jimtothehum

Member
Mar 23, 2018
1,604
Just a hypothetical: Say Bernie becomes president, how much do we really think he could accomplish? I am expecting the Obama years "party of no" Republican Party times ten with a few "moderate" Democrats thrown in.
 

Blue Skies

Banned
Mar 27, 2019
9,224
Just a hypothetical: Say Bernie becomes president, how much do we really think he could accomplish? I am expecting the Obama years "party of no" Republican Party times ten with a few "moderate" Democrats thrown in.
he would've a real similar first term as Obama. republicans would steamroll the 2022 election after it become obvious that he can't deliver on his dozens of promises
 

AkumaNiko

Member
Oct 28, 2017
1,438
So your argument is that the obscene consolidation of media doesn't (or can't?) have a negative effect on people's general well being? Because that is the only way this makes sense at all, unless you genuinely believe politicians can only deal with one issue at a time.

Consuming media via TV/MOVIES/MUSIC is on the lowest peg on the totem pole in regards to the well being of the american people. Worry about the sick/poor/kids looking for an education without signing their life away before you worry about whats on TV
 

excelsiorlef

Bad Praxis
Member
Oct 25, 2017
74,234
Personally I'd only vote for him if he took a strong stance at breaking up Sony Pictures so that Spider-Man can be liberated and allowed to return home
 

Ensorcell

Member
Oct 27, 2017
6,064
Just a hypothetical: Say Bernie becomes president, how much do we really think he could accomplish? I am expecting the Obama years "party of no" Republican Party times ten with a few "moderate" Democrats thrown in.
Yeah, but you'll get the 'party of no' regardless of who the Dem president is. It really has nothing to do with how moderate the Dem president would be.
 
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Boom Roasted

Member
Feb 8, 2018
363
People consistently use the word "unrealistic" when discussing a Bernie Sanders proposal. I don't think those of you who engage in this language really understand why he makes them. They allow him to build his platform which I think is fairly obvious, but, more importantly, they set the stage for the public, political, and legislative negotiations that would occur to turn these proposals into law.

His strategy is to start with everything that he wants in the law instead of compromising it before any negotiating has started. Maybe the public will push back on some of what he is proposing, but most think that corporations have too much money and control over our lives. Bernie seems to recognize that government is the only public entity large enough to challenge corporate greed, but I don't think he believes this is a zero sum game.
 

sph3re

One Winged Slayer
Avenger
Oct 28, 2017
8,789
Disney doesn't control nearly as much as you think it does.
1c8ace8f-every-company-disney-owns-13_pageversion-lg.jpg
 

nelsonroyale

Member
Oct 28, 2017
12,249
Do it. Bernie iis easily leading the pack in terms of articulating his vision of political change.

interesting to read many comments on here about how unfeasible it is. if everyone thought like you guys we still be in the stone age. Change is often disruptive, and can happen against the odds. narratives about the feasibility of something often affect the feasibility, since they play with people's expectations of what is possible. it is insane how limited the political imagination is at present. i am not sure if it has ever been this bad. many people's expectation are so fundamentally low. the issue with much of the opposition to trump so far, has been that it hasn't been bold enough...whereas one of trump's greatest strengths is how bold he appears to be.
 
Oct 27, 2017
3,826
People consistently use the word "unrealistic" when discussing a Bernie Sanders proposal. I don't think those of you who engage in this language really understand why he makes them. They allow him to build his platform which I think is fairly obvious, but, more importantly, they set the stage for the public, political, and legislative negotiations that would occur to turn these proposals into law.

His strategy is to start with everything that he wants in the law instead of compromising it before any negotiating has started. Maybe the public will push back on some of what he is proposing, but most think that corporations have too much money and control over our lives. Bernie seems to recognize that government is the only public entity large enough to challenge corporate greed, but I don't think he believes this is a zero sum game.
People are so used to the past 30 years of Democratic obsequiousness (anyone have a better/simpler synonym?) That they think compromising before coming to the bargaining table is good politics.

Consuming media via TV/MOVIES/MUSIC is on the lowest peg on the totem pole in regards to the well being of the american people. Worry about the sick/poor/kids looking for an education without signing their life away before you worry about whats on TV

wheredoyouthinkweare.gif
 

marmalade

Member
Nov 28, 2018
580
Disney Fox merger should be reversed, and Disney should probably be broken up further. Bob Iger should have night sweats about the future viability of his empire.
 

Vyrak

Banned
Jan 12, 2018
663
Consuming media via TV/MOVIES/MUSIC is on the lowest peg on the totem pole in regards to the well being of the american people. Worry about the sick/poor/kids looking for an education without signing their life away before you worry about whats on TV

Well aside from that being a silly take given that media shapes the entire conversation around the "important" issues and can single handedly decide what does or doesn't manifest into policy, this is completely ignoring the idea that for some reason you feel that politicians can only do one thing at a time. The fact that you won't address this at all makes it seem like you are more interested in the wellbeing of Disney?
 

Squishy3

Member
Oct 27, 2017
812
Im all for going after mega corps that make peoples lives bad. But name dropping disney is weird, mega corp? Sure, ruining peoples lives? nah. Rather than name dropping disney, say your will go after mega pharma who charges $7k for insulin that costs pennies on the dollar to make

Go after insurance companies that refuse to cover new FDA approved medications for no apparent reason causing people to go broke/suffer or die just to be able to take medications.

Or go after predatory lenders charging high interest college loans to middle class/poor kids

If you say you're going to go after that, you have my attention
His entire plan focuses on more than just Disney, and also has an entire section devoted to putting more power in the hands of the workers. The article in the OP is focusing on the Disney part because it's a website about entertainment.

https://berniesanders.com/issues/corporate-accountability-and-democracy/

Also he is absolutely against companies charging $7k for insulin. Like, you're focusing on one thing when he has multiple positions and this is just outlining his corporate plans. His healthcare platform covers the costs of prescription drugs. https://berniesanders.com/issues/medicare-for-all/
 
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absolutbro

Member
Oct 25, 2017
2,628
ull disclosure: in my line of work, I've seen at least 6 mergers nuked, each process took about a year, some were no names, but some you would easily recognize, and some had international components. The government did what it did and the companies accepted it and the government isnt getting enough credit for their work. Maybe the companies bitched about it behind closed doors. But they got over it. One repeat offender eventually did something else entirely.
As someone who has worked the government side of this stuff for over 15 years now, thank you.
 

Tfritz

Member
Oct 25, 2017
14,616
the funniest thing about that image is putting Marvel on the same level as 20th Century Fox, because the only reason anyone gives a shit about Marvel in 2019 is because Disney spent a decade building the Marvel Movie #Brand.
 

Tracygill

Banned
Nov 2, 2017
1,853
The Left
Just a hypothetical: Say Bernie becomes president, how much do we really think he could accomplish? I am expecting the Obama years "party of no" Republican Party times ten with a few "moderate" Democrats thrown in.

prospect.org

The Day One Agenda

The Next Administration: Using Presidential Power for Good

prospect.org

Cancel Student Debt—Almost All of It

An obscure, decades-old provision called “compromise and settlement” authority could allow the Department of Education to opt out of collecting trillions in debt.

The Day One Agenda
The Next Administration: Using Presidential Power for Good

Theoretically speaking, this is all correct. A president has a thicket of checks and balances to maneuver through. But America has also been passing laws for over 232 years, and buried in the U.S. Code are the raw materials for fundamental change. It doesn't take Green Lantern's ring to unearth these possibilities, just a president willing to use the laws already passed to their fullest potential.

The Prospect has identified 30 meaningful executive actions, all derived from authority in specific statutes, which could be implemented on Day One by a new president. These would not be executive orders, much less abuses of authority, but strategic exercise of legitimate presidential power.


Without signing a single new law, the next president can
  • lower prescription drug prices,
  • cancel student debt,
  • break up the big banks,
  • give everybody who wants one a bank account,
  • counteract the dominance of monopoly power,
  • protect farmers from price discrimination and unfair dealing,
  • force divestment from fossil fuel projects,
  • close a slew of tax loopholes,
  • hold crooked CEOs accountable,
  • mandate reductions of greenhouse gas emissions,
  • allow the effective legalization of marijuana,
  • make it easier for 800,000 workers to join a union, and much, much more.

We have compiled a series of essays to explain precisely how, and under what authority, the next president can accomplish all this.

The need for a Day One agenda is particularly acute as we head into 2020. I keep sensing an undercurrent of despair when talking to liberal partisans about the election, a sigh that beating Trump is not enough but all that can be done. Yes, Democrats are only an even-money shot, at best, to flip the Senate. And yes, even if they succeed, Mitch "Grim Reaper" McConnell can obstruct the majority with the filibuster, and it would not be up to the next president, but the 50th senator ideologically, someone like Joe Manchin or Kyrsten Sinema, to agree to change the Senate rules to eliminate the 60-vote threshold for legislation. (There's always budget reconciliation, but that limited path goes through the same conservaDems.)

But this reality does not have to inspire progressive anguish. Anyone telling you that a Democratic victory next November would merely signal four years of endless gridlock hasn't thought about the possibilities laid out in this issue. And if you doubt the opportunity for strong executive action, let me direct your attention to Donald Trump.

MAKE NO MISTAKE: Trump is an autocrat, more than willing to break the law to realize his campaign promises. His invocation of inherent, extreme executive power, egged on chiefly by Attorney General William Barr, is in fact dangerous, as former Representative Brad Miller lays out for us later in this issue. Trump has asserted the right to ignore Congress's oversight function, reinterpret laws based on his own preferences, hide information from lawmakers and the public, promise pardons before illegal actions take place, appoint acting heads of federal agencies without advice and consent from the Senate, and raise the specter of emergency to follow through on his campaign promises.

But in a significant number of cases, Trump's pathway has sprung from a simple proposition: When Congress gives the executive branch authority, the president, you know, can actually use it.

Trump's health and human services secretary is employing the federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act of 1938 to test the importation of lower-cost prescription drugs from Canada. His education secretary canceled student debt automatically for 25,000 disabled veterans, implementing part of the Higher Education Opportunity Act of 2008. His agriculture secretary is resurfacing the work requirements already present in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program statute, to prevent states from waiving them.

We've similarly seen Trump apply Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 to impose tariffs on imports he deems present a risk to national security. He also used the Commodity Credit Corporation, established in 1933, to send billions of dollars to farmers, to protect them from the blowback from his own tariffs.

Even his most tyrannical action, transferring billions from the Defense Department to build sections of a wall along the Mexican border, had the backing of a federal law: The National Emergencies Act of 1976 allows limited circumstances for presidents to move around money, despite Congress holding the purse strings. (It was such an emergency that he waited seven months to announce the second batch of funding shifts.)

Few of Trump's ideas have been good policy, from a progressive perspective. Some, like the invocation of emergency powers, are a common tool of despots which never turns out well even when used by small-d democrats, from Lincoln's suspension of habeas corpus to Roosevelt's Japanese internment camps.

But Congress has routinely transferred its authority to the executive branch, putting arrow after arrow into a quiver that presidents now have in their arsenal. I despise radical "unitary executive" theories that misread the Constitution to presume an unassailable executive. But the president, by definition, carries out the laws. Trump has been using it for ill. An effective Democratic president could use it for good.

THE U.S. GOVERNMENT is one of the world's largest purchasers of goods and services. This alone gives presidents widespread power to influence the economy by setting benchmarks for federal contractors to deliver high minimum wages, pay equity, safe workplaces, and shared prosperity. The government can even stop doing business with distasteful companies that rely on federal contracts, like the private-prison industry.

The government also manages giant swaths of public land, and can choose to open it up to development and fossil fuel production, or shut that down. And there are all sorts of statutory programs where presidents get to set the rules. When President Kennedy in 1962, after much prodding and delay, fulfilled a campaign promise to prohibit discrimination in federally aided housing, all it took was the proverbial "stroke of a pen."

As Trump has repeatedly shown, in entire issue areas like foreign policy and immigration and global trade, the next president would have expansive authority, all granted by a plain reading of the Constitution, specific congressional statute, or the legislative branch's studied deference. Who the next president chooses for the Federal Reserve Board will define the course of economic policy.

Presidents can make regulatory decisions like who qualifies for overtime pay. They can decide who serves as a worker's employer, a critical determination for collective bargaining. They can choose whether corporations should still enjoy a "safe harbor" to facilitate stock buybacks that enrich investors at the expense of workers. They can't bring forth Medicare for All, but they can use Section 1332 waivers from the Affordable Care Act to enable single-payer programs at the state level, and potentially use nearly $1 billion from the ACA's Prevention and Public Health Fund to defray startup costs.

Once you start thinking about the possibilities, it's hard to stop. Statutory language is sometimes clear and sometimes muddled, but regulatory discretion is almost always broad. What a president chooses to emphasize, and how much the letter of the law can be bent to their preferences, makes a huge difference.

Executive orders are a poor substitute for the authorities already existing in statutory language. It's nice that Democratic primary candidates have been talking about executive orders, such as Kamala Harris's proposed actions to mitigate gun violence, or Beto O'Rourke's ideas on immigration. Some executive orders will make a huge difference in people's lives, like Harris's, Amy Klobuchar's, and Cory Booker's plans for clemency boards and mass commutations for low-level federal drug offenders. (Joe Biden's plan along these lines, predictably, is far narrower.)

But there's no substitute for authority from Congress. And in a surprising number of cases, presidents already have it. They don't have to rummage for a few votes for financial reform; the architecture of existing law allows them to reform already. They don't have to muster courage from swing-seat representatives to fight big corporations and tax the rich; the Federal Trade Commission and the IRS can get us there.

Public momentum can keep these rules in place, as advances for the American people tend to stick around. For instance, when you cancel publicly held student debt, as the education secretary has the authority to do under the "compromise and settlement" provision of the Higher Education Act, it's difficult to un-cancel it. When you license out excessively priced prescription drugs to generic competitors, as the government can do under the Bayh-Dole Act of 1980 or Section 1498 of the federal code, it'll be difficult to un-license it, and shoot drug prices back up again.

And aggressive executive action can spur legislative action. Congress doesn't particularly like governing, but they hate being circumvented. Presidents making known their intentions to use existing statutes to solve problems can lead to lawmakers finally getting around to it themselves.

prospect.org

The Day One Agenda

The Next Administration: Using Presidential Power for Good



Overhaul the Business of Wall Street

Remaking the financial system does not require any new laws.

"When the president signed the financial reform law, that was half-time," one of Wall Street's top lobbyists said about the aftermath of the Dodd-Frank Act. "The legislators left the field and now it's time for the regulators to take over." That byzantine process of rule-writing and implementation moved at a glacial pace, was captured by industry, and resulted in rules that were riddled with one loophole after another.

As a result, the Trump administration didn't really need congressional action to realize its deregulatory agenda, though some lawmakers were willing to do Wall Street's bidding anyway. Witness regulators' recent gutting of the Volcker Rule, the ban on banks engaging in risky and speculative trading that was one of the few structural reforms contained in Dodd-Frank, a change regulators made on their own.

There are two important lessons from this experience. One is that remaking the financial system does not need new laws. Congress has delegated so much authority over the financial sector to watchdog agencies that experts questioned whether they even needed new legal authority to overhaul the industry after the 2008 financial crisis. The second is that tinkering around the margins is insufficient. A new presidential administration needs to use that authority to go big and change the fundamental structure of Wall Street.

(...)

Cutting Down the Big Banks

While the Dodd-Frank Act contained important reforms, it didn't end the existence of Too Big to Fail banks by breaking them up. It did, however, establish a process that requires banks to draw up a "living will," proving that they can go bankrupt without triggering a financial crisis. Regulators evaluate these plans, and they have the authority to restructure a bank if the living will doesn't pass their smell test, by forcing a bank to "divest certain assets or operations," per Dodd-Frank's language. This could be a meaningful tool to shrink the size and complexity of the largest banks.

(...)

Tackling the Industry's Other Bad Actors

Private equity is a predatory business model that enriches a few elites at the expense of workers, retirees, and communities. Investors lose out, too, and they need substantive protections from being fleeced by excessive fees and unimpressive returns. Current policies have been far too modest to really influence the power of these firms. There are bold new proposals being advanced to crack down on private equity looting. While targeting some of the worst abuses, including the asset stripping that private equity engages in as portfolio companies approach bankruptcy, requires legislation, other reforms can be done by regulation.

(...)

Protecting Consumers

A new administration has all the tools it needs to begin to remedy historic and still present discriminatory lending practices, which have perpetuated the racial wealth gap. An economic and racial justice agenda would include re-elevating the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's Office of Fair Lending back into the bureau's enforcement division and conducting a meaningful crackdown on lending discrimination. Bank regulators could also reinvigorate the Community Reinvestment Act as the tool it was meant to be: a way to drive investment into low-income communities of color. And they could revive a Department of Housing and Urban Development rule that requires affirmative remediation of past discrimination, not mere promises not to do it again.

(...)


prospect.org

Cancel Student Debt—Almost All of It

An obscure, decades-old provision called “compromise and settlement” authority could allow the Department of Education to opt out of collecting trillions in debt.

Cancel Student Debt—Almost All of It

An obscure, decades-old provision called "compromise and settlement" authority could allow the Department of Education to opt out of collecting trillions in debt.

Right now, more than 44 million Americans hold nearly $1.6 trillion in student debt, and this debt is ruining lives. It prevents people from buying a house or car, getting married, and starting a family. To activists, it's a policy failure. "The idea of making individuals and families pay out of pocket for something that's a right and public good is wrong," says Ann Larson, co-founder of the Debt Collective, an organization that advocates for student debt cancellation.

(...)

The answer, according to Luke Herrine, a Ph.D. student in law at Yale, lies with an obscure statute dating back to the Eisenhower presidency known as "compromise and settlement" authority. This authority was granted to the Department of Education first in 1958 and then codified further in the Higher Education Act of 1965.

(...)



Make Marijuana Effectively Legal

By rescheduling cannabis as a less dangerous narcotic, the next president can upend the drug war and the damaging effects on communities of color.

The dissonance between state and federal marijuana laws has created a legal jumble of bad policies and work-arounds. Statehouses, Congress, and the White House have created a labyrinthine world of marijuana rules and rulemaking. The next president however, can clean up much of this mess with the stroke of a pen.

(...)

But if control of Congress fails to materialize, a Democratic president can still make progress on marijuana.

The executive branch can exercise its administrative powers to reschedule marijuana by moving the drug to a less restrictive tier of controls. Marijuana is illegal under the Controlled Substances Act: It falls into Schedule I, the highest of the five tiers of regulation for drugs with a strong potential for abuse and no currently accepted medical use, a distinction that marijuana inexplicably shares with heroin and LSD.

(...)

The next administration would have both the administrative tools and the public backing it needs to eliminate many of the current legal uncertainties in the marijuana sector. Congressional action that establishes a strong regulatory framework would be the most efficient and sustainable way to reschedule marijuana or to legalize it. But Congress as an institution, much like the DEA, has been tethered to outdated mores. By pursuing administrative remedies, pardoning minor offenders, and prioritizing science and research over the reefer madness fears of the remaining prohibitionists, the next president can strengthen the case for moving forward on marijuana.



Unleash the Existing Anti-Monopoly Arsenal

Corporate power can be neutralized if federal agencies simply used the prodigious authority they've been granted.

The next presidential administration has the legal authority to tackle corporate power. On the surface, that claim may seem surprising. After all, won't a president committed to going after mergers and monopolies be stymied by a judiciary hostile to antitrust and regulation of big business and by a Congress unlikely to enact major antitrust reforms?

The reality is quite different: The president already has extraordinary authority under decades-old statutes. The question is will he or she appoint officials—to the Department of Justice (DOJ) Antitrust Division, Federal Trade Commission (FTC), U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), and other agencies—determined to tame corporate dominance of our economy and politics. The Trump administration has failed to tap into its standing authority, and the Obama administration, while certainly better, had only a modest record of achievements. A new president could reverse that pattern by aggressively deploying the anti-monopoly powers spread across numerous federal regulatory bodies.

(...)

Ending Unfair Competition and Practices Through the FTC

The Federal Trade Commission, established in 1914, has the power to make national antitrust policy. In 1890, Congress had passed the Sherman Act, the first federal antitrust law. But in a 1911 case, Standard Oil Co. of New Jersey v. United States, the Supreme Court held it had the ultimate power to interpret the Sherman Act and determine what antitrust would mean in practice. In response to this judicial activism, Congress created the FTC to be an expert investigative and policymaking body that would recapture authority from the Court and operate under the watchful eye of the public and its elected representatives.

(...)

Stopping Further Corporate Consolidation

Although they have adopted a tolerant attitude toward corporate consolidation in recent decades, the DOJ and the FTC have the power to restore strict anti-merger rules. Some of the Supreme Court's most important decisions on the anti-merger section of the Clayton Act date from the 1960s. These rulings, in line with the text and intent of the Clayton Act, restricted mergers and acquisitions between direct rivals and customers and suppliers.

(...)

Restoring Consumers' Right to Repair

The agencies should seek to restore consumers' right to repair their smartphones, automobiles, and other durable goods at independent repair shops or on their own.

(...)

Protecting Farmers From Agricultural Middlemen

The USDA has the authority to protect cattle ranchers, hog farmers, and poultry growers from powerful buyers and processors. Congress enacted the Packers and Stockyards Act in 1922 to protect these farmers and ranchers from deceptive, discriminatory, and unfair practices by packers and other agricultural processors. In practice, the USDA has broad power to establish rules of fair market conduct and protect chicken, hog, and livestock producers from abusive processors.

(...)
 

Deleted member 22490

User requested account closure
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Oct 28, 2017
9,237
How the fuck did "conglomerates like Disney" become "only Disney"

The sole focus isn't on Disney. He's just using them as an example of a conglomerate.
 
Oct 25, 2017
12,319
bernie sanders be like "i want stronger restrictions on corporate mergers and acquisitions with clear rules and limits to prevent things like the disney behemoth from happening" and y'all be like "um actually disney isn't technically a monopoly so you can't do that"
"it's not technically a monopoly" is one of the most dishonest arguments posters here put forward
 

Soupman Prime

The Fallen
Nov 8, 2017
8,990
Boston, MA
Week has only begun but it's like we have plenty of shit on MCU threads lol.

If he can do it then try I guess. All I know is that Fox was selling and 2 offered to buy it. It's whatever I guess, if he can figure it out to make it not happen then cool for him and the others.
 

Dream Machine

Member
Oct 25, 2017
13,085
How the fuck did "conglomerates like Disney" become "only Disney"

The sole focus isn't on Disney. He's just using them as an example of a conglomerate.
bernie sanders has a way of making people act really obtuse and weird. I think it's mostly because people are capitalists to the bone, and when methods to achieve the social justice they say they want comes into conflict with that, well...
 

Sandstar

Member
Oct 28, 2017
7,921
Disney made 12 billion dollars last year. Apple made 50 billion. Why isn't anyone calling for the breakup of Apple? (and before you say someone is, why have we had a dozen threads with people wringing their hands about Fox merging with Disney, and zero threads about breaking up Apple.)
 

ReAxion

Member
Oct 26, 2017
3,882
Disney made 12 billion dollars last year. Apple made 50 billion. Why isn't anyone calling for the breakup of Apple? (and before you say someone is, why have we had a dozen threads with people wringing their hands about Fox merging with Disney, and zero threads about breaking up Apple.)

iPhone isn't "i" acquiring "Phone" to make iPhone.
 

Sandstar

Member
Oct 28, 2017
7,921
iPhone isn't "i" acquiring "Phone" to make iPhone.

So, what don't you like about Disney? Why do they deserved to be broken up, but not Apple?


Why is Apple owning 73% of the smartphone market's profits better than Disney owning 40% of the movie industry profits. Again, Disney made 12 billion, Apple made 50 billion. Why are we focused on breaking up Disney, and not Apple?
 

Deleted member 25600

User requested account closure
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Oct 29, 2017
5,701
So, what don't you like about Disney? Why do they deserved to be broken up, but not Apple?


Why is Apple owning 73% of the smartphone market's profits better than Disney owning 40% of the movie industry profits. Again, Disney made 12 billion, Apple made 50 billion. Why are we focused on breaking up Disney, and not Apple?
Apple probably should be cracked open too. And Alphabet.
 

shintoki

Member
Oct 25, 2017
16,445
I'm confused at why people keep saying unrealistic. Trump has been pushing shit constantly through executive orders while Congress has been succeeding power to the president for years. He'd only be a lame duck if Congress decided to limit Presidential power.
 

Tfritz

Member
Oct 25, 2017
14,616
Well, yeah, Alphabet should. Strange. I must've missed the break up apple and break up alphabet threads tho. Only disney seems to get those. Huh.

probably because disney recently acquired fox and thus makes it a good, specific example of a merger of two massive corporations that most people can say "oh yeah, i understand what you're talking about!"
 

Kill3r7

Member
Oct 25, 2017
26,424
I'm confused at why people keep saying unrealistic. Trump has been pushing shit constantly through executive orders while Congress has been succeeding power to the president for years. He'd only be a lame duck if Congress decided to limit Presidential power.

I must have missed where Trump was successful in stopping the AT&T merger? Sanders can have DOJ bring about an anti-trust suit but that will be an uphill battle.
 

Shy

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
18,520
I'm confused at why people keep saying unrealistic. Trump has been pushing shit constantly through executive orders while Congress has been succeeding power to the president for years. He'd only be a lame duck if Congress decided to limit Presidential power.
Because liberals only care about the status quo.

And especially on this forum, people will stan for corps who make that fav media.
 

Kay

The Fallen
Oct 27, 2017
2,077
Disney made 12 billion dollars last year. Apple made 50 billion. Why isn't anyone calling for the breakup of Apple? (and before you say someone is, why have we had a dozen threads with people wringing their hands about Fox merging with Disney, and zero threads about breaking up Apple.)
Apple is an issue that can be solved with the fixing of corporate tax. They haven't expanded by buying their competition or buying companies in different markets like disney
 

Deleted member 25600

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Oct 29, 2017
5,701
Well, yeah, Alphabet should. Strange. I must've missed the break up apple and break up alphabet threads tho. Only disney seems to get those. Huh.
You are bizarrely defensive about Disney.

Maybe re-read the title of this thread. Then read it again, and again until you understand that it's not specifically about Disney, but that perhaps Disney is being used as an example because of the high profile Fox merger that happened a 5 months ago that should never have been allowed.

Take your time. I'm sure you'll get there.
 

Deleted member 8593

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Oct 26, 2017
27,176
probably because disney recently acquired fox and thus makes it a good, specific example of a merger of two massive corporations that most people can say "oh yeah, i understand what you're talking about!"

Very true. The daily abuses of power by companies such as Alphabet, Apple and Facebook just blend together.
 

Sandstar

Member
Oct 28, 2017
7,921
You are bizarrely defensive about Disney.

Maybe re-read the title of this thread. Then read it again, and again until you understand that it's not specifically about Disney, but that perhaps Disney is being used as an example because of the high profile Fox merger that happened a 5 months ago that should never have been allowed.

Take your time. I'm sure you'll get there.

Oh. Am I not allowed to talk about the contents of the thread? Merely the title of the thread? I'm sorry.

Oh wait, looking at the title, I see Disney is in fact mentioned, and I'm allowed to talk about it. Huzzah!
 

ReAxion

Member
Oct 26, 2017
3,882
So, what don't you like about Disney? Why do they deserved to be broken up, but not Apple?


Why is Apple owning 73% of the smartphone market's profits better than Disney owning 40% of the movie industry profits. Again, Disney made 12 billion, Apple made 50 billion. Why are we focused on breaking up Disney, and not Apple?

A monopoly on profits is not monopoly on a market, first of all. Secondly, it's an example of a merger of giants. What giants got together to make the iPhone.
 

Deleted member 25600

User requested account closure
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Oct 29, 2017
5,701
Oh. Am I not allowed to talk about the contents of the thread? Merely the title of the thread? I'm sorry.
The only reason this thread has devolved into this wankfest is because of people like you getting overly defensive at Disney being used as an example of a company that should be broken up. The title of the thread and the OP is not specifically about disney. So don't get indignant about a lack of threads about Alphabet or Apple being broken up.
 

Sandstar

Member
Oct 28, 2017
7,921
A monopoly on profits is not monopoly on a market, first of all. Secondly, it's an example of a merger of giants. What giants got together to make the iPhone.

But that's what people are arguing about Disney. They claim they own 40% of the movie industry profit, so I just point out that Apple owns 75% of the smartphone industry profits. It's....well, apples to apples.
 

ReAxion

Member
Oct 26, 2017
3,882
But that's what people are arguing about Disney. They claim they own 40% of the movie industry profit, so I just point out that Apple owns 75% of the smartphone industry profits. It's....well, apples to apples.

Apple didn't buy their competitors to get there, so it's not apples to apples.