my obvious point; when a noisy lunatic nobody on social media (or a gaming discussion section) advances the idea that Trump personally authorized concentration camps for illegal immigrants, where they are ripped away from their children, starved, forced to drink from toilets, &c. &c. then sure, it's stupid. When a party has notables & leadership doing it, wouldn't you recognize that's an entirely different issue?

The reverse is true. Democrats have leadership, not just entertainment or media, advancing the idea of incarcerating & reeducating those who voted for Trump. You can tell yourself that it's only Sandy Cortez from Westchester, and who listens to the stupid little trollop anyway?

I'll tell you who. The Democrat feckin' Party, that's who. Same reason they couldn't muster the courage to condemn any of the overt anti-Semitic bile (J00z with giant laser beams controlling the weather, &c) that routinely spills from "The Squad" and instead fabricated a long yarn of total horsecrap about how Trump is really responsible, and solely so, for the race hatred in America.

 

[jmervyn]

That's a fine sentiment, but how exactly do you compromise with someone who has already decided you are a racist bigot not worth listening to before they ever even hear your argument? Where is the middle ground with someone who believes you don't even have the right to speak your mind? Someone who defines fascism as "you" and without even the slightest hint of self awareness defines unity as "shut up and do what I tell you"?

Where do you even start? Does anyone know? Because I sure as hell don't.

That is the situation everyone even slightly on the right side of the spectrum finds themselves in today. We don't even agree on the fundamentals anymore. Freedom of speech, freedom of religion, the right to privacy, innocence before guilt, the right to a fair trial, etc. FFS, those things used to be their rallying cry. But now god forbid you ever tweeted something that even hinted at being favorable to the "wrong" candidate. Facts don't work. Logic doesn't work. They openly deny science while proclaiming themselves the sole, unquestionable authority on the subject. And they've already taught our children that 2 + 2 = whatever you feel it does. Is there anything left that isn't crying about hurt feelings?

Couldn't have said it better, though I probably could use far more descriptive & colorful language in trying to do so.

I would add that the current fascist Progressives, and not a few of the Bernie-flavored Maoists, are blaming Trump for the polarization. How they can do so is something I can only explain with a combination of rank stupidity, ignorance, and a blind devotion which is completely reminiscent of fascism from the 1900's through 1940's.

Proggies always squeal and whinge about such comparisons, but it's completely apt and historically accurate. It's not slurring them as Nazis, as they incessantly do with even the most milquetoast of conservatives; fascism has long roots in the U.S. going back to Woodrow Wilson, and it's a pity that the proponents have managed to (deliberately) conflate a clear type of socialism with Royalists with anti-collectivists.

 

[jmervyn]

I'm not talking articles. I'm talking real life, boots on the ground.

I was asked for articles, under the inference that I was talking out my arse. You entered the discussion when I provided them.

Go talk to your school districts. Do you know a lot of school districts send home a "doggie bag on Fridays" so the kids can eat on the weekends? And I'm talking rural/middle class school districts, not just inner city ones.

I worked in such a school system for 17 years.

If you ever worked with low income families there is a lot of problems, but saying that kids don't go hungry is false and is ignorance at very least. I'm talking kids and teenagers which don't get to choose where any money the family makes goes too.

I was born in low-income circumstances and am currently considered borderline "poor" despite my salary. Thanks, Governor Cuomo!

"Using school lunch programs as a metric is deeply flawed; those monies are simply used by the family for different purposes because they know they can get their kids fed breakfast & lunch by the Gov't." ----Are you serious? Maybe they are using it to keep electric and a roof over there head, get out of the news channels and go talk to your school districts and see the real situation.

I live on the outskirts of NYC. I've frequented Harlem. Would you claim there's somewhere 'more real'?

Here how about you wander over to a low income area and tell me where the grocery store is? Wait, there isn't one. There is a corner store which jacked up the prices of food because EBT/Snap covers them. So yeah that food stamps does fine for a family in a decent area, but in a rural area or urban area to where one can't actually get to it and that box of mac'n'cheese went from Aldi cost of 50cents a box or at a major chain of ~1.00 to 2-3.

This is where you're confusing Michelle Obama's propaganda with MANY other issues. This "food deserts" bullcrap is caused by market economics, not RACISSS behavior. Mom & Pop groceries are going out of business everywhere, because they can no longer sustain operations when they have to pay do-nothings higher than minimum wage and defend themselves against both legal claims of discrimination, and high levels of theft.

In the slum/city I drive through daily on my trip to work, there's numerous 'bodegas' such as you describe. There's also a poor quality Wal-Mart, a good quality Wal-Mart, two chain groceries, and at least one "Mom & Pop".

Not overly far away - certainly available by car or bus - there's a Trader Joe's and a number of other upscale chichi locales catering to those who have more money than sense.

You can toss me articles but the fallacy is that they don't cover all areas and some are better than others, but the truth of the matter is simple: There are food insecurities among the youth and if there wasn't why would all these programs exist? (hint: They wouldn't)

Hint yourself: "If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it."
Guess which phase you're misunderstanding?

Saying walk down to a soup kitchen also isn't a feasible thing depending on time of year and distance and age of children and some areas

Children are tough things. I used to walk over half a mile through a barrio daily to catch the school bus (admittedly in the desert SouthWest).

 

[superdave]

Democrat Party

the Democrat Party

I'll tell you who. The Democrat feckin' Party, that's who.

Democrat Party (epithet) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[superdave]

Glurin already answered the concentration camps issue, but I'll expound. It reinforces my obvious point; when a noisy lunatic nobody on social media (or a gaming discussion section) advances the idea that Trump personally authorized concentration camps for illegal immigrants, where they are ripped away from their children, starved, forced to drink from toilets, &c. &c. then sure, it's stupid. When a party has notables & leadership doing it, wouldn't you recognize that's an entirely different issue?

And yet you and Glurin don't deny that children are being taken away from families and locked away. Your only disagreement is one of nomenclature...you object to the use of the words concentration camp to describe where they are locked away.

Many of those immigrant children are NOT illegals. They arrived at a port of entry and declared asylum. That does NOT make them illegal.

Somehow, with no proof you both have now started to spout the insane "fact" that the US now wants to lock up Americans in actual concentration camps to re-educate them. That is fucking insane.

There is one American and one only that needs to be locked away in one for a few weeks. Stephen Miller.

Link us to proof of these re-education camps.

 

[superdave]

I live on the outskirts of NYC. I've frequented Harlem. Would you claim there's somewhere 'more real'?

I drive by poor Blacks so I know what I'm talking about when it comes to poverty today. Seriously?

 

[Glurin]

Many of those immigrant children are NOT illegals. They arrived at a port of entry and declared asylum. That does NOT make them illegal.

Actually, yes, it does. Asylum has to be granted before they are no longer illegal. Until then, they are just like everyone else who crosses the border without permission. You can't just march into someone else's home and declare that you live there now.

Let me ask you this. What exactly would you have us do with them, knowing that many of those children are traveling with people who are NOT related to them and are in fact intending to do them harm? Not to mention the drug mules, rapists, murderers, and worse. They have to go somewhere until we can sort them out. And yes, it's a huge issue. Mexico's problems have spilled over the southern border for over a hundred miles because the democrats keep dismantling efforts to impose even the most basic level of enforcement down there.

It's not that bad on the north side because, lets face it, nobody really has an issue with Canada smuggling maple syrup into the United States. Kinder Eggs, on the other hand, now that's a huge no no.