Tag Archives: Donald Trump

The little people have had enough – not just here, but in America too, by Nigel Farage

Brit Nigel Farage has a far better understanding of US politics than most of the American punditry and expertocracy. From Farage at telegraph.co.uk:

There are fewer than 30 days to go before the US presidential election. It is a campaign which mirrors many of the arguments and conflicts that we have seen recently in British politics, especially during the recent referendum campaign. Essentially, this election is about continuity versus change, with huge doses of personal vitriol thrown in.

When I arrived at the Republican Party convention in Cleveland, Ohio, back in July, I was amazed at the reaction to me over the Brexit result. Normally we follow trends in America, not the other way round, but it was clear that many of the delegates saw Brexit as an aspiration for what they see as the Trump “revolution” against the Establishment. I met many others who were not delegates or political anoraks, who were also keen to talk about Brexit. A group of retired US Navy veterans told me we should have done it years ago. Others were less impressed and shouted at me in the streets. Indeed, this weekend while I was in St Louis, I received some proper abuse on the Washington University campus.

One thing is for certain: our referendum is being talked about the world over and it may well be the first kick-back against the status quo that leads to a popular revolt across the West. While Trump and Clinton may be the most unpopular presidential candidates ever, there has been a growing distrust of the political class. Just as in the UK, where cash for questions and the MPs’ expenses scandals lead to a chorus of uproar, the elites in Washington are seen as remote and detached.

Many TV campaign adverts pointed to the fact that various incumbents defending their seats on Capitol Hill are in it for themselves, their families and for the money. In America today there is a strong element of the hereditary principle, with Bushes and Clintons setting down their own dynasties. But one of the reasons that Ukip went from being an insignificant political party to winning the 2014 European elections is that we spoke about issues in a language that resonated with ordinary people.

Like him or loathe him, Trump is not a part of the political elite and he most certainly is not constrained by political correctness. When I spoke at one of his rallies in Jackson, Mississippi, I saw a fanatical gathering of his fans who want to give the Establishment a good hiding. “We want our country back” works as a slogan here, too. The first signs of a political rebellion took the form of the Tea Party. The satirist Ian Hislop once described it as rather like Ukip – but with God and guns. They not only railed against the Washington elites, but made the link between big business, Wall Street banks and Washington politics. The same story is behind the growth of new parties across the whole of the European Union and was an important feature in voters’ minds in the UK this June.

To continue reading: The little people have had enough – not just here, but in America too

They Said That? 10/10/16

There is one part of last night’s debate that has received little attention, but which reveals something about both candidates. The last question of the night was perfect. Here’s the transcript:

RADDATZ: We’ve sneaked in one more question, and it comes from Karl Becker.

QUESTION: Good evening. My question to both of you is, regardless of the current rhetoric, would either of you name one positive thing that you respect in one another?

(APPLAUSE)

RADDATZ: Mr. Trump, would you like to go first?

CLINTON: Well, I certainly will, because I think that’s a very fair and important question. Look, I respect his children. His children are incredibly able and devoted, and I think that says a lot about Donald. I don’t agree with nearly anything else he says or does, but I do respect that. And I think that is something that as a mother and a grandmother is very important to me.

So I believe that this election has become in part so — so conflict-oriented, so intense because there’s a lot at stake. This is not an ordinary time, and this is not an ordinary election. We are going to be choosing a president who will set policy for not just four or eight years, but because of some of the important decisions we have to make here at home and around the world, from the Supreme Court to energy and so much else, and so there is a lot at stake. It’s one of the most consequential elections that we’ve had.

And that’s why I’ve tried to put forth specific policies and plans, trying to get it off of the personal and put it on to what it is I want to do as president. And that’s why I hope people will check on that for themselves so that they can see that, yes, I’ve spent 30 years, actually maybe a little more, working to help kids and families. And I want to take all that experience to the White House and do that every single day.

RADDATZ: Mr. Trump?

TRUMP: Well, I consider her statement about my children to be a very nice compliment. I don’t know if it was meant to be a compliment, but it is a great — I’m very proud of my children. And they’ve done a wonderful job, and they’ve been wonderful, wonderful kids. So I consider that a compliment.

I will say this about Hillary. She doesn’t quit. She doesn’t give up. I respect that. I tell it like it is. She’s a fighter. I disagree with much of what she’s fighting for. I do disagree with her judgment in many cases. But she does fight hard, and she doesn’t quit, and she doesn’t give up. And I consider that to be a very good trait.

RADDATZ: Thanks to both of you.

Look at Hillary’s answer. She complimented Trump’s children, only indirectly complimenting Trump as their father. One would think that if she wanted to directly compliment Trump, she might have said something about his rise to his party’s nomination against all odds. Note also that Clinton then shifted into standard campaign-speak about herself and her plans.

Look at Trump’s answer. He said that he considered Hillary’s compliment of his children a compliment, although he didn’t “know if it was meant to be a compliment.” He then paid her a direct compliment, concluding, “But she does fight hard, and she doesn’t quit, and she doesn’t give up. And I consider that to be a very good trait.” Then he shut up, although he certainly had time to, like Hillary, puff himself up and make one final pitch.

Based on that little exchange, which candidate showed more class and character?

An American Tragedy: Trump Won Big, by Raúl Ilargi Meijer

Raúl Ilargi Meijer reaches the same conclusion as Scott Adams about the “winner” of last night’s debate. However, he has a completely different perspective and tone than Adams. From Meijer at theautomaticearth.com:

If the US presidential debate last night showed anything, it must be that just about everyone has dug themselves into their trenches and had no desire whatsoever to ever came out.

This seemed especially clear on the Hillary side, which appeared to include -to an extent- ‘moderators’ Anderson Cooper and Martha Raddatz, judging from their interruptions. But, granted, they were the only biased side in the discussion, so we don’t really know what trenches the Republicans have dug.

The biggest problem with biased moderators is that people notice their bias. Not those who are on one side already, it passes them by. But others do. And perhaps more importantly, -in this case-, Hillary’s team loses its ability to adopt a neutral view. And she will therefore hear so much praise that she can’t figure out if she’s not done too well.

To illustrate that point: the main takeaway must be that Trump won the debate hands down, but that’s the opposite of what Hillary sympathizers concluded and what various polls said. It’s still true though, if only for one simple reason. That is, for 48 hours straight all talk and ‘reporting’ had been about Trumps lewd ‘words’ on the Access Hollywood tapes.

Trump really was cornered, and he knew it, everyone knew it. But after the second debate, and within 90 minutes, most of the talk turned towards how he ‘threatened’ to jail Hillary. Now, that’s not what he said, but even if he had, it’s something a lot more people sympathize with than with his language on the tapes. That’s a lot of territory ‘conquered’.

Meanwhile, even the likes of Paul Ryan don’t seem to grasp what happened overnight (he apparently think Hillary already won). What he doesn’t appear to see is, again, that Trump looked completely lost for 48 hours, but doesn’t look so lost now. There are 4 weeks and a day left in the campaign, and a lot can still happen.

Look, Trump is a buffoon. The word could have been invented specifically to define him. And it would be a very bad idea to make him president of the US. But that doesn’t mean the idea of making Hillary president is any better. It may well be worse, for a variety of reasons.

What the debate made clear once more is that America stands face to face with itself, it’s looking in a giant mirror, one which -only- in choice moments does not contort its own image, and America finds there’s nothing to like about what it sees in those brief moments in that mirror. And then therefore immediately proceeds to contort that image like it’s used to doing.

America may not like to look at its own stone cold hard reality, but it’s better than any culture ever in painting a picture of itself that it does like. In fact, it’s the first nation ever that made exactly that its main goal in life.

To continue reading: An American Tragedy: Trump Won Big

 

Quick Debate Reactions from Switzerland, by Scott Adams

Scott Adams’ take on the second debate, on a guest post at theburningplatform.com:

I just watched the debate on replay. Trump won bigly. This one wasn’t close. And keep in mind that I called Clinton the winner of the first debate, and I now endorse Gary Johnson, primarily to avoid being called an alleged enabler of alleged sex abusers and their alleged enablers. That basket of deplorables includes both Bill and Hillary Clinton (the alleged doer and the alleged cleaner-upper) plus Trump and his alleged misdeeds.

Some quick reactions…

1. When the Access Hollywood tape came up, Trump dismissed it as locker room banter that he regrets. You expected that part. The persuasion move was that he quickly contrasted that “small” issue with images of ISIS beheadings, and cage-drownings. It was a high ground maneuver, a powerful visual anchor (like the Rosie O’Donnell move from his first primary debate), and a contrast play. In this framing, Trump cares about saving your life while Clinton cares about your choice of words. I realize the issue is Trump’s alleged deeds, not his words. But in terms of debate persuasion, Trump nailed it hard.
2. Clinton’s body language was defensive. Trump is physically larger and prowled the stage. He won the optics. It only got worse when a fly landed on Clinton’s face mid-answer. Both candidates looked perfect in terms of wardrobe and hair, given what they have to work with.

3. Trump threw in enough random details about Syria to persuade viewers that he knows more than they thought he knew. And he did a great job selling the idea that he knows more than the generals (as ridiculous as that sounds), at least in terms of not announcing where we plan to attack. I agree with the moderator who said there might be good reasons for announcing attacks – such as giving time for civilians to leave – but it wasn’t quite a counter-argument. Trump succeeded in looking informed on Syria, and at the same time reinforced the “can’t keep a secret” theme for Clinton.

4. Trump’s pre-debate show with Bill’s alleged victims dismantled Clinton’s pro-woman high ground before the debate even started. I didn’t see the pre-debate show, but I assume it was impactful. It had to be. Clinton looked shaken from the start.

5. The best quotable moments from the debate are pro-Trump. His comment about putting Clinton in jail has that marvelous visual persuasion quality about it, and it was the laugh of the night, which means it will be repeated endlessly. He also looked like he meant it.

Clinton’s Abe Lincoln defense for two-faced politicking failed as hard as anything can fail. Mrs. Clinton, I knew Abe Lincoln, and you’re no Abe Lincoln. You know that was in your head. Or it will be.

6. Most of the rest was policy stuff that no one understands or cares about. We don’t know how to fix Obamacare or what to do with TPP. But by acting competent on these and other policy issues, Trump gains more than Clinton in persuasion.

7. Trump attacked Clinton on emails, and did a good job. His base needed that.

8. Clinton had to defend her “deplorables” comment. She said she regretted it. Regret isn’t what the public wanted to hear. That’s about her. They wanted to hear that she doesn’t think that way. She failed to address the emotional part of that topic, and that’s a persuasion fail.

To continue reading: Quick Debate Reactions from Switzerland

He Said That? 10/9/16

From Donald Trump at tonight’s debate:

TRUMP: “Bernie Sanders and between super delegates and Debra Wassermann Schultz and I was surprised to see him sign on with the devil. The thing that you should be apologizing for are the 33,000 e-mails that you deleted and you acid washed and the two boxes of e-mails and other things last week that were taken from an office are are now missing. I didn’t know I would say this, but I’m going to and I hate to say it. If I win, I am going to instruct my attorney general to get a special prosecutor to look into your situation. There has never been so many lies, so much exception. There has never been anything like it. We will have a special prosecutor. I go out and speak and the people of this country are furious. The long time workers at the FBI are furious. There has never been anything like this with e-mails. You get a subpoena and after getting the subpoena you delete 33,000 e-mails and acid watch them or bleach them. An expensive process. We will get a special prosecutor and look into it. You know what, people have been — their lives have been destroyed for doing 1/5 of what you have done. You should be a shamed.”

The Politics of Porcine Proclivities, Propensities, and Predilections, by Robert Gore

Much of Donald Trump’s success stems from the weird fixations, taboos, and hypocrisies of those who oppose him. A country can’t control its own borders or decide to whom it will allow entrance. Terrorists acts by Muslims cannot be called Islamic terrorism. Allow members of that religion, an appreciable portion of whom have sworn to destroy us, to enter the country without determining if they are part of that appreciable portion. Restrictions on guns for the law-abiding will control violent crime. Call the leader of the second most powerful nation on the planet, which has a nuclear arsenal that could destroy our country, “Hitler” and that furthers the cause of world peace, but embracing negotiations poses a grave threat to US security. Every release of information damaging to the Democrats comes from Russia.

No weirdness is weirder than the preoccupation with sex and gender. We are told that men dressed as women must be allowed to use women’s bathrooms, the girls and women discomfited, enraged, or terrified by their new bathroom mates be damned. The right to an abortion, on the rationale that it allows women control of their own bodies, is the most important right found—scratch that—”implied” in the Constitution, but income taxes, which steal from the most successful women thirty to fifty percent of the products of their minds and bodies during their entire working lives, and for which there once was a Constitutional prohibition, should be raised. And there ought to be, never mind that First Amendment, laws banning hateful expressions against women, ethnic, racial, sexual-preference, and gender-fluid minorities.

A 2005 videotape has been released in which Donald Trump expresses sentiments about the opposite sex that many find hateful. He has apologized, saying that: “[T]hese words don’t reflect who I am,” a recitation that has become standard in these sorts of apologies. Actually, the words are probably a pretty good reflection of Trump’s attitudes on women and sex. Most men have joined in locker room (or other all-male venues) discussions of female attributes in which the level of discourse is no more elevated than Trump’s. However, the worthies who are shocked, shocked to find that men engage in outrageously vulgar and sexist banter amongst themselves have probably swung the pendulum of today’s sexual orthodoxy as far as it’s going to go.

SLL noted in “Tribes” that the law cannot eliminate prejudice. Nor can it eliminate hard-wired aspects of the human psyche, especially those related to sexuality. Our species, like all species, is built to propagate itself. If it weren’t there wouldn’t be seven plus billion of us. SLL’s expertise is limited to the male half of the species. In the interests of returning some reality to a subject that has become increasingly devoid of it, let’s talk about human, heterosexual males.

Notwithstanding the admiration men may express for female executives, politicians, lawyers, doctors, and the like, most have trouble resisting the head turn when a comely and well put together young woman strolls by. No man has ever fallen for a woman because she gave good Powerpoint presentation or oral argument on appeal, or because she wrote an insightful article, performed a difficult surgery, or built a multibillion dollar business. It may seem unfair to women, given the abolition of legalized discrimination against them and their undeniable progress in so many fields of endeavor, that most men are so heavily influenced by biological, instinctual forces. Women’s roles and their conception of themselves have changed, why shouldn’t men’s thinking?

Life and biology are seldom fair. It is a hilarious conceit that law and edicts can change fundamental human nature, but one with tragic consequences. That never stops the commanders and controllers from trying. Those who would shred the First Amendment to ban politically incorrect speech cannot ban politically incorrect thought; the former effort may well increase the latter result. There may come a day when women rule, where they fill every important position and make every important decision, and men are their absolute slaves. However, when the Queen of the Amazons pronounces her pronouncements to her assembled subjects, if she’s buxom and beautiful most males will be thinking to themselves: “I sure like the way she fills out that outfit, wonder what she’s like in the sack.”

So label males as pigs and Donald Trump as a prime porker. This is a f__k you year in politics, and women, particularly those who want to make their way in this world based on their talents, brains, hard work, and merit, not their physical attributes, cannot be blamed for deciding: “If that’s the way he talks about woman, then f__k him, I’m not voting for the bastard.” However, making porcine proclivities an issue, hoping to steer female votes to Hillary, the Clinton campaign plays a dangerous game.

Take every offensive thing the Donald has ever said or done and he’s still a piglet compared to Bill Clinton’s blue-ribbon, two-thousand-pound swine. Clinton has: been credibly accused of raping or sexually assaulting multiple women; allowed a star-struck younger women to have sex with him; demeaned the office of the presidency with his Oval Office sexual hijinks; had a semen-stained dress proffered as evidence against him; paid $850,000 to settle a sexual harassment law suit, and had to defend himself against impeachment for perjury and obstruction of justice related to that suit. The release of the Trump video assuredly puts all that into play. Hillary brings a knife to this fight; Trump has a bazooka.

Hillary has been her husband’s biggest enabler and defender. The woman who once said, “Every survivor of sexual assault deserves to be heard, believed, and supported,” vilified and defamed every woman who publicly accused Bill Clinton. The hypocrisy has been breathtaking, but well in keeping with what’s become a standard liberal trope: we love mankind (or womankind), it’s individuals we can’t stand and will treat like shit. Calling attention to Bill’s depredations, she also calls attention to her own less-than-honorable role in them.

Speaking of breathtaking hypocrisy, how about that of the media, commentators, and Republicans who are deserting Trump and calling on him to quit the race? Many of the males denouncing Trump are sanctimonious hypocrites who have said or done much worse. Many of the media figures are the same ones who, acting at the behest of Hillary, tore into Bill’s accusers. They demonized rather than investigated, then said the particular accusation had been investigated to death, then issued calls to move on past “old news.” When the Lewinsky affair and the blue dress surfaced, they airily dismissed it as private, consensual sex, until perjury, obstruction of justice, and impeachment emerged as properly public matters.

Trump’s vulgarity supposedly poses a threat to all that is good and decent in American politics. For at least the twentieth time his campaign has been declared dead by the political establishment, media, and his opponent’s campaign. But think about it. They’ve had months to dig up dirt on Trump and this is all they’ve got? The pettiness smacks of desperation, and the difference in scale between allegations made against Trump and the Clintons’ well-documented sleaze, corruption, and criminality is yet another instance of the overwhelming bias against Trump, which has already driven so many fed-up-with-the-establishment voters into his camp. The disclosure may well boomerang, but Trump has to hit hard on the Clintons’ depredations and refocus attention among supporters and potential supporters on his issues. If he can’t do that, he has no business being president.

NOBODY WANTS TO READ ABOUT HONOR

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AMAZON

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NOOK

The Oompa Loompa Man, by Uncola

This is a pretty good attempt to discover the “real” Donald Trump. From Uncola, on a post at theburninghedge.com:

In a nationalized chocolate factory founded by a mysterious, enigmatic zeitgeist taking the form of Gene Wilder’s ghost, immigrated by naughty kids and feeding the fat, obnoxious ones their saccharine sweet poison; there rises an orange Oompa Loompa man frightening the children. The man has applied for a new position in the factory that happens to be nothing less than to become its new president and Chief Executive Officer. If the collective Charlie Buckets, Alt-Right Oompa Loompa’s and the other likeminded children in the factory give their winning tickets to the orange man, the man will become president. However, if this happens, the kids currently in the established positions of authority at the factory are afraid the man will look to them and say: “YOU’RE FIRED!”

Even though the political Charlies, Alt-Right Oompa’s and others may, indeed, have some questions of their own regarding the Orange Oompa Loompa man, they fear and despise the man’s opponent more: The Wicked Witch of the East. Furthermore, the man speaks directly and honestly regarding the specific problems currently manifesting in the factory and this causes the witch to continually shriek: “He’s a divisive misogynistic, xenophobic, bully! I’m melting! I’m melting!” But that’s another story entirely.

So who is this bombastic, bloviating, billionaire Oompa Loompa man?

Born on June 14, 1946 to parents living in the New York City Queens neighborhood known as Jamaica Estates, he is today known as one of the world’s wealthiest billionaires. He is the chairman of the Trump Organization, a multinational business consortium with holdings in real estate, hotels, casinos, resorts and golf courses. As an eponymous and privately held international brand, the organization also operates in various other forms of corporate commerce including: construction, hospitality, entertainment, publishing, media, model management, retail, financial services, board game development, food and beverages, business education, online travel, airlines, helicopter air services, beauty pageants, fashion apparel, jewelry and accessories, home furnishing, lighting products, bath textiles and accessories, bedding, home fragrance products, leather goods, barware, steaks, wine, bottled spring water and chocolate bars.

In addition, the man has authored, or coauthored, 16 books published via his own publishing company and he owns a television company based in New York that produces several television programs including his own reality based TV shows entitled the Apprentice and the Celebrity Apprentice. Both of these shows, in combination, have run a consecutive 14 seasons on the NBC network since January of 2004.

How did the man become so successful? Well, it all started in 1906 when the man’s grandfather moved to the New York City borough of Queens and began a career in real estate. In 1918, the man’s grandfather died from the flu and left an estate valued at $31,359, or $492,016 in 2016 dollars. The man’s grandmother then resurrected the family business under the name of Elizabeth Trump & Son in 1923 with her son Fred, the man’s father, who was just 18 years old at the time.

From 1927 to 1932, Elizabeth and Fred Trump built more than 300 residential homes in Queens, then moved on to build many other homes in Brooklyn with the assistance of financing obtained from the newly established Federal Housing Administration. From 1949 through 1965, Elizabeth Trump & Son built 1,300, 2,000 and 4,600 unit apartment complexes in Brooklyn, Beach Haven and Coney Island. The projects continued until Fred Trump was accused of misappropriating state funds. His reputation suffered and he soon he was unable acquire funding for further projects beyond 1965. In addition, according Fred Trump’s Wikipedia page, he had a 1927 Klu Klux Klan riot arrest because, after all, Wikipedia would not want us to forget about that.

To continue reading: The Oompa Loompa Ma

Washington Leads The World To War, by Paul Craig Roberts

If we can look up from important matters like Donald Trump’s taxes, there is a nontrivial possibility that neoconservatives lead the US not just into a little regime change operation, as they have in the past, but a global conflagration involving not just the usual second tier suspects, but Russia and China as well. That possibility is much more likely if Hillary Clinton is elected president. From Paul Craig Roberts at paulcraigroberts.org:

What must the world think watching the US presidential campaign? Over time US political campaigns have become more unreal and less related to voters’ concerns, but the current one is so unreal as to be absurd.

The offshoring of American jobs by global corporations and the deregulation of the US financial system have resulted in American economic failure. One might think that this would be an issue in a presidential campaign.

The neoconservative ideology of US world hegemony is driving the US and its vassals into conflict with Russia and China. The risks of nuclear war are higher than at any previous time in history. One might think that this also would be an issue in a presidential campaign.

Instead, the issues are Trump’s legal use of tax laws and his non-hostile attitude toward President Putin of Russia.

One might think that the issue would be Hillary’s extremely hostile attitude toward Putin (“the new Hitler”), which promises conflict with a major nuclear power.

As for benefitting from tax laws, Pat Buchanan pointed out that Hillary used to her benefit a loss almost as large as Trump’s and during the Arkansas years Hillary even took a tax deduction for itemized pieces of used clothing donated to a charity, including $2 for one of Bill’s used underpants.

The vice presidential “debate” revealed that the Democratic Party’s candidate is so ignorant that he thinks Putin, who is democratically elected and has enormous public support, is a dictator.

Here is what we know about the two presidential candidates. Hillary has a long list of scandals from Whitewater and Vince Foster to Benghazi and violation of national security protocols. She is bought-and-paid-for by the oligarchs on Wall Street, in the mega-banks, and in the military-security complex as well as by foreign interests. The proof is the Clinton’s $120 million personal fortune and the $1,600 million in their foundation. Goldman Sachs did not pay Hillary $675,000 for three 20-minute speeches for the wisdom they contained.

What we know about Trump is that the oligarchic establishment cannot stand him and has ordered the Ministry of Propaganda, a.k.a., the US media, to destroy him.

Clearly, Hillary is the candidate of the One Percent, and Trump is the candidate for the rest of us.

Unfortunately, about half of the 99 percent is too dumb to know this.

Moreover, if Trump were to end up in the White House, it doesn’t mean he could prevail over the oligarchy.

The oligarchy is entrenched in Washington with control over economic and foreign policy positions, think tanks and other lobbyists, and the media.

The people control nothing.

What does the world think when they see Donald Trump damned because he doesn’t want war with Russia or the American economy moved offshore?

Where in American politics do Washington’s European, British, Canadian, Australian, and Japanese vassals see leadership worthy of their sacrifice of sovereignty and independent foreign policy? Where do they even see a modicum of intelligence?

Why does the world look to the most stupid, vile, arrogant, corrupt and murderous government on the planet for leadership?

War is the only destination to which Washington can lead.

http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2016/10/05/washington-leads-the-world-to-war-paul-craig-roberts/

Must Read of the Day – ‘I Listened to a Trump Supporter’, by Michael Krieger

Although SLL never insists its readers do anything, thus there are no “must reads,” this is a very good article. From Michael Krieger at libertyblitzkrieg.com:

The following article by David A Hill Jr is simply outstanding.

Here are some powerful excerpts from the piece: I Listened to a Trump Supporter

I talked at length with a Trump supporter I grew up around. I wanted to understand. I respected her growing up. I wanted to know why a person as kind and compassionate as I remember her is voting for someone like Donald Trump.

She was a family friend, a good person. In rural Ohio, everything was tight. Money, jobs. If you really needed quick cash, she’d put you to work doing landscaping. She’d pay fairly and reliably for the area.

She’s voting for Donald Trump. I disagree with her choice, but I understand why she rejects Clinton so fiercely, and why she’s been swept up in Donald Trump’s particular brand of right-wing populism. I feel that on the left, it’s increasingly easy to ignore these people, to disregard them, to write them off as racists, bigots, or uneducated. I think that’s a loss for everyone involved, and that sometimes listening can help you to at least understand why a person is making the choices they make, so you can work on the root causes. For her, the root cause isn’t racism. In fact, I remember her as one of the only people in the area who proudly hired black workers, in a place where that was a huge issue. She fought over that choice.

But that’s enough background. Let me relay a bit of what she told me.

She’s a person who built her business from the ground up. She wasn’t rich, but was very comfortable for the area. She had a nice house, a nice car, and was stable. She achieved the American dream of not having to struggle. Things changed during the housing crisis. A landscaping business requires customers who need landscaping, and people who don’t own homes just don’t need landscaping. In some of these neighborhoods, one in five people lost their homes. That almost immediately turns a successful landscaping business into a struggling one.

Then there was a domino effect. She couldn’t pay for her lawn-care equipment leases and loans. That hurt her work efficiency. Then, she lost her car. But that didn’t stop the payments. Then, she lost her house. She slowly had to let go all of her employees, until it was just her, hand-mowing lawns for cash the way you might expect a high school student in the summertime.

She told me that every week, it seemed there was another default letter, another foreclosure, another bank demanding more blood from her dry veins. To her, that pile of default notices and demands for payment looked suspiciously similar to Hillary Clinton’s top donor list.

She lost everything she worked so hard for. Obama swore he was going to help. The Wall Street bailout did seem to help Wall Street. But it did absolutely nothing for her. She turns on the news and sees how the Dow Jones is doing better than ever. But that didn’t bring her house and livelihood back. Liberals insist that Obama’s made her life better. But, now she’s driving a car that falls apart randomly while having to pay those same banks for a car she doesn’t own and never will. It’s difficult to convince someone whose life is objectively worse that their life is better. And it’s disingenuous to try. You can break down the specifics, sure. But when someone’s hungry, and you’re busy silencing their complaints by telling them how well world hunger is improving, you’re just going to upset them.

To continue reading: Must Read of the Day – ‘I Listened to a Trump Supporter’

This Long Run Won’t Be Long Enough, by Robert Gore

The people running the world’s businesses and governments mostly come from elite business and law schools. Graduates emerge from these programs with well-honed skills in verbalization, public presentation, image management, and strategic conformity, and with a hubristic belief that they are qualified, even entitled, to run large and important institutions.

For all their intelligence, they often lack a nuts-and-bolts understanding of how any particularly institution actually operates, or the qualities of character necessary to inspire basic respect among the people with whom they will work, much less to manage, motivate, or lead them. A few try to remedy their deficiencies. Most are willfully blinded by exaggerated estimations of their own merit, and the praise and confirmation they receive from others of the same stripe.

In either business or government, the lower rungs (constituents being the lowest rung of government) are closer to on-the-ground realities. Open and honest lines of communication to the upper echelon are rare. In light of reprisal risks, most people tell bosses or political functionaries what they want to hear. Most bosses, bureaucrats, and politicians investigate no farther, and craft self-serving narratives to promote what they’re doing.

The genesis of the burgeoning political revolt is the realization that the business-government nexus is not functioning as advertised and is contrary to the interests of the people subjected to it. Much of what the ruling class has done has failed, and failed spectacularly, especially when measured against the hype that promotes it. Hubristic delusion has prevented much of the elite from recognizing either their failures or shattering credibility. They are falling in line for Hillary Clinton, but here too they delude themselves.

Clinton will not be the status quo they know and love because that status quo is doomed. How much longer can the Federal Reserve undermine savings, investment, and production, and reward leveraged speculation with zero and lower interest rates? How long can the government continue to borrow before the Fed is the only buyer of its debt? When will ever-expanding debt and ever-mounting regulations crush the already faltering economy? What will be the point of recognition that there is no way the government can keep all the promises it has made? When will Obamacare and a host of other unaffordable government-provided goods and services be pronounced dead? When will the hope of global domination be abandoned? When does the average Joe and Jane become aware that most of what government has done has been a massive mistake?

These are questions that presume eventual outcomes. It’s astounding that the status quo has been maintained for as long as it has, that the answer to all these questions is: “Not now, but sometime in the future.” While there are a myriad of reasons for the absence of a generally recognizable collapse, three stand out.

Taking debt monetization, interest rate suppression, and asset price promotion to previously undreamed of outer limits, central bankers have also explored new frontiers in economic and financial anesthetization. Pain has its uses, one of which is that the sufferer may take remedial actions to ameliorate or stop it. Financial anesthesia, like the medical variety, masks pain and consequently delays the patient’s healing responses to it. Cheap, abundant fiat debt forestalls necessary but painful deflation, bankruptcies, the repricing of assets, and their transfer from the weak to the strong, and it consigns the economy to the realm of the living dead. How long can such a state of suspended animation last? Japan started anesthetizing and zombifying its economy twenty-six years ago and its economic monitors still register activity, albeit anemic. Now that Japan’s strategy has gone world-wide, nobody really knows how long a global zombie economy can stagger forward.

The remaining productive Americans carry the gorilla of government on their backs. With each new tax, regulation, dollar of debt, unfunded promise, and addition to the rolls of people supported by the government, the gorilla gets heavier. Perversely, at least in the short run, that has diminished the threat to the government that its milk cows balk at the increasingly onerous regime—they are too busy trying to survive it. Furthermore, as the number of producers decreases and the number on the dole increases, the pool of potential resisters shrinks. This cannot go on forever. The Atlases will shrug eventually, or more likely collapse, but until they do the government’s game keeps going.

Finally, the government has its own public-opinion-molding operation and has co-opted most of the “independent” media. One would be hard put to find a single adjustment to the government’s economic statistics production process over the last several decades that has had the effect of increasing either the inflation or the unemployment rate. The “news” Americans get from the mainstream media about the US’s many interventions in foreign lands is laughable: propaganda at best, usually closer to outright fiction. The news Americans don’t get about those interventions, government surveillance, weapons boondoggles, the deep state, crony influence and enrichment, immigration, crime, and the futility of wars on poverty, drugs, and terror fills alternative media websites and books that seldom make bestseller lists. Managing, shaping, and stifling information flows has kept the powers that be in power…and the incurious millions docile.

Hillary Clinton represents the powers’ fingers-crossed hope that their hideous, destined-for-breakdown contraption can be kept going for a few more years. Donald Trump represents the resentment of those who bear the brunt of their increasingly obvious failures. Whoever gets elected, at some point the unsustainable will give way and the powers’ artifices will become manifest liabilities. Which has already occurred with the mainstream media and is in process with the Fed. The media’s blatantly biased coverage of the election has irretrievably shredded its credibility and has probably caused a net addition to the ranks of Trump voters. Faith in the Fed’s nostrums is dwindling as the much touted liftoff never arrives. Fundamentally unsound, debt-saturated economic and financial systems will eventually vomit out a crisis that central bankers can’t fix or forestall.

In the long run reality is reality, not what the powers would like it to be or what they try to con the masses into believing it is. Don’t give up hope! The long run is short enough that most of us won’t be dead when it arrives.

NOBODY READS LONG BOOKS ANYMORE

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