[Newfie]

Ibon,
Why do I reference Hillary? Because there were 2 people running for President. One D and one R. If you want me to support the D side then the D side needs to put up a superior candidate to the R side.

Ther is no doubt Trump is a seriously flawed individual. Then again much the same can be said of most Presidents. What galls me is the way the MSM worshipped Obama and are decidedly anti-Trump. Now Trump is a lying scoundrel, so was Obama. Obama lied with more fluency and class, that is true.

Look at what Plant just found out about Obama, he stutters. I don’t think that’s much of a big deal but I can only imagine the ruckus in the MSM if Trump started stuttering.

So why do I always bring up HC? Because she was the offered alternative. And in my mind she would have been worse, not for the economy (I desire it to crash so she would have been better for that) but because of the FBI/DOJ exposures. It’s pretty clear, through the way she stole the nomination, she would have reinforced the strongly D machine system in DC. You don’t have to like Trump to see that he is doing the country a deep service by upsetting that apple cart.

AND, to date, I’ve not seen the D party doing much to come up with a string of viable candidates for the next election. They made some changes to the primary voting system, a good first step, but it’s a looong Road before the D’s restore democracy to their party.

[Newfie]

Ibon,

Let me ask one more question. I’m assuming from your rehtoric you strongly support the immediate impeachment of Donald Trump.

1- How long do you think that would take.
2- Would you be happier with Pence as President?

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', 'I')bon,

Let me ask one more question. I’m assuming from your rehtoric you strongly support the immediate impeachment of Donald Trump.

1- How long do you think that would take.
2- Would you be happier with Pence as President?

[mmasters]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Ibon', '
')Trump has no real moral positions

[KaiserJeep]

The carefully manicured image of every POTUS in recent memory is a product of public relations and media relations efforts on the part of PR specialists and press secretaries. The difference with Trump is he has his tweets/followers and pretty much doesn't give a damn about his image. It is both appalling and refreshing at the same time.

If you think you can get to be POTUS without being both a moral dog and an ethical SOB, think again. I don't think Trump is in any important way any different from any of his predecessors. The moral champ was probably Carter, and that made for an ineffectual POTUS, the most such, although Obama was almost as bad. The moral dog was JFK, today's press would publicise an endless string of "bimbo eruptions". In terms of getting things done, Ronald Reagan, followed by Bill Clinton.

The difference is that Trump lets it all hang out in public. And that is all the difference.

[Newfie]

Ibon,

Thanks for that honesty. Your hatred comes across, that is very, very clear.

The endless repetition of that hatred surely colors your presence here.

This is where the whole difficulty with communication comes in. You keep hating Trump. That is what you think you are saying. What at least some of hear is a complete condemnation of all Republicans.

Now that doesn’t happen in all your posts, but it happens sufficiently that you start to sound, well a bit deranged. Maybe this is because I’ve too many aquaintenaces who really do hate all Republicans (and most Democrats as well if they don’t tie the EXACT line).

There is no doubt the country as a whole needs a break from this marital quality fight we are in. Some kind of reset. Don’t see it happening.

[Ibon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', '.')

This is where the whole difficulty with communication comes in. You keep hating Trump. That is what you think you are saying. What at least some of hear is a complete condemnation of all Republicans.

[Newfie]

I’ll try to address that.

I try to evaluate Trump based on what I see him doing. There are things I support and things I am neutral about and things I do not support. So, yes, there are things about Trump I support. Does this make me deplorable?

This above evaluation is separate from my evaualtion as a moral, ethical, or decent human. I do not like Trump as a person, I don’t like his style, his facade, his personal values, or his world view. I would not ask him over for diner or accept an invitation. I thought it was laughable years ago when he first postured and am incredible that the USA has sunk to this level.

That is where the HC equivalency comes in. I am even more appalled that the USA has sunk to level that the two candidates were equally reprehensible to me. To simply blame Trump is to presume he is the problem. This is most decidedly not true. And that only comes to light when you look at the alternatives. Then you see that the rot is pervasive.

It does no good to constantly pound on Trump if you have nothing better to offer.

All this wasted energy should be put into reforming the Two political parties so that this mess does not occur again.

In the meantime all the hate speech actually works to Trumos benefit, it sucks up all the conversation, there is no room left to discuss truly important issues. Why are we not discussing climate change, resource loss, electric grid rationalization, and oh so many other practical matters?

Conviencing me to hate Trump is a hollow victory, it advances nothing. Why is it so important that I hate Trump if we agree on so much else about the physical world?

Enough for now, sorry for the overly long post.

[Newfie]

KJ wrote:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')he difference is that Trump lets it all hang out in public. And that is all the difference.

[evilgenius]

I think that the meme of unionization is an important one working its way through American Society. Many people see labor unions as socialist. They aren't, actually. When the Cold War was about to end what happened in Poland proved that. What labor unions are is the cohesive organization of otherwise disenfranchised individuals in order to make gains which none of those individuals could make on their own. As such, when they work, they have a lot of power. That power, however, is only ever truly relevant toward addressing those issues over which the organization was formed. When the perception of that power, and thus its political might, becomes larger than that, the power fades.

If a society is lucky, while unions were at the top of their arc they will have succeeded in bringing about some basic changes which will become not only embedded in law, but in people's perceptions of fairness. In America, those were things like the 40 hour work week, overtime pay, and outlawing child labor. To some degree, the right to organize, collective bargaining, was also instituted by unions, but that's not nearly so sacrosanct. Though unions have faded, the most widely held of the ideas brought about by them have not gone away in the aftermath. That's important when we consider the angry American.

It's important because of another meme, entrepreneurial endeavor, in the American Landscape. What people can do on their own has replaced what they can do collectively. And this has had a knock on effect which has resulted in renewed empowerment of many still disenfranchised people for whom collectivism only promised liberation. For collectivism only promised what it would be like to work, but it never appropriated work for those who were yet disenfranchised. As I say, it was not truly socialism. Even though the emphasis upon the individual has produced an actual wider suffrage than that of the collective approach, there is still cohesiveness surrounding the basic ideas of fairness wrought under it, if not much of an homage to where they came from. People seem to hate unions. A lot of that is probably due to how they simply aren't as relevant to the kind of service industry economy the US has become. Some of it is due to the malfeasance seen in the operation of unions by those who ran them when they had gained too much power. Some of it is due to how the entrepreneur must always go it either alone or in a purposeful group. The idea of giving place to unions detracts from that. It does so, in part, because of a fear of what the largess of unions in their overwrought state can do to a fledgling endeavor. The costs would surely wreck it. But costs will always matter, even if they aren't externally imposed. Entrepreneurs will always be challenged to examine what they think is fair, and whether that sort of fairness is important enough not to compromise on.

There is a real temptation in the current version of America to cross the line when it comes to the ideals that were established when unionization was strong. Collective bargaining may be a type of the proverbial canary in a coal mine. It dies out before the other things you care about, giving you warning that what you care about is in danger. I think America is flitting about between the two memes of collectivism toward common interests and the power of the individual. Part of that may be due to the long term regression of the collective values brought about by unions. Much of society doesn't have any memory of what it is like to struggle either in a world that doesn't have those institutionalized, nor to struggle for them. They do have some very emotional bump when it comes to abhorring the excess that the unions operated under when they were powerful. In many ways this causes people to miss other memes that pervade society, but which don't rise up to a level of importance high enough to elevate one's understanding either way concerning one's place as an individual or as a member of the collective. Those memes are things like the value of a certain amount of money. I dare say that how Americans perceive the value of ten dollars hasn't changed for at least three decades when it comes to wages, while it has changed, at least over the past decade or so, especially in the house price run up, when it comes to the cost of things.

I don't believe unions are coming back. I think they were a product of their time. I do think that, maybe, something new in this current volatility will replace them. What that may be is up to this time, and how Americans resolve these various issues according to how important they feel they are.

[asg70]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', '
')You keep hating Trump. That is what you think you are saying. What at least some of hear is a complete condemnation of all Republicans.

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('asg70', 'T')rump's base is really more responsible for dragging political discourse into the gutter

[Newfie]

Evil,
One problem with “unions” is how people think of the, what they picture when you finger up the image in your mind, in short the “meme.”

There are a variety of unions, they are organized differently, work differently, and accomplish different things.

Think:
Ford or Chevy production line
Teachers and other public unions
Railroad unions
Construction unions
Professional unions

It’s hard to accurately generalize across such a broad range, construction unions in particular are a breed apart and provide necessary services I think the general public is blind to.

Memes can and do over simplify, loose all meaningful distinction. And because not everyone in the conversation carries the same mental definition/image it makes conversation difficult.

[evilgenius]

I think union membership is definitely down from its heyday. I gave some reasons. There are more, obviously.

One thing that I think the adherence to the sense of fairness has produced is a sort of ironic blindness to a situation that is occurring in certain businesses. There are businesses these days that have been able to pawn off costs that once resided with them, and pass them along to workers who are no longer called workers. The independent contractor was once thought of as that home repairman who agreed to do a job for a homeowner. Big business has taken that model and run with it. The gig economy is built upon it. It has become a way for otherwise non-profitable businesses to prosper.

Instead of being considered workers, who come with costs that society demands workers come with because of the adherence to the sense of fairness, these independent contractors are considered businesses themselves, who theoretically compete for the money that a gig or traditional economy business offers them to complete tasks that those businesses need done. I say theoretically because actual competition may take place, but it is generally amongst a group that has no say as to the pay structure for what they do. They may occasionally be offered premium money, but that is usually only when the vast majority of people in the pool of potential workers don't want to do something. The notion of receiving pay for a day's worth of work doesn't underlie the arrangement. It's all piecemeal. According to the sense of fairness this is some kind of monstrous return to the world of yesterday.

Or it would be, if the practice wasn't so successful. Because when things are tight people realize that unions did one thing more than they did all of the others, they got people work. They used seniority to parse it out, if it was rare. And, like Keynes pointed out, it doesn't matter if the pay for those slices of work increases or decreases. Without some structural understanding orchestrating pay, people look upon work as something divorced from things like justice. They need to eat, then they can think about justice. The sense of fairness is an extension of that to most people, not a prerequisite.

I think this is where work is headed. AI is actually a kind of salvation from that, and a catalyst for it. As long as those who once worked don't have to compete against a rigged structure, they can own as many copies of themeselves, what they once did, as they can afford to. All they need is a level playing field where investing in those things will bring in some kind of profit, if they manage the thing properly. It only has to be scalable. It could be scalable if the businesses needing work done remained averse to owning the means to produce that work themselves, and the producers of the equipment were disincentivized to compete directly in the various sectors their equipment would work in. I think you can see it would be so, if the model as it is working out now actually did extend into the era of artificial intelligence.

[Zarquon]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Newfie', '
')There is no doubt the country as a whole needs a break from this marital quality fight we are in. Some kind of reset. Don’t see it happening.

[evilgenius]

I hope people can see that I brought up unions as an example of the meme of collective vs. independent thinking in American Society. I think those two memes dominate the thought processes working so diligently to drive us apart today. We're happiest when we enjoy some form of protection against those who wield great individual power. At the same time, almost every one of us wants that kind of power! At best the sort of protections we gain from engaging in collective thought provide what I've been calling a sense of fairness. Even if a protection isn't enshrined in the law, often people will think it is because this sense has been transferred to them through a meme. People don't have to want unions, or any of the other social structures that provide a way for us to understand each other, to want or perceive fairness. They can live lives of privilege that operate completely outside of those founding social structures and get along just fine. I think, however, that they will discover that it is different to encounter those who do have great individual power operating under that state than under one that is more connected.

Unions began as a means for individuals who by themselves could not act successfully in their own interests to do so as a group. Something happens to us as we join groups. We are not only finding our power in common interests. We also have to recognize that other people in the group are not like us. If we want the power of the group we find that we have to understand tolerance. But we still, almost all of us, want to exercise great individual power. Today we want to join groups without joining in humility. I don't want to say to people that they should not be afraid of those who do have great individual power. Those people really do pose a threat. However, I do think that threat is not what most people think it is. They can't see it because they can't get past how they project their own desire, and knowledge of what they would be like if they achieved to that same level, upon their image of those in power. As such, they perceive intent where there isn't any. How people who do have that power work that power is by continuing to engage in the things that have made them successful, until those things are proven wrong. It's the operation of those things that push the little people around. That's why I bring up independent contracting, and how it has made it possible to run businesses that would not have been profitable in a bygone era, where the sense of fairness ruled more concretely. There are a lot more employees today that are not classified as employees than there were yesterday. As the working segments of the legal, medical, financial and other once revered professions become commoditized by artificial intelligence the problem will only get worse.

Bernie Sanders aside, I don't believe we can solve this new challenge with the old solutions. Those old solutions were new solutions once, which were pertinent to their time. Today we need a new kind of collectivism. We need something that pertains to ownership, that attacks the very structure which enables those currently at the top to continue to operate, even when the sense of fairness would say they ought to have given up. That's why I believe we need to protect the ability of those who do work to buy the coming artificially intelligent versions of what they do now in a scalable fashion. I also think we need to address how shares are organized when we give companies the powers they enjoy under incorporation. There need to be classes of stock which are about replacing earnings, not just about returning value to shareholders.

[asg70]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Plantagenet', '
')it had been going on a long long long time before Trump got into it.

[asg70]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('evilgenius', '
')Bernie Sanders aside, I don't believe we can solve this new challenge with the old solutions.

[KaiserJeep]

If you want to talk reality versus starry-eyed theory, both the R's and the D's spend more time taking money from Corporations and wealthy so-called "political supporters" that they do representing the interests of the people who elected them and believed in them.

That in fact IS the very essence of American exceptionalism and the basis for the wealth that all citizens of this country enjoy. We have a system of economics and government, we have a Constitution, and pragmaticly speaking, we know just when to draw the line with either in the interests of TCB (taking Care of Business).

This country and all others have in the past three decades gone through a profound change with digital technology. Just what the final result might be is uncertain. One clear difference is that somebody like Trump could never have been elected in the old system, where the media told us what to think and believe. But Trump (or at least his guy Roger Stone) bypassed the media and spoke a Populist message directly to the people.

In the balance, change is good, and this is more change than is typical. Since I do not carry a smartphone (not any more, ever) or even a flip phone, I am an interested observer of modern cyber culture. "Cyber" would be the right word there, make no mistake. One day your kid or grandkid will have an implant in their brain, and become a very different individual, overnite.

As for those of you who interact socially mainly through the Internet, give a long hard think about who you are now, versus before the network connected to your own brain.

[Newfie]

KJ,

There are a couple of memes in your post worth noting.

Ds are pinko socialist commies who will ruin the USA.
Rs are right wing racist and fascist who will ruin America.
THEY must be defeated at all costs.
WE represent true American values.
The parties are all powerful and a third party can never rise up.

Obviously not all of us hold all of these concepts, but they flourish too well.

Thanks for pointing them out.

There is another meme; Corporate America runs America despite the party in power. To my mind that has more credability. Perhaps others disagree.