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Post by donkeypuncherben on Jan 16, 2019 8:44:49 GMT -5
Fair enough but this often seems to be state driven by Putin or a few bad apples among the rich like the Koch's and Sheldon Adelson and maybe unwittingly Zuckerberg. I don't think this is some genreal fulfillment of Marx's predictions or an indictment of the market based economic systems.
I also don't think it is the fault of the Davos or Silicon Valley sets or people like Bezos which is what comes to my mind when when I hear 'small wealthy elite'
Whatever ill effects are caused by Amazon and other corporations I think could be fixed within the system with compartively minor policy changes like leathcare and higher education reform or minimum wage.
I really don't think it is too much to ask people to not support someone who is as obviously immoral, narcissistic, and unintelligent as Trump
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Post by ErixonStone on Jan 16, 2019 9:41:49 GMT -5
Trump preys on people's biases and fears. He is, of course, not alone.
At its core, in spite of its secular Constitution, America has always been steeped in religion. The nation was founded on the idea of not having a religion dictated to you, but the desire for authority in determining morals has always been a part of America.
Even today, we hold "the Founding Fathers" in an absurdly high regard as infallible. We argue over the intent of their words the same way we argue over the intent of Biblical scripture.
So, it isn't surprising at all that Americans would default to the position of whatever political leader with whom they already identified - be it that the leader has an R or a D next to their name, or that the leader is of the same religious faith, or that the leader happens to agree on a single issue.
Our politics have become one dimensional. We are all living on a line where positions can only be left or right, and people have to accept policy as a package-deal. You aren't allowed, for example, to support national healthcare, affordable education, and a border wall. You aren't allowed to support deregulation, trickle-down economics, and accepting immigrants and refugees. You can't support LGBTQ+ rights and cutting government spending.
This has become the biggest problem. In order to have a political leader that agrees with you on your important points, you have to accept some of the policies you don't agree with. And in order to make it work for you - especially the repugnant, bigoted views - people have to do some mental gymnastics to justify their choice.
This is what religious people do. They do not accept that their source of authority is fallible, so they have to be dishonest. That is a dangerous mindset that allows their minds to be taken over by the disingenuous. And that is where we are today.
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Post by joegolferg on Jan 16, 2019 10:15:52 GMT -5
Fair enough but this often seems to be state driven by Putin or a few bad apples among the rich like the Koch's and Sheldon Adelson and maybe unwittingly Zuckerberg. I don't think this is some genreal fulfillment of Marx's predictions or an indictment of the market based economic systems.
I also don't think it is the fault of the Davos or Silicon Valley sets or people like Bezos which is what comes to my mind when when I hear 'small wealthy elite'
Whatever ill effects are caused by Amazon and other corporations I think could be fixed within the system with compartively minor policy changes like leathcare and higher education reform or minimum wage.
I really don't think it is too much to ask people to not support someone who is as obviously immoral, narcissistic, and unintelligent as Trump
Minimum wage is at a point now where it really doesn't make a difference. Wages go up, so do prices from the same companies to compensate for the higher wage budget - sometimes accompanied with staff cuts etc. A minimum wage increase in modern times would only be effective if there were some pretty hard-line regulations in place to stop companies from hiking prices or cutting back to offset forced wage increases. Tough one. Personally I'm in favour of a maximum wage where the top earners cannot take home more than 15-20 times the wage of the bottom earner at that company. The only real policy for Healthcare and education to make it more accessible, efficient and effective, is to socialize both. Make tuition free and healthcare free at the point of use to all US citizens. The big opposition here is that the large corporations that make billions from people's unfortunate health circumstances will put up monumental fight against such a move. The Dems or Republicans would never back such policies as both parties a very pro capitalism or neoliberalism, even. Small policies cannot fix the flaws of capitalism. Especially not in America, which would undoubtedly be the last ever capitalist country on earth if things went that way. |
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Post by donkeypuncherben on Jan 16, 2019 11:15:58 GMT -5
Well labor as a share of GDP has been gradually dropping for decades so I don't think that increase in the price of labor has a one to one increase in the price of the products.
Yes, increasing wages might lead some businesses to increase capital investments rather than hire more workers but we have been in a siuation for a while now where unemployment is very low but wage growth still sucks. I would ague this is strong evidence that if there ever was a time in the last 60 years that it made sense to increase the minimum wage, the time is our current era.
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Post by paulus on Jan 16, 2019 11:37:47 GMT -5
Fair enough but this often seems to be state driven by Putin or a few bad apples among the rich like the Koch's and Sheldon Adelson and maybe unwittingly Zuckerberg. I don't think this is some genreal fulfillment of Marx's predictions or an indictment of the market based economic systems.
I also don't think it is the fault of the Davos or Silicon Valley sets or people like Bezos which is what comes to my mind when when I hear 'small wealthy elite'
Whatever ill effects are caused by Amazon and other corporations I think could be fixed within the system with compartively minor policy changes like leathcare and higher education reform or minimum wage.
I really don't think it is too much to ask people to not support someone who is as obviously immoral, narcissistic, and unintelligent as Trump I think the likes of Amazon are very much part of the problem Joe is pointing to. They don't pay their taxes - smaller competitors do. They already have a competitive advantage due to their size - they entrench that advantage by reducing their tax burden in comparison to their competitors - resulting in smaller competitors going under. Which then means their competitive advantage and leverage with national governments grows further. Rinse repeat until you only have a small number of large competitors, which then start carving up the market between themselves. The number of small businesses in the US has fallen steadily over the last 20-30 years as this drift towards corporate power has simply been left unchecked. I really don't think it's too much to ask companies to contribute back to the societies from which they take so much. |
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Post by donkeypuncherben on Jan 16, 2019 11:59:15 GMT -5
I'm not against corporate tax reform so not going to argue against you here. I'm also not against campaign finance reform or other tactics to reduce the influence of big business in politics. To me this falls within the realm of policy changes, not in blowing up the system. Democrats were and still are largely against Citizen's United and are also against the constant cutting of corporate taxes in this country.
Anyway I don't think type of problem this is what got us Trump and all the terrible things that come with him, so it is a secondary issue to me.
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Post by paulus on Jan 16, 2019 12:18:25 GMT -5
I think it's very much related - the seat of discontent the average Joe has with current system is all to do with growing inequality. Hence they are very positive when someone claims the will "drain the swamp". They have been sold the lie that the immigrant bogey man is driving down their wages and that's why they're poor. This is obviously bollocks - but it's what;'s being peddled by Trump and many other like him across the globe right now.
The real reason inequality has grown is mainly because the corps have too much power now - the money that traditionally would go back into the system to help the lower end, is now being held in offshores doing precisely @!$# all for us all. If we could get 25% of that money and pump it back into public services - education being the biggest net benefit long term - then inequality would start to fall again.
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Post by donkeypuncherben on Jan 16, 2019 12:58:32 GMT -5
I just completely disagree about that. I think it is a false narrative. The average Trump voter is much more motivated by racism and hatred of things like immigrants and minorities on food stamps or even false persecution complexes like the war Christmas \ Christianity than they are motivated by inequality.
Like Trump's base of rural poor whites loved his tax cut even though it full of policies that will further cement structural inequality.
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Post by nevadaballin on Jan 16, 2019 12:59:35 GMT -5
LOL no. It is not a small elite causing the problem. 40% of the country approves of this and his approval ratings go up after his more racist moments like Charlottesville.
The country has millions upon millions of people who support him because of the most deplorable policies
On the grand scale of things it is the small, wealthy elite who are THE biggest problem. We've almost hit peak Marx. He predicted that corps would eventually monopolize industries and society would become totalitarian disguised as free market capitalism. This is where we're at in 2019. America will be fine. Yea Trump is an aszhole but no matter what happens, he is only temporary. Our DNA is made up of the resilience of all the other people in the world - because we are the ultimate melting pot. We have a habit of swinging with extreme knee jerk reactions to everything but we do eventually settle down to what makes sense in most cases. Our Constitution is strong but more importantly, it is revered by everyone who is a citizen here. That reverence is what gives it strength and is also what makes us the successful experiment that we have been so far. As long as we hold the rule of law up high, we'll be fine. Yes, the machine breaks down once in a while but we have great mechanics  This is how democracy works in a republic. Sometimes sh1t gets ugly. But people from any side have the right and opportunity to lead if they wish to try and can garner the support for their ideas. If that leadership sucks, then "we the people" get to replace them. And we do. That's how we balance the madness. Trump has tried his best to break the Constitution and rule of law but he's failing miserably. Our systems are working. They just don't work fast enough for most people (including myself lol). Patience is truly a virtue. With that said, Trump is a traitor and a puppet of our enemy. Make no mistake, this shut down is ALL on the Traitor. He said he'd be proud to do it and he did it. McConnell could end it with a veto vote in the Senate on the bill Traitor rejected but he won't. But that still does not get Traitor off the hook. This is 100% on him and voters will not forget (the upcoming bizillion political TV ads won't let us forget lol). |
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Post by donkeypuncherben on Jan 16, 2019 13:07:20 GMT -5
I hope you are right Nevada, but I'm chilling with my wife and son in Germany until this episode blows over just in case. Because one citizen who doesn't support rule of law is in the most important spot and he's surrounded by sycophants and I haven't seen anything from the senate that looks like an effort to reign him in.
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Post by nevadaballin on Jan 16, 2019 13:54:21 GMT -5
I hope you are right Nevada, but I'm chilling with my wife and son in Germany until this episode blows over just in case. Because one citizen who doesn't support rule of law is in the most important spot and he's surrounded by sycophants and I haven't seen anything from the senate that looks like an effort to reign him in. Yea i know. But he isn't a king. He cannot create law and he cannot hold office as long as he wants. He can only do so much damage before our checks and balances beat him down. Those in Congress who support him will still need to answer to their voters as well. As usual, it will all come down to who can get an overwhelming amount of supporters to vote. We already found out that 3 million more isn't enough. Probably need a +5 million (or get rid of the stupid Electoral College) Also... #MuellerIsComing |
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Post by gregfordyce on Jan 16, 2019 17:23:03 GMT -5
A 10% raise when in reality it is 2.6%, c'mon, anybody who voted for this arsehat, tell me why you still support a lying piece of dog feces like this? Plus he told them it was the first raise they had gotten in "like, 10 years," when in TRUTH the military has gotten a pay raise every single year for the last 20 years. Can't help himself. He simply MUST lie. He cannot control it. |
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Post by gregfordyce on Jan 16, 2019 17:26:59 GMT -5
I hope you are right Nevada, but I'm chilling with my wife and son in Germany until this episode blows over just in case. Because one citizen who doesn't support rule of law is in the most important spot and he's surrounded by sycophants and I haven't seen anything from the senate that looks like an effort to reign him in. Yea i know. But he isn't a king. He cannot create law and he cannot hold office as long as he wants. He can only do so much damage before our checks and balances beat him down. Those in Congress who support him will still need to answer to their voters as well. As usual, it will all come down to who can get an overwhelming amount of supporters to vote. We already found out that 3 million more isn't enough. Probably need a +5 million (or get rid of the stupid Electoral College) Also... #MuellerIsComing I sooo want to believe you. But you have much more confidence in our checks and balances, and in the "right thing" being done, than I do, I'm afraid. We are on a very slippery slope towards fascism, and seem to be accelerating. The one good thing about Trump is that he has peeled back the veneer and shown us the true authoritarians (and racists, and idiots, and cultists, and...) in our midst. I am still shocked at the large numbers of them that there are here in America.... |
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Post by gregfordyce on Jan 16, 2019 17:29:26 GMT -5
On an unrelated topic, I just had to add this: did anyone see the wonderful "feast" that the Orange Douche-Canoe served the Clemson football team at the WH on Monday? Ice-cold fast food from McDonalds and Dominos. Thousands of burgers and french fries, left sitting ice-cold without any heating, on a table, congealing in their own fat.
That pretty much sums up this numb-nuts and his classlessness in a nutshell.
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Post by nevadaballin on Jan 16, 2019 18:24:14 GMT -5
Yea i know. But he isn't a king. He cannot create law and he cannot hold office as long as he wants. He can only do so much damage before our checks and balances beat him down. Those in Congress who support him will still need to answer to their voters as well. As usual, it will all come down to who can get an overwhelming amount of supporters to vote. We already found out that 3 million more isn't enough. Probably need a +5 million (or get rid of the stupid Electoral College) Also... #MuellerIsComing I sooo want to believe you. But you have much more confidence in our checks and balances, and in the "right thing" being done, than I do, I'm afraid. We are on a very slippery slope towards fascism, and seem to be accelerating. The one good thing about Trump is that he has peeled back the veneer and shown us the true authoritarians (and racists, and idiots, and cultists, and...) in our midst. I am still shocked at the large numbers of them that there are here in America.... The biggest check and balance we have going for us is the term limit. I don't feel like it is accelerating at all. I feel like it's slowing down since the mid-terms. Now if we could just get those applied to Congress, we'd be golden. But for now, I trust that voters will term limit him to just one term anyway. Democrats need a real candidate though. Someone that independents can get behind. Not Clinton. Not Bernie Sanders. Not Warren. Not even Biden although a debate between he and Traitor would be entertaining. We're not here for the entertainment. There's a lot of work that needs to be done. That whole "Mission Accomplished Part 2" for ISIS in Syria backfired unfortunately. We knew it would. Of course, "Mr. I Know More About Everything Than Everybody" didn't seem to know - because he doesn't pay attention to the real world. Trump also knows more about the TGC 2019 golf swing than anybody. And the course creator too. In fact, ....... He knows more about playing a guitar than Jimi Hendrix. He knows more about kung fu than Chuck Norris He knows more about fine dining cooking than Gordon Ramsey He knows more about flying airliners than Sully He knows more about technology than Steve Jobs and Bill Gates COMBINED He knows more about fried chicken than Colonel Sanders (this may be true)The list goes on and on. It's amazing how much he knows.... and he has the greatest memory of all time that helps him retain all of that awesome knowledge. Just wanted y'all to know that. Ok, just kidding. the traitor is an idiot. |
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