# AOC: Pros and Cons **URL:** \ **Category:** Political Topics\ **Created:** [July 14, 2022, 3:16am UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121 "2022-07-14T03:16:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![AcademicActuary](https://community.goactuary.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@AcademicActuary](https://community.goactuary.com/u/AcademicActuary)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 2:43pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/61 "2022-07-14T14:43:13Z")
Digging deeper, the Acela train has a _top_ speed of 150 mph and it takes 3.75 hours to make the 215 trek from NYC to Boston for an _average_ speed of about 57 mph or 38.2% of the top speed. The current world speed record for a commercial train on steel wheels is held by the French TGV at **574.8 km/h (357.2 mph)** , achieved on 3 April 2007 on the new [LGV Est](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGV_Est). Acela is high speed by American standard. For some reason the French are able to do much better. Have you ever been on a high speed train in Europe? . . ---
**Author:** ![twig93](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/twig93/32/527_2.png) [@twig93](https://community.goactuary.com/u/twig93)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 2:47pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/62 "2022-07-14T14:47:25Z")
> [@SredniVashtar](#): > > > [@twig93](#): > > > > No domestic air travel is absurd. > > > [@twig93](#): > > > > > [@](#): > > > > > > the FAQ clarifies the scale of these statements: “build out high-speed rail at a scale where air travel stops becoming necessary;” > > I think you misunderstood this comment. > > I read that to mean: “build out high-speed rail in order to replace a significant % of flights.” But she doesn’t talk like a pedantic actuary, she talks like a politician, so she makes it sound rosier. > > Did she ever clarify herself? I don’t think the FAQ was authored solely by her. “A scale where air travel stops becoming necessary” doesn’t sound like she’s only interested in replacing a _portion_ of all flights. She doesn’t even say “domestic air travel” but I’m giving her the benefit of the doubt that she doesn’t mean taking high speed rail to Africa and Europe and Australia. She also planned for this to be fully implemented by 2029 2030… including _replacing_ every single internal combustion engine. That’s not investing in technology so that in 10 years a workable replacement to every internal combustion engine exists as an alternative for people who are interested in buying new vehicles that year… that’s seizing every vehicle (well, the 99.99% that have ICE’s) in the country. (Edited to correct the year in which GND is to be fully implemented per the FAQ.) ---
**Author:** ![WhenFCAS](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/whenfcas/32/18203_2.png) [@WhenFCAS](https://community.goactuary.com/u/WhenFCAS)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 2:50pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/63 "2022-07-14T14:50:54Z")
Am I stupid to think she’s a classic proof that you don’t have to be smart nor have the legal background to become a politician. I guess this is democracy where as long as you get voted by the people, you can run the country. ---
**Author:** ![Nick\_Papagiorgio](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/nick_papagiorgio/32/451_2.png) [@Nick\_Papagiorgio](https://community.goactuary.com/u/Nick_Papagiorgio)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 2:51pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/64 "2022-07-14T14:51:30Z")
> [@SredniVashtar](#): > > I would probably go a bit further, and say that US Democracy is broken generally right now. Congress is powerless, and Democrats are especially powerless, no matter what. The basic mechanisms by which we make laws are broken, and our laws will not represent our will. I don’t think I agree with this. I think right now there is very little consensus as to what our problems are. This creates not enough willpower to change them. Ask 20 people what their biggest problem in America is and you will get 14 or 15 different answers. To get action you need agreement on the problem. Sure we can all point things out but as soon as we do several start poking holes and many don’t think it’s an issue. This is not enough willpower for change. That’s by design. Democracy is working fine. Changes aren’t being made because not enough people think the issues are that big of a deal. I have largely asserted that’s because life is good in America. The average person complains a lot on the internet, but lives a very comfortable life in the real world that they do not want to radically change. Democracy has spoken, we are basically satisfied in this country. AKA not doing anything right now is a feature not a bug. ---
**Author:** ![CSPAN](https://community.goactuary.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/c/35a633/32.png) [@CSPAN](https://community.goactuary.com/u/CSPAN)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 2:55pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/65 "2022-07-14T14:55:51Z")
Things people in this thread say or imply government should do: - Universal income - Guaranteed jobs - Create lots of public service jobs - Subsidize private sector jobs - Investment/funding for communities affected by climate change - Various economic engineering efforts to bolster green/clean energy industries - Upgrading every building in the country for energy efficiency - High speed rail What’s terrible is not the apparent support for these ideas, but the fact that supporters won’t hold anyone accountable when many or all of these policies fail to achieve their stated goals. Instead, it’s likely more social and economic engineering ideas will be proposed. Repeat until nearly every aspect of one’s life is heavily controlled by government without any real benefit (except the control). It’s quite shocking how illiberal many of you are. ---
**Author:** ![twig93](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/twig93/32/527_2.png) [@twig93](https://community.goactuary.com/u/twig93)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 3:00pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/66 "2022-07-14T15:00:46Z")
Certainly not one that went 357 mph. By comparison a 777 goes 644 mph… and maintains a cruising speed of well over 500 mph essentially the entire duration of the flight. From what I can tell the LGV Est has an average speed of 173.5 mph (per Wikipedia). That’s a little slower than Japan’s bullet train that I used in my example. ---
**Author:** ![dr\_t\_non-fan](https://community.goactuary.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/a8b319/32.png) [@dr\_t\_non-fan](https://community.goactuary.com/u/dr_t_non-fan)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 3:03pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/67 "2022-07-14T15:03:15Z")
And, AGAIN, you realize that she is in no position whatsoever to implement ANYTHING?? Not Speaker of The House. Not President. Etc. ---
**Author:** ![CuriousGeorge](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/curiousgeorge/32/28457_2.png) [@CuriousGeorge](https://community.goactuary.com/u/CuriousGeorge)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 3:03pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/68 "2022-07-14T15:03:23Z")
It’s been a while, but I watched a few videos of her questioning executives from large businesses. I think one was a bank that loaned money for an oil pipeline. It felt like her questioning was designed for “gotchas”, rather than fact finding. AOC: Since you abc, why don’t you think you have any responsibility for paying for xyz? CEO: Uhh, we don’t abc. ---
**Author:** ![WhenFCAS](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/whenfcas/32/18203_2.png) [@WhenFCAS](https://community.goactuary.com/u/WhenFCAS)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 3:08pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/69 "2022-07-14T15:08:39Z")
She’s just not likeable at least by me. Whatever she says sounds like she rehearsed beforehand, and it seems like she just says things to sound smart. Whenever she argues, it sounds like her judgment is driven by emotions rather than practicality/logic which bothers me. She’s very good at pointing out problems but never follow up with solutions. Just so I don’t sound like a biased right wing person, I consider myself a moderate. ---
**Author:** ![YankeeTripper](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/yankeetripper/32/946_2.png) [@YankeeTripper](https://community.goactuary.com/u/YankeeTripper)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 3:28pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/70 "2022-07-14T15:28:19Z")
I want to like Nuclear Power but can you guarantee we won’t have a Chernobyl or Fuchasima event in the US? We almost did with Three Mile Island in my life time. Also has you solved the problem of disposal of spent fuel rods yet? ---
**Author:** ![Ted\_Hoffman](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/ted_hoffman/32/83127_2.png) [@Ted\_Hoffman](https://community.goactuary.com/u/Ted_Hoffman)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 3:30pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/71 "2022-07-14T15:30:15Z")
I think it’s great to have big ideas. I think it’s foolish to think every one of your big ideas can and will get implemented exactly like you want, with no changes, immediately after you propose them. That’s where AOC is. If she doesn’t get her grand idea, she’s gets _screw you all, I’m not helping you out_ or she’s _I helped you all out on \_\_\_\_\_, now it’s your turn to repay the favor, do exactly what I want or you won’t really be doing me a favor._ It ignores the reality that people are resistant to change and tend to move slowly when change happens, absent a massive immediate, imminently life-threatening shock that forces action. No, climate change isn’t it - hundreds of thousands of people aren’t literally dropping dead on the sidewalk daily because of it. Are there any moderates mentoring her, talking to her, trying to help smooth ideas into a workable package that could get widespread support and at least start walking ideas toward reality? I don’t know. I am going to guess “hahahahahahahahahahahahaha, no.” And I think that’s the missing piece for her. I don’t know if she could ever be an effective leader in the party, but I think her approach to getting action done is made difficult by both her approach and her being a POC (which has its own issues right off the bat). ---
**Author:** ![SredniVashtar](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/srednivashtar/32/2894_2.png) [@SredniVashtar](https://community.goactuary.com/u/SredniVashtar)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 3:30pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/72 "2022-07-14T15:30:20Z")
> [@twig93](#): > > “A scale where air travel stops becoming necessary” doesn’t sound like she’s only interested in replacing a _portion_ of all flights. It does to me. I suspect it does to most people? But it wouldn’t to someone who is expecting her to say something extreme (fox) or who has a habit of taking words literally (you). > She also planned for this to be fully implemented by 2029… including _replacing_ every single internal combustion engine. > That’s not investing in technology so that in 10 years a workable replacement to every internal combustion engine exists as an alternative for people who are interested in buying new vehicles that year… that’s seizing every vehicle (well, the 99.99% that have ICE’s) in the country. This is a bigger catch, but I’d say her words are vague there too. The phrase (“…with a goal to…”) suggests to me that she probably doesn’t mean in the immediate future. So I would rather ask for clarity. …In both cases, I admit I might be giving her too much benefit of the doubt, and I wouldn’t know it if I was. ---
**Author:** ![SredniVashtar](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/srednivashtar/32/2894_2.png) [@SredniVashtar](https://community.goactuary.com/u/SredniVashtar)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 3:32pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/73 "2022-07-14T15:32:51Z")
> [@Nick\_Papagiorgio](#): > > I don’t think I agree with this. I think right now there is very little consensus as to what our problems are. This creates not enough willpower to change them. Ask 20 people what their biggest problem in America is and you will get 14 or 15 different answers. To get action you need agreement on the problem. Sure we can all point things out but as soon as we do several start poking holes and many don’t think it’s an issue. This is not enough willpower for change. > > That’s by design. Democracy is working fine. Changes aren’t being made because not enough people think the issues are that big of a deal. I have largely asserted that’s because life is good in America. The average person complains a lot on the internet, but lives a very comfortable life in the real world that they do not want to radically change. Democracy has spoken, we are basically satisfied in this country. > > AKA not doing anything right now is a feature not a bug. We are probably in the wrong thread for this. But I completely disagree. I think Congress was intended to pass laws that most of the country prefers, and it has not in decades and is getting worse still. Lots of things were never intended, the most obvious example being the filibuster, which has caused many laws to fail that have wide support among Americans. In lieu of Congress, the US is ruled by Executive Orders and Supreme Court Decisions. Which is bonkers. We also regularly accept really, really stupid failures of Democracy, like “shutting down the government”, or how all of our popularly elected leaders are incredibly unpopular. ---
**Author:** ![Ted\_Hoffman](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/ted_hoffman/32/83127_2.png) [@Ted\_Hoffman](https://community.goactuary.com/u/Ted_Hoffman)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 3:34pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/74 "2022-07-14T15:34:13Z")
> [@Nick\_Papagiorgio](#): > > She’s too close to communism. It doesn’t work, never will. Let it go. > [@The\_President](#): > > This post has a lot of opportunity for improvement. > [@Nick\_Papagiorgio](#): > > Not really. [The Differences Between Communism and Socialism (thoughtco.com)](https://www.thoughtco.com/difference-between-communism-and-socialism-195448) ---
**Author:** ![The\_President](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/the_president/32/70075_2.png) [@The\_President](https://community.goactuary.com/u/The_President)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 3:50pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/75 "2022-07-14T15:50:56Z")
> [@NormalDan](#): > > On what basis are we getting pretty screwed by climate change right now? Things in America seem pretty good right now to me. I think we tend to ignore the cost of economic losses from the climate events we are seeing and look only at things like houses dropping into the Atlantic which only impacts a few rich people with weekend homes in the Hamptons or vacation homes on the outer banks of NC. Hurricanes, wildfires, strong nor’easters, droughts - things we were told more than 20 years ago would happen with climate change seem to be costing us somewhere around 100-300B each year right now. I am not sure how far that amount of money takes us under various green initiatives, and it doesn’t solve the issue of China or India making its own decisions that aren’t helpful towards the goal, but we are already paying something to deal with climate change, and that will go up the further we kick the can down the road. ---
**Author:** ![twig93](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/twig93/32/527_2.png) [@twig93](https://community.goactuary.com/u/twig93)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 3:51pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/76 "2022-07-14T15:51:30Z")
> [@dr\_t\_non-fan](#): > > And, AGAIN, you realize that she is in no position whatsoever to implement ANYTHING?? > Not Speaker of The House. Not President. Etc. Look, I was asked why I don’t like her policies and I answered. That said, there are many who are talking about her running for POTUS and I fully expect her to try at some point. I expect her campaign will play out similar to Bernie Sanders, but I think she will try. ---
**Author:** ![twig93](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/twig93/32/527_2.png) [@twig93](https://community.goactuary.com/u/twig93)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 3:59pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/77 "2022-07-14T15:59:49Z")
> [@YankeeTripper](#): > > I want to like Nuclear Power but can you guarantee we won’t have a Chernobyl or Fuchasima event in the US? We almost did with Three Mile Island in my life time. No one can guarantee anything. But a lot of lessons were learned in Three Mile Island and Fukushima (don’t build a nuclear power plant near a fault line on the coast for example). > [@](#): > > Also has you solved the problem of disposal of spent fuel rods yet? It’s as solved as the problem of what to do with spent EV & hybrid car batteries. ---
**Author:** ![AcademicActuary](https://community.goactuary.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@AcademicActuary](https://community.goactuary.com/u/AcademicActuary)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 4:03pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/78 "2022-07-14T16:03:27Z")
Planes get you from airport to airport quickly. People generally want to go from city center to city center. Paris to Lyon is further than NYC to Charlotte. The train in France would take about 2 hours. How long would it take you to go from Manhatten to Laguardia to Charlotte airport to city center? ---
**Author:** ![twig93](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/twig93/32/527_2.png) [@twig93](https://community.goactuary.com/u/twig93)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 4:04pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/79 "2022-07-14T16:04:27Z")
I agree with this, but I also agree with NormalDan in that we aren’t getting completely screwed. In spite of paying some costs of climate change already, life is pretty good, other than Covid. ---
**Author:** ![YankeeTripper](https://community.goactuary.com/user_avatar/community.goactuary.com/yankeetripper/32/946_2.png) [@YankeeTripper](https://community.goactuary.com/u/YankeeTripper)\ **Post date:** [July 14, 2022, 4:06pm UTC](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121/80 "2022-07-14T16:06:11Z")
Comparing the waste disposal problem of EV batteries to the waste disposal Of spent nuclear fuel rods is like comparing the damage nuclear bomb drop to the damage cause by an oil spill. [Previous page](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121.md?page=3) [Next page](https://community.goactuary.com/t/aoc-pros-and-cons/6121.md?page=5)