Also most people should be doing their investments in equities through mutual funds or ETFs. Only sophisticated investors with a lot of time to devote to managing their investments should be operating at the level of trading in stocks of individual companies.
> You will notice governments around the world copying the method. That is, launching initiatives to audit everything,
Which is it? Are they copying DOGE or are they auditing things, because what DOGE is doing is not auditing. Auditing involves bringing in people who understand what they are looking at.
The could do just as much fraud reduction but with less harm to legitimate beneficiaries by not closing as many offices or by making it so people can do their identity verification at post offices.
Post offices are already set up to do ID verification for the government—that is one of the ways you can do ID verification when creating a login.gov or ID.me account if for some reason you can’t use their online verification methods.
Since login.gov or ID.me is what they want you to use for doing online SSA stuff if the post office is good enough for setting those up they should be good enough for directly verifying for SSA.
This would provide a way for many people who for whatever reason cannot do online verification and don’t have a nearby SSA office an option since post offices are we more plentiful than SSA offices.
Are you referring to most of Europe requiring voter ID at the polls?
If so that is not comparable to the US because in Europe they actually try to make it easy for people are are eligible to vote to actually get the required ID.
In the US the states that have added stricter voting ID requirements have done things like:
• Close the offices that issue ID in areas that tend to vote against the party that is imposing the ID requirement.
• Reduce the hours that the remaining offices will issue ID, often meaning that to get an ID you have to visit in a middle of a weekday. For poorer people this can mean losing a whole day of work to try to get ID, and can be expensive because the states doing this tend to have poor public transit. These people are also more likely to vote for the other party.
• Allow alternate forms of ID for people who don't have a driver's license. This should be a good thing, but when you look at what alternates are allowed you find things like a state issued hunting license is acceptable but a state issued student ID from a state university is not even though the hunting license and the student ID are both equally is reliable when it comes to showing identity. They say it is just coincidence that people with hunting licenses are far more likely to vote for the party imposing the ID requirements and people with student IDs are far more likely to vote for the other party.
In addition it can cost $100 or more to get the documents needed to get the ID, which is a significant expense to many less well off people (especially added to the lost wages in states where they have to miss work to get the ID).
If they proposed voter ID laws that included funding to help people get IDs so that the above problems went away most of the opposition would go away.
But they never do because the point is not to prevent the fraud that they say is happening (but can never find any evidence for). It is to make it hard for people who vote the wrong way to vote.
Further evidence that is the real goal can be seen by looking at the other things they are doing, such as reducing the number of polling places in areas that vote the wrong way so that there will be long lines. That discourages people from voting in those areas. They also have made laws criminalizing providing food or water to people in those lines making it even harder for people to stick it out until they can vote.
Another trick is to go through the registration list and purge people for whom there is some doubt about their continuing eligibility to vote. Normally that's a good thing and is a normal part of a well fun election system, but it can be turned into a disenfranchisement tactic by doing such a just before an election and not trying to notify the purged people so that they only find out when they actually try to vote. I'll give you one guess which party does most of the "just before the election" purges and which districts they are more likely to do them in.
A purge that is not intended as a disenfranchisement tactic would occur in the years between elections and those purged would be sent notice so people would have plenty of time to reregister if they were still eligible.
How many of the things described above are also done in Europe?
In Europe (NL) secrecy of your vote is generally valued in high regard. So you don't register as voter for a political party, and get the voting card sent home - which you then hand in at the voting station which can be open from 6:00 in the morning to 22:00 in the evening. At the voting station the id check is performed.
> “Another trick is to go through the registration list and purge people…”
I’ve worked at election polls in New York for every election since 2012. There is a lot of noise about enrollment here, and confusion about the laws. People who are deceased for years, but have not been removed. Some youth return home to vote, but actually live elsewhere.
And voter ID is particularly contentious. Every election someone holds up the line to debate the issue. Certainly in my community many voters have above average incomes, and they can’t imagine what the inconveniences could be as they drive to the polls and fetch their drivers license from their wallets—a whole series of commitments which happen to support their mistaken beliefs of secure elections (check your privilege).
So when someone tries to argue it was too easy to vote, I remind them—first, they are asked to identify themselves by name, to provide their address as the challenge question. Their signature is their oath and affidavit that they are the named voter. Finally, to make a false claim is a felony.
Harley efficient fraud to impersonate one voter at a time, in a room with 750 of your local neighbors who could overhear your fraud and contest your vote. With early voting, and mail in voting the registered voter could have already voted. What’s more, it was the case you could overwrite your mail-in vote with an in-person vote on the date of the election. That is no longer permitted. So the hypothetical fraudster could strike out—so no, it’s not very easy.
I feel proud to see my colleagues help my neighbors vote smoothly and efficiently
I asked the bureau of elections that I work only in my local districts, so I guess theoretically I could also contest a vote. But here’s the amazing thing, even if someone contests your vote and fills out our paperwork and gives their information, that contested voter can still vote by giving their oath they are who they say they are. Wow! This is what democracy looks like to me.
The problem isn't requirement of ID, but how hard is it to get an ID to begin with? It does seem to be almost uniquely US problem (even when 90% of voters are also drivers).
Given social security, where you are about to receive thousands of dollars in support while you are unemployed, why would a $100 ID matter? Like if you can't even pull up your pants and organize this key item of life, why should you receive support?
Voting is more interesting one. Supposedly better educated and better well off democratic voters aren't able to procure an ID? WTF I am reading?
> Like if you can't even pull up your pants and organize this key item of life, why should you receive support?
How many social security recipients do you suppose are disabled? Are only those of sound body and mind deserving of the social security they've been paying into their whole lives?
> Obvious solution is for social security offices to issue Ids if they are capable.
I'm not sure what this solves, and as far as I'm aware it's not being done, so even if it's an "obvious solution" it's a moot point.
> Other one is delegating most of the function to banks.
Again I don't know what this means.
> IMO this is prime example of self destructing empathy Musk has been parroting about.
I'd say the opposite. We are talking inconveniencing everyone on social security not 0.1% and very likely wrongfully booting some off who fail to get the memo or are otherwise unable to meet the requirements. All to chase some hypothetical fraud that makes up 0.1% of the budget. The damage done is very likely to outweigh any savings.
I'm *very* interested in making government more efficient, and even more so rooting out fraud. But the cost of the effort has to be considered, and frankly I have yet to see DOGE do either of those things.
Here in Idaho it's a minimum of $35 dollars for a 4-year (the shortest you can get). The cost may be higher or lower elsewhere. Now work out all the other costs of this effort (validating this stuff isn't free, getting caretakers to drive one to an office, damage done to people who don't get the memo or are unable to comply, etc) and you might be ready to work out if this particular plan is worth it.
> Given social security, where you are about to receive thousands of dollars in support while you are unemployed, why would a $100 ID matter?
For getting ID when retiring a bigger problem might be proving your ID to the agency that issues the IDs. To get a driver's license in some states if you don't already have an acceptable photo ID such as a US passport you need to show your birth certificate (original or a certified copy).
Getting a certified copy of your birth certificate usually require showing ID. Some states require that to be a photo ID.
Some states do provide alternatives if you don't have one of the photo IDs they prefer. Texas for example has three lists labeled A, B, and C. A includes the strongest forms of identity documentation, B intermediate, and C weakest. They want one from A, or 2 from B, or 1 from B and 2 from C. Most people could probably do 1 from B and 2 from C, although it might be challenging if you were the wife in a traditional husband works/wife keeps house arrangement.
Some states will let you get it if you submit a notarized sworn statement saying who you are, so those should be no problem.
There may also be issues in making the request. Remember, for someone retiring we are talking about people born 60-70 years ago. I don't know if all states have consolidated their birth records processing or if it is handled separately by each county. If it is the later for the state where you were born you may need to know which county you were born in to get a copy of the birth certificate.
I have no doubt that there are even people who aren't sure what state they were born in. Kids from military families might have no memories of their birth state. They were probably told what state it was at some point but may not remember that 60 years later when they are retiring.
People who were adopted when very young might also be a problem. If they were adopted young enough that they had not yet learned their own first name the adoptive parents may have changed the child's first name. They may never know their birth name which could make finding their birth certificate hard even if they do know the state or county of their birth.
Another problem could be mismatched names. I ran into that when I realized that I hadn't seen my Social Security card in years and applied for copy. Many common names in the US have short forms that are widely used and alternate forms that are widely used. Someone whose first name is Robert for example might go by Rob or Robbie or Bob or Bobbie or even Bert. I've got a name like that, although with only two short/variant forms.
The Social Security Administration (SSA) has me in their records using the longest form of my name. My driver's license has the short form that probably 90% of the people with my first name actually use. The SSA said because of that my driver's license was not acceptable ID to them. The address matched the address they had for me and the birthday matched but that wasn't good enough.
I eventually found one utility where I had used the long form when signing up and an apartment lease that I signed with the long form. A copy of that lease agreement and a utility bill finally convinced them to issue me copy of my card.
After that I got a certified copy of my birth certificate and then got a passport so that I would have one document that could be used for both proof of identity and proof of citizenship and that can be periodically renewed without having to reprove identity and citizenship.
> Voting is more interesting one. Supposedly better educated and better well off democratic voters aren't able to procure an ID? WTF I am reading?
Around 21 million eligible voters in the US in fact do lack ID that would be acceptable under their state's voter ID laws.
Some people are surprised by this, wondering how those people can open a bank account, cash checks, or get a job without without such ID.
Then they learn something even more surprising: 6% of US adults don't have any bank accounts, and 23% of adults making less than $25k/year don't have any bank account.
One way to cash a check without ID is to use a third party endorsement. You sign the check over to a trusted friend who does have ID and they cash the check and then give you the cash.
For jobs my guess is that a fair number of the people without ID are living with someone who does have ID and has a job. In a traditional household with one income earner and one person who stays at home the stay at home person may go nost of the life without ever needing whatever ID their state requires for voting.
My guess is many of the rest have jobs that pay in cash and are off the record.
> It doesn’t sound like they are referring to newborns needing to be physically present to get a SSN.
Correct. They already tried to take care of that two weeks ago.
Since 1988, through a program called Enumeration at Birth (EAB), as part of their state's birth registration process (typically done at the hospital when the baby is born) allowed the parents to request Social Security registration. The state would then automatically send the information to the Social Security Administration (SSA) for processing.
Last week the acting SSA director ordered EAB cancelled in Maine, so parents would have to go to an SSA office to register their newborn [1][2][3]. The DOGE website showed that EAB was cancelled in Arizona, Maryland, Michigan, New Mexico, and Rhode Island (but did not list Maine).
There was enough objection to this that they then reversed the cancellation in Maine. The acting director said
> I recently directed Social Security employees to end two contracts which affected the good people of the state of Maine. The two contracts are Enumeration at Birth (EAB), which helps new parents quickly request a Social Security number and card for their newborn before leaving the hospital, and Electronic Death Registry (EDR) which shares recorded deaths with Social Security. In retrospect, I realize that ending these contracts created an undue burden on the people of Maine, which was not the intent. For that, I apologize and have directed that both contracts be immediately reinstated
He also said that EAB and EDR remain in place for every state.
As far as I know there was no explanation given on why specifically Maine, or on why those 5 other states were on the DOGE site.
True most CEOs are too cowardly to try to save us from $50 trillion in debt and financial collapse. Fighting the government jobs program of non productive people is something most don’t want to do.
Taking a position with established norms about how the job is to be done and taking direction from elected officials above you is one thing.
Interfering with elections to create a position for yourself and then using threats about further interference to bully the elected officials around you is quite another.
Interference? You mean donations to campaigns, which is entirely legal?
That's not interference. That's how the US system works. If you're upset a Musk for donating, then surely you are upset at others donating too, yes? Because all those contributions had a goal too, often policy changes.
Outside of donations, I see conspiracy theories about starlink and voting machines online, but surely you don't mean that.
What elected officials has Musk "bullied"? Was any of this supposed bulling quoted in context? Was any of this supposed bullying just impolite speech, for which Washington is famous?
> The single most important thing facing humanity right now is carbon in the atmosphere
Then supporting Musk makes little sense.
He's massively cutting funding for research into addressing climate change or enforcing regulations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
He played a major role in electing a President who says climate change is a hoax, wants to kill renewable energy, wants to greatly increase fossil fuel use, and wants to get rid of any regulations that try to at least reduce emissions from that fossil fuel.
He promotes conspiracy theories that explain away things that might have been due to or partially due to climate change, thus downplaying the need to address climate change. E.g., that the California wildfires in the Los Angeles area recently were due to a "globalist plot to wage economic warfare and deindustrialize the United States".
Even if a few on the right buy a few EVs specifically because of Musk it won't outweigh the damage the things described above are doing to the effort to fight climate change.
You could move to Nuevo Laredo in Mexico, which is on the US/Mexico border, and buy a Mexican BYD. Register it in Mexico and get a Mexican driver's license.
Right on the other side of the border is Laredo, Texas, making it easy to come to the US for most things you want to do outside of your home if you don't want to do them in Mexico.
Google is telling me that crossing the border into the US at Laredo is usually pretty quick and easy for a US citizen.
It's sort of a backdoor, because while you would be living in Mexico in the sense that Mexico is where your apartment is, that apartment could be less then a mile from a border crossing so you could easily do most things in the US and just go back to Mexico every night to sleep.
If the internet is to be believed they would not need a Temporary Import Permit when visiting the US with the Mexican car because they are a US citizen. They would be able to stay with the car for up to a year in the US, so even if they wanted to take a vacation or road trip to someplace other than Laredo, TX that should be OK.
PS: there's an interesting limitation of Google maps I just noticed. If I've got a view that shows both the US and Mexico Laredos and do a search, I only get results on the US side. I have to scroll so that most of the view is the Mexico side before it will show anything.
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