opo

>...The US would have no problem affording that education, if it just considered taxing the richest members of its society a reasonable amount, as it did in the past.

The USA has about the most progressive taxes of all the OECD countries. In the United States high earners pay high taxes and pay a heavy share of the federal tax burden, while lower- and middle-income households pay comparatively little in direct federal income tax and there is no national consumption tax. In other OECD countries the high earners pay high taxes, but the poor and middle classes also pay high taxes including a 15%–25% national sales taxes (VAT). The US would have no problem affording that education if its tax policy was similar to all the other OECD countries, but that is not a choice voters have made.

https://www.oecd.org/content/dam/oecd/en/publications/report...

>...The total number of aircraft counted during the disarmament efforts post war were something like 15k across the entire Japanese army and navy combined across all types of planes

They were not planning on using those planes for dog-fighting. They planned to use everything they could for kamikaze attacks.

>...why are the 100-200k that died by the end of 1945 from the bombings enough when similar amounts wouldn't have been spread among military targets the US could more precisely hit?

The atomic bomb was the only reason Hirohito gave in his surrender speech to the Japanese people. There also was this:

>...Later in a private letter to the Crown Prince he did not expect to be made public, the emperor stressed Japan’s deficiency in “science”—a euphemism that encompassed atomic weapons—and an underestimation of the United States and Great Britain. He did not mention Soviet entry into the war.

https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/japans-surren...

>...History already proves that the "One hundred million die proudly" is propaganda bluster.

I am not sure why you say that "History already proves" - we really don't know what would have happened. For example, if in 1944 someone was saying that Japan would have over a thousand kamikaze attacks by the end of the war, you might have claimed that was propaganda bluster, but it turns out that is what happened. If someone had said that 90% of the Japanese defenders on Okinawa would fight to the death, you might claim that was propaganda bluster. Or that hundreds of civilians would commit suicide, etc, etc. This was total war.

>...A big part of the anti-moral-bomb does hinge on the supposition that Japan would not have held much longer and the feared invasion scenario was a case of prudent planning for a worst case that was unlikely to happen.

By the time of the fight for Okinawa, Japan was far past any hope of winning that war, yet it was the bloodiest campaign of the entire war. No one who knew about that battle would have claimed that Japan was defeated. Truman and others just hoped that the atomic bomb might be enough to convince Japan to give up.

>...We know for sure from Truman et al's own writings at the time show that their only concern wasn't the least bloody end of the war with Japan and they wanted to demonstrate the bomb to the USSR, I think that's pretty undisputed history even by the pro-moral-bombing side of the argument.

There is very little evidence of this. Truman's own writings at time (or later) never mention this idea.

This idea that Truman decided to drop the bomb to impress the Soviets was popularized later. It even has an analysis in the Reddit BadHistory subreddit:

https://www.reddit.com/r/badhistory/comments/1z07v8/deconstr...

>...Ultimately I think (and I know this is extremely hard to prove ahistorically) a naval blockade and shelling/arial campaign that devastated what little military might Japan had left would have lead to the same shift as the bombs and that the casualties from that would be lower or at least less morally weighted as the intentional atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

A full blockade would have led to many more deaths due to famine, etc.

The last major battle before the dropping of the atomic bombs was the battle for Okinawa and it was the bloodiest and fiercest battle fought against the Japanese. Absolutely no one who knew about that battle would have claimed that Japan was already defeated.

>...When the guns fell silent, more than 240,000 people had lost their lives in the campaign for Okinawa. The American loss rate was 35 percent of the force, totaling 49,151 casualties.

>...So close to the home islands, most Japanese soldiers refused to surrender and fought to the death. Their fanaticism contributed to a dreadful toll. Some 110,000 Japanese and conscripted Okinawan defenders were killed in action.

https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/okinawa-costs...

Japan had every intention of defending the main islands just as strong, or stronger, starting with operation Ketsu-Go. One of the slogans in Japan in 1945 was "The sooner the Americans come, the better...One hundred million die proudly."

https://irp.fas.org/eprint/arens/chap4.htm

The proposed allied invasion was planned to have 42 aircraft carriers, 24 battleships, and 400 destroyers and destroyer escorts. Please take a moment to try and picture that armada... Yet even with an armada of that size, that wasn't considered enough!

>...Ken Nichols, the District Engineer of the Manhattan Engineer District, wrote that at the beginning of August 1945, "[p]lanning for the invasion of the main Japanese home islands had reached its final stages, and if the landings actually took place, we might supply about fifteen atomic bombs to support the troops."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Downfall

One thing they would have been facing was a massive kamikaze force:

>...Estimates of how many would have been available vary, but range between 5,000 and 7,000; plans for waves of 1,000 planes were in place. Both sides planned for higher-than-normal success rates since the invasion would greatly reduce problems of finding targets ("fly to the shore, hang a right, find a transport") and the vulnerable transports would be concentrated near shore in order to offload troops. These weren't the only suicide attackers. The navy had midget submarines and frogmen who would attack the landing craft with explosive charges. Civilians were formally "drafted" into defense units, most of which had no military weapons or uniform, and which had been instructed to attack with bamboo spears or hand tools. There's no way to tell whether such units would have had any positive effect - but their inclusion would almost guarantee that US troops would fire on civilians, with the potential for mass slaughter.

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/4ka1z1/what_...

A Japanese military officer summed up the thinking by the Japanese military this way:

>...We will prepare 10,000 planes to meet the landing of the enemy. We will mobilize every aircraft possible, both training and "special attack" planes. We will smash one third of the enemy's war potential with this air force at sea. Another third will also be smashed at sea by our warships, human torpedoes and other special weapons. Furthermore, when the enemy actually lands, if we are ready to sacrifice a million men we will be able to inflict an equal number of casualties upon them. If the enemy loses a million men, then the public opinion in America will become inclined towards peace, and Japan will be able to gain peace with comparatively advantageous conditions.

https://irp.fas.org/eprint/arens/chap4.htm

>We have one example in the bombing but that doesn't mean that was the only option.

Yes, besides the atomic bombs there could have been an invasion or a blockade. Both of these options would have resulted in more deaths on both sides.

>The main reason is there are alternative paths where neither were required. Japan was already fishing around for diplomatic end to the war with the major sticking point being conditional vs unconditional surrender and their main condition iirc was protection for the Emperor ...

This is not true. While there were peace feelers put out by the civilian members of the Big 6, the military hardliners blocked each of them. (Most accounts also state that part of their conditions would be to be given the islands in the South Pacific that the allies had just conquered.)

Even AFTER an atomic bomb had been dropped, the military had unacceptable demands:

>...Three members held out for three additional terms: Army Minister General Korechika Anami and the Chiefs of Staff of the Army, General Yoshijiro Umezu, and Navy, Admiral Soemu Toyoda. These additional terms included: 1) Japan would disarm her own forces; 2) Japan would conduct any “so-called” war crimes trials of her own nationals; and 3) there would be no occupation of Japan. This last term would assure the continuance of the Imperial system and Hirohito’s seat on the throne. These positions would be referred to as the “one condition” and the “four condition” Japanese peace terms. Under the Japanese governing system, however, the Big Six could only act when unanimous. With a three to three split, they were deadlocked.

It was at this point that Hirohito intervened:

>...At the end of the theatrical demonstration of the deadlock, the emperor spoke. He stated he had given serious consideration to the situation at home and aboard. He then announced his support of the “one condition” offer. He and Japan must “bear the unbearable.” The Big Six and later the full cabinet made Hirohito’s decision official government policy. The American and Allied reply accepted the Japanese surrender offer, except that it stated clearly that the emperor would be subordinate to the occupation commander. This produced another dispute as to whether Japan could accept these terms. The emperor intervened again to announce he was satisfied with the American cable.

https://www.nationalww2museum.org/war/articles/japans-surren...

Even after all this, hardline military officers attempted a violent military coup to destroy the Emperor's recorded surrender broadcast and keep the war going.

This is a complex topic and I think you have done a good job of summarizing the main issues. To add a little context:

>...that the Fed did not really have the tools to fix, because of Gold Standard and lack of legal authorization.

This was just bad policy by the Fed. The Fed had the legal authority to be the lender of last resort and could have prevented the bank failures. Many explanations have been given over the years as to why the Fed didn't provide liquidity. Because the Fed failed to supply emergency liquidity, the U.S. money supply plummeted by nearly 30% over the next couple of years, which essentially turned what likely would have been a recession into the Great Depression.

This is not to say the gold standard was not a problem. During the 1930's, leaving the gold standard was one of the few good moves done to help the economy by the federal government.

>2)European farmers, who cannot use Roundup or a large swath of other pesticides and herbicides, *have greater per-acre productivity.

That depends on what crop you are talking about and the reasons have more nuance than you are implying. In terms of corn, the USA averages almost 50% higher productivity per acre (174 to 120 bushels).

https://farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2020/11/the-changing-distr...

On the other hand, I have read that Europe has higher productivity per acre for wheat.

On both of these crops, the differences at least partially are due to the climate differences between the two regions.

When you look at the first half of the year, Germany was a net importer of electricity:

>Net imports amounted to only 1.3 TWh, compared with 9.6 TWh during the first half of 2025.

Though 1.3 TWH is a huge improvement over 9.6 by any standard.

https://energy-charts.info/?l=en&c=DE

I think no one outside of Germany particularly cares about their internal politics, energy prices, or what role the Energiewende placed in the long-term industrial slowdown. The criticism that Germany gets for the Energiewende is that they decided to shut down nuclear power plants while THEY WERE STILL BURNING COAL! I don't think this legally qualifies as a crime against humanity, but it was horribly negligent.

Coal is such a dirty fuel, that burning it should be a last resort. A properly running coal plant with all safety equipment working will kill people through pollution. Every year in Germany and all downwind countries people die due to the effects of burning coal. (See https://wwfeu.awsassets.panda.org/downloads/dark_cloud_repor.... )

Long term, it is hard to know the loss of life that will come from this foolish policy. The Energiewende was implemented around 2010 - they knew about the role of CO2 as a greenhouse gas and they. did. it. anyway.

So now 15 years later, how much dependent is Germany on coal? Last I looked it was about 20% of the electrical power generated. They estimate that sometime between 2030 - 2038 they will stop all burning of coal.

Vague assertions with no evidence don't really help the discussion. If someone is going to assert such a strong claim like "We have more than enough taxes on working people and not enough on the wealthiest classes.", they really need to at least define what they mean by "working people" and "wealthiest classes" and then give some evidence to show that "taxes are disproportionately applied" between these groups. (You say it was a "truthful comment" but how can you even be sure you are interpeting the comment the way the original poster meant?)

(In general, whether people agree or disagree with an assertion I would hope they wouldn't downvote something as long as the person contributes enough to the discussion that the reader can understand what they are asserting and can check for themselves if the evidence they give supports or doesn't support the assertion.)

>...Not quite how he phrased it, but close.

The "temporarily embarrassed millionaire" quote is from Ronald Wright. The Steinbeck quote is actually very different than the Ronald Wright quote.

The actual quote is mocking wealthy armchair leftists rather than explaining why the American working class rejected socialism:

>>Except for the field organizers of strikes, who were pretty tough monkeys and devoted, most of the so-called Communists I met were middle-class, middle-aged people playing a game of dreams. I remember a woman in easy circumstances saying to another even more affluent: “After the revolution even we will have more, won’t we, dear?” Then there was another lover of proletarians who used to raise hell with Sunday picnickers on her property. ...

>...This way of spending temporarily available resources on expanding the welfare state got a name: The Dutch Disease.

The term "Dutch Disease" is a bit more general than that:

>...The term was coined in 1977 by The Economist to describe the decline of the manufacturing sector in the Netherlands after the discovery of the large Groningen gas field in 1959.[1][2]

>The presumed mechanism is that while revenues increase in a growing sector (or inflows of foreign aid), the given economy's currency becomes stronger ("appreciates") compared to foreign currencies (manifested in the exchange rate). This results in the country's other exports becoming more expensive for other countries to buy, while imports become cheaper, rendering those sectors less competitive.

Ideally a temporary windfall should be used to invest in the future. Taking a temporary windfall and spending it on basically buying votes should have a name, but that isn't generally what the term Dutch Disease refers too.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_disease

>...Funny thing is: if you tell the hospital that you do not have an insurance they will charge you a price that actually sounds reasonable, say $700 for a CT scan

That has not been my experience. Insurance negotiates lower rates and without insurance, the full fare price suggested price has always been higher.

Think about this for a minute. If three months of filming actually cause an increase in cancer rates the long-term residents of St. George (the downwinders), would have have devastatingly high cancer rates, right? The nearby residents were exposed to fallout from 100+ above ground nuclear tests and they were exposed for multiple decades, not just three months. This issue has actually has been studied and published in peer reviewed journals. A paper that studied the mortality of residents in that area concluded:

>...There was no excess risk of cancer mortality in southwestern Utah, for single or grouped sites, with the single exception of leukemia which showed statistically significant odds ratios of 1.45 based on 62 deaths at all ages, and 2.84 based on nine deaths at ages 0-14. The finding for childhood leukemia was based on different time periods and geographic comparisons from those of two earlier studies in which no such excess was found. Mortality from all cancer sites combined was significantly lower in southwestern Utah than in the remainder of the state, even after adjustment for the higher proportion of (lower risk) Mormons in southwestern Utah.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/3788954/

Trying to figure out when this strange idea about The Conqueror first appeared, I saw references to a 1980 article in People magazine. People magazine is not actually a peer reviewed journal.

Considering that about 39.2% of the population is expected to get diagnosed with cancer in their lifetimes, do you actually think a rate of 41% is statistically significant?

https://seer.cancer.gov/statfacts/html/all.html

One thing that I think would be helpful for anyone is to think about a contentious issue you hold a very strong opinion on. Consider what would make you change your mind on this issue. If there is literally nothing anyone could say to you (no new information, no perspective) that would make you change your mind, maybe you should ask yourself why...

The important issue to focus on isn't that long ago people had a model that was not a good model of reality. The issue is that now we have better models and the person who claims they have an educated opinion should know it. Blindly holding to a model that has been shown to be inferior is what makes it an extremist belief.

The geocentric model was thought to be true for literally thousands of years by every astronomer and scientist. Today if someone claimed the geocentric model was true, we would consider it an extremist belief - even though pretty much every major astronomer believed it for thousands of years.

>Calling the Gateway 2000 customer support 800 number was my introduction to understanding computers and I am grateful to their staff for being patient with a 12 year old.

You had a better experience than I had. Bought a Gateway, the cheap hard disk in it went back within a few weeks. Took two calls to support (each putting me on hold for maybe 45 minutes) to get them to admit the hard disk was bad and each call was quite long I remember.

They sent out a raw hard disk and I had to install Windows and all the drivers by hand over the weekend because of course it is my fault they used the cheapest drives they could find.

I think they charged me for the new drive and said they would rebate it if they got the old drive back within a month. I think I was able to use the package they sent the replacement in to mail the disk back, but I had to pay the postage.

Good riddance to a bad company.

If the building costs for the nuclear plants are paid for, nuclear costs are comparable to the costs for utility solar today (and much less than solar 10 years ago).

Closing down nuclear plants while you keep burning coal is not a good decision, no matter how you look at it: deaths due to pollution (in Germany and downwind countries), deaths due to mining, economic costs, etc. We will also see in the future what affect all the extra CO2 that is being emitted. Even now, I just read that Germany ranks 8th globally for the amount of coal they burn. The people who made the decisions to close nuclear plants while they still burn coal are responsible for all that.

>[1] No, PLATO was never nearly so widespread

Plato often gets overlooked, but it was highly influential. A well written book on it is: "The Friendly Orange Glow: The Untold Story of the PLATO System and the Dawn of Cyberculture"

The wikipedia page has some overview info on it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PLATO_(computer_system)

In terms of usage, there aren't many stats, but I saw this: "The CERL PLATO system logged 10 million hours of use between September, 1978 and May, 1985 (a period for which the most complete statistics are available).

https://liz.nl/plato18.htm

>This hatred is irrational, but has incidentally done the world a lot of good.

Turning off nuclear power plants while you still are burning coal does not meet the criteria for a crime against humanity, but that decision has resulted in the death of many people already. Those that supported this decision are responsible for those deaths and for that contribution to future deaths caused by climate change.

>...Today solar & wind are significantly cheaper than natural gas, and orders of magnitude cheaper than nuclear.

Solar is not "orders of magnitude" cheaper than nuclear. Utility solar cost is somewhat comparable to older nuclear power plants that are already running and much cheaper than new nuclear. Rooftop solar is much more expensive than older nuclear power plants that are already running and comparable to the price of new nuclear.

This is a common claim, but it is a misleading simplification of US politics and European politics. (In simple terms, many of the economic positions taken by the Democratic Party would be considered centrist in Europe, but if you include positions that have been taken on immigration, identity politics, criminal justice, reproductive rights, etc. it would not.)

>...had Russia not also invaded from the North with 1.5 million troops, there's a chance they would not have surrendered

The Japanese had already moved all of their experienced troops from Manchuria before the Soviet invasion. They were maybe surprised that the USSR would break the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact, but the defense of the home islands was their main concern at that point.

The Japanese knew the USSR was not a threat to the main islands as the Soviets could never have done a large invasion of Japan. The Soviets had a few ships that the USA had given them as part of Project Hula, but that is nothing compared to what would be needed for a full scale invasion of Japan. The Soviets did have plans to possibly attack Hokkaido, but as the wikipedia entry says "...Historians have generally considered it unlikely that an invasion of Hokkaido would have succeeded. "

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proposed_Soviet_invasion_of_Ho...

In comparison, the proposed allied invasion was planned to have 42 aircraft carriers, 24 battleships, and 400 destroyers and destroyer escorts. Even that wasn't considered enough:

>...Ken Nichols, the District Engineer of the Manhattan Engineer District, wrote that at the beginning of August 1945, "[p]lanning for the invasion of the main Japanese home islands had reached its final stages, and if the landings actually took place, we might supply about fifteen atomic bombs to support the troops."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Downfall

Marginal utility tends to diminish as you consume more of a good, but you can't compare utility between individuals. Utility is ordinal, has no common scale and is subjective. It doesn't make sense to try and claim that redistribution will always maximize the total wellbeing of society.

The 1% limit is a limit on the level of the property tax. If property tax values somehow fell by 50%, in theory, the property tax rate would double to ensure city operations remain funded. However, Seattle is almost at the statutory limit right now so there isn't much room to increase the rate - I this scenario the city would hit the 1% limit and be forced to get the money somewhere else or cut its budget instead. As I initially wrote:

>...If total citywide property value drops by 50%, the tax rate would hit its legal maximum ceiling, and the city would have to make up the money somewhere else or cut spending.

And the city wouldn't even get all of the increase it is allowed as there are other tax districts who would also want a higher rate. The tax increase that would be allowed would be prorated with the other tax districts.

(The 1% revenue growth cap you referred to earlier is a different statute and a different issue.)

One big limitation is RCW 84.52.050 (Limitation of levies) which I think implements the 1% constitutional max allowed levy. I read somewhere that Seattle is at a levy of about 9.4, so that would be a hard limit right there.

>...If total citywide property value drops by 50%, the property tax rate doubles that year.

This claim is simply not true. Even in a budget based system like Seattle, there are hard statutory limits on how much the tax could increase.

If total citywide property value drops by 50%, the tax rate would hit its legal maximum ceiling, and the city would have to make up the money somewhere else or cut spending.

Other papers have found both employment losses and more significant price increases. A discussion of the topic was in the Ask Economics subreddit:

https://old.reddit.com/r/AskEconomics/comments/1smjx29/was_c...

>You're going to have a hard time convincing me the wealthy aren't gaming the tax system after all the reporting and leaks over the last ~40 years.

Obviously every person tries to avoid taxes - you don’t have to be rich do do that - but the idea that there are magic banks that loan money and don’t mind waiting decades to get their money back is some kind of weird propaganda.

>...I suspect you are simplifying what's happening quite a bit

People keep saying “buy, borrow, die” as if it is really that simple - like it is that one simple trick that banks and the IRS hate.

>...But wouldn't the more likely scenario be that you borrow 100m with a 10 year draw at x% interest and then at the end of the 10 years you do a stock sale (some taxes paid), pay the interest (interest is generally non-taxable) ...

Your scenario is not “buy, borrow, die” as a core concept of that meme is you take advantage of the stepped-up basis upon death and the estate pays the interest. With your scenario the person imght have an interest payment of 50 million + the original 100 million, so now they have to sell enough stock to pay the 150 million and the 23-36% taxes on the gain (depending on the state they are located in - obviously different for countries other than the USA). That isn’t estate planning, that is hoping your stocks really go up and that the loan doesn’t come due in a downturn like 2008.

>"oh no my art lost value!"

That trick where for example, where someone would donate some painting to a museum and pay someone to say the donation is with N million, might have worked at some point in time, but that kind of thing is pretty much guaranteed to get an audit these days from what I have read and I would be very careful trying to do that.

A variant of the "buy, borrow, die" which some claim is done is basically that a bank essentially becomes a minority shareholder of the estate for giving the money. Though I recall one CPA who dealt in this area replying that none of the family offices he knew would likely be interested in this approach - people like Goldman Sachs are not your friends.

The buy, borrow, die idea came from McCaffery in the 90s which was before various IRS sections like 1259 and 7701(o) were codified.

Go get a calculator - if you took out a loan and had the interest set a the minimum of the AFR, what would it compound to in 30 years? It would obviously be much higher than just selling stock and paying capital gains on it.

The ultra rich do take out loans, and these loans do get repaid, and that money has to come from somewhere. Go google something like billionaire stock sales to see examples - if they all could just say, "Thanks for the zero percent interest loan! I'll pay you back in 30 years in my estate!" - I think they would have.