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Sometimes you sign up for things, because the advertisment did look great. But then, at one point, you want to cancel that subscription.


My point is, this was the advertisement. If you thought it looked great, you signed up for it. And if you didn't vote for this, but you voted for something ridiculous like banning around dozen people from playing sports, well, I have the same amount of sympathy for you too.


Yes and no. It seems obvious it was the advertisement but I know people who voted for Trump that are otherwise fairly liberal. They were either grossly uninformed, misinformed, or simply _didn't believe_ the reporting about various issues.

The last is the most frustrating to me because there is a hint of the truth there - the stuff reported about Trump _is_ insane. They're doing things so openly and brazenly that there are kneejerk reactions to either ask "is it really so bad if they're doing it in the open" or "surely the reporting must be a lie because no one would be that shameless".


I'm not buying it. The guy was president for 4 years, tried to steal an election, and before all of that, challenged Obamas eligibility based entirely on his name and the color of his skin.

Being "grossly uninformed" is no excuse anymore.


I don't disagree. I'm furious with these people. They're close to me.

They aren't stupid... just not paying attention and skeptical due to a combination of propaganda (fake news!) and rightful incredulity at the state of things.

But I can't excuse them.


Shouldn’t voters at least try in good faith to inform themselves? How else can we expect democracy to work?

For example - The day after Brexit - so many people regretted voting to leave. They could’ve thought about it 24 hours earlier, no? “I was misinformed, uninformed” sounds lazy and shallow, isn’t it? How hard can it be to spend an hour less on Netflix and an hour more learning about what’s on the ballot?


Dude's last major act was to turn a mob loose on Congress in order to get SCOTUS to repeat 2000. It wasn't obscure news.

Anyone pikachufacing here is a liar.


If that's the case, you're an easily-duped sucker of a customer and deserve to lose your money.


How funny this comment is, when we take into consideration of us being on an industry full of dark patterns.


But you're not allowed to call them low-informed, uneducated, or any slightly negative/offensive qualifier. Otherwise you get the "this is why Trump won" lecture.


[flagged]


> I would much rather that they be knocked down a peg or three, which if it continues long enough might even result in lower prices for domestic students.

When an organization loses a significant portion of it's annual income [0], there's often three main choices on what can be done next [1]

* reduce the quality / variety of services provided -- i.e. cut services, keep prices the same, don't admit more students

* increase prices for remaining "customers" -- i.e. increase prices, don't cut services, don't admit more students

* increase income by getting more paying "customers" -- i.e. don't cut services, don't increase prices, get more domestic students [2]

I struggle to see how you believe this could end up reducing prices for US domestic students for the same quality of education as before... unless your point is to degrade the standing of the educational institution/quality of the education provided so it becomes cheaper...? if that's true, why would you want that?

--

[0]: close to a third of annual income in this case "Over 6,700 international students were enrolled at the institution last academic year, university data shows, making up 27% of its student body." -- https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c05768jmm11o

[1]: based on my random experiences and stuff i've read, this is not an exhaustive cite-able statement

[2]: could also take out a loan, but that's basically short-term increasing income


>When an organization loses a significant portion of it's annual income

It might be wrong to think of the university's main source of revenue as tuition or tuition-adjacent fees.

>I struggle to see how you believe this could end up reducing prices for

Because we live in a supply-and-demand world.

>for the same quality of education as before.

No one going to university goes there for the quality of education. They do so for the prestigious credentials. If somehow having fewer foreign students would actually result in a lower quality of education at, say, Harvard Law School or some such, then things are fucked up far beyond my ability to care about the outcome or Trump's meddling causing that.


What does tearing down Harvard achieve again? What does punishing visitors to our country who are law abiding achieve again? Clearly it mentions these students can transfer, so all of the little benefits you dreamt up inside your head are dead on arrival. Your perpetual victimhood has a shelf life, hurting everyone you don't like because they're not from here when this country is founded on the ideas of immigrations... you never understood the plot.


> With fewer students applying, there will be more room there for Americans.

The US has benefitted enormously from being able to brain-drain other countries for their best and brightest. As a country, you are much better off offering the limited amount of spots in higher education to smart and driven students from abroad, than to average Americans.

> suppressors are likely to become legalized here in the coming months.

The fallout of reversing the brain-drain is going to take decades to have an impact, but you don't care, because you're getting your toy now now now.


> it continues long enough might even result in lower prices for domestic students

International students pay full price so they wind up subsidizing domestic students. Many universities were already predicting strained budgets from fewer international students.


> Higher education is one of the biggest grifts out there.

Look at the man-made objects around you. Every single one of them has been improved or made less expensive by research at institutes of higher education, including the device that you're using to read this comment, the electrical system used to power that device, the vehicles used to transport the people and goods to construct that electrical system...

Maybe, according to your values, higher education isn’t worth that - but to call it a grift is ridiculous.


>Look at the man-made objects around you. Every single one of them has been improved or made less expensive by research at institutes of higher education, including the device that you're using to read this comment, the electrical system used to power that device, the vehicles used to transport the people and goods to construct that electrical system...

Yes, and I fail to see how cockblocking the foreign students could impact that. Education is their side hustle, as is commonly said, and foreign students are some fraction of that side hustle... so how will that affect research? Will the professors and doctors at Harvard who are always scribbling out grant proposals stop doing so in protest?

>but to call it a grift is ridiculous.

I'd call it worse, but I don't know anything more slanderous than "grift".


> how will that affect research? Will the professors and doctors at Harvard who are always scribbling out grant proposals stop doing so in protest?

It's very straightforward: many of those foreign students who are being forced to leave Harvard were the ones actually doing research.


And they're irreplaceable, I take it. The not-quite-bright grad student doing scutwork in the lab... an unsung genius and the power behind this research that churns out magical doodads. No one else could substitute.

Sounds pretty fucking racist, really. In the other comment someone was claiming that foreign students pay full price, and so they subsidize domestic students... in other words, university administration prefers them because they're more lucrative. Not because they're of a higher academic caliber. This is a nest of nasty, perverse incentives that hurts our own citizens and we have all sorts of propagandists telling us it's really for our own good.

Nothing about this is straightforward. Even if (and for me it's a big if) you were correct, pretending that this is straightforward is just disingenuous.


You asked: "how will this affect research", and the answer I gave was that the people doing the research will be forced to leave. From there, you assumed this:

  "And they're irreplaceable, I take it."
And then went on to conclude this:

  "Sounds pretty fucking racist, really."
So ask yourself... am I sounding racist, or are you just projecting racist sounding things onto me? It's very difficult to discuss anything when when that's your chosen rhetoric.


>You asked: "how will this affect research", and the answer I gave was that the people doing the research will be forced to leave.

No, the people who do this research are constantly shuffling in and shuffling out, year after year, and when this goes into effect the people who will shuffle in will be more americans and fewer foreigners, and no one is going to see any real difference.

Well, unless you're racist and just hate americans. Then you will probably perceive that they are somehow inferior.


Yes it's true that people shuffle in and out, but you're making it seem like a lead researcher on a project leaving suddenly would have no impact on the work. Often times yes, a project can fail if key personnel leave. Many labs are just a professor and one grad student who they had to work for years to get up to speed. Many times that grad student is the one person in the whole world who has the specialized knowledge they do. Such is the nature of researching at the bleeding edge of a field. If they were to suddenly leave it would have a noticeably negative impact on their research output, even if the best American student stepped into the role immediately.

That you fail to consider that possibility but you are very keen to claim "racist and just hate Americans" leads me to unfortunately quote the HN rules at you:

  "Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith."


I'm sorry, but the priorities you've got here are so completely fucked I don't even know how to respond respectfully.

Systematic dismantling of education? No big deal. Shoot guns with less noise? Awesome! WTF? I loose more faith in my countrymen day by day with this shit.


Why do you need a real suppressor to cosplay a pretend political stance? If you haven't already gotten the right size oil filter, just go buy a spray painted soda can from that guy at the flea market that sells decorative airplanes made from soda cans. Heck of a lot lighter, too.

The authoritarian jackboots are here today, destroying individual liberties (and the economy to really put the nails in the coffin), and yet it's basically crickets from the otherwise-loud 2A fundamentalists - just like how the first round of Dear Leader had them dropping "from my cold, dead hands" and replacing it with "blue lives matter".


>Why do you need a real suppressor to cosplay a pretend political stance?

Because I'd like to not become deaf.

>The authoritarian jackboots are here today, destroying individual liberties

Which liberty do you no longer have, that you had one year ago?

>and the economy to really put the nails in the coffin)

The argument that was most likely to convince me to be concerned is glossed over so much you don't even much bother with it. It's not just you doing that, basically everyone towards the left does this.

>and replacing it with "blue lives matter".

Couldn't care less about cops if I tried. Again, just more failure. We've got so little in common, it'd be difficult to even describe how far apart we are. But, looks like my faction has the votes. Going to be an interesting few years... and maybe unpleasant for you.


> Because I'd like to not become deaf.

Alright sure, this is valid. But it drastically reduces your point from arguing about the ideals of liberty to just pragmatically having a device you find useful. "I don't care about the destruction of liberty because I might get a toy" isn't a compelling argument.

> We've got so little in common, it'd be difficult to even describe how far apart we are

Except you know, we probably actually aren't. I recognize your nick from early reddit, like a decade and a half ago at this point? Generally found your points agreeable, from my libertarian perspective. And yet here we are now, arguing on completely opposite sides.

> Which liberty do you no longer have, that you had one year ago?

The natural right of free speech is under open attack by these attempts to make universities obey the whims of an autocratic executive. Even not being in college, and not even really agreeing with the speech being used as a strawman here, that is still an infringement upon my rights. Just as say, drug prohibition is an infringement upon my rights even though I'm not really big into drugs.

> The argument that was most likely to convince me to be concerned is glossed over [economy]

I didn't gloss it over - I referenced it. Go read any of the economics threads where these arguments are hashed out. Here's one: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44057663 . Maybe my coming from more of an Austrian economics analysis might actually ring true for you in some ways? I would love to hear where I'm wrong, but from what I've seen responses either fall into repeating talking points, nihilism, or ghosting the conversation.

It's most certainly true that the elites (US politicians and corporate class) have sold out the US worker with the monetary policies of the past few decades. The problem is that the Republican party is always stuck on complaining about being had by the last over-and-done con, with that energy going into supporting the setup for the next con. And I don't see how it's any different this time.

> maybe unpleasant for you

The destruction of our societal institutions, bureaucratic checks and balances, our economy, and our standing in the world are going to make things quite unpleasant for all of us. You just haven't realized it yet.


Higher education is what made America rich and powerful and influential. Many immigrants who come to these schools stay there. Many others form positive links between their counties and the US. International students pay more and therefore subsidize American students. Kicking them out would likely increase the price, which is not a huge deal with Harvard but would be incredibly damaging if say he did this to all universities including state ones

Besides this is just Trump abusing and violating the law to go after his enemies. It could be anyone next including you. Impartial rule of law is one of the core aspects of a liberal democracy. It's one of the reasons we are better then corrupt Dictatorships. It's like Nixon but worse and more open. What we need is Trump and maga to be knocked down many pegs before they destroy our country (please remember you live here in the place Trump is destroying)


Lots and lots of people accurately predicted this multiple years out at this point. They were continually dismissed as alarmists by supposedly “serious people”.


~raises hand~ Been there, Done that...

(Been ridiculed for it. Still get ridiculed for pointing out the current reality of it, with or without the additional "I told you so!" included.)


I've been like fuckin' Nostradamus since early in the Dubya admin just because I skim GAO and CBO reports on big legislation sometimes, can read graphs, take the things Republicans say they want to do seriously, and have a half-decent grasp on 20th century history, including the latter half of it.


There is something I think that a lot of people find very self soothing by just refusing to see what is actually in front of them so that they don’t have to actually do anything about it. There is a certain satisfaction that people get by telling others they are overreacting.


This was all advertised. And you can’t cancel a subscription for a president. You got it for for years, more if he figures out a way to stay.


And yet some have held that subscription for years..




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