This article considers the subject that neoliberal rationality constructs.
By engaging first with Michel Foucault’s account of the entrepreneurial self, then with
contemporary critical theorists who build upon and move beyond Foucault’s account, it
considers three aspects of the human condition under neoliberal hegemony: the moral, the
political, and the existential.
Neoliberal rationality, then, analyses not only people’s economic activity (with Smith, those activities
that spring from our natural propensity to ‘truck, barter, and exchange’) in terms of competition and
investment, but all of their action. It turns economics, the study of economic behaviour, into
“praxeology”: the study of human action as such.8 With the rise of rational choice theory in the post-WWII
period, economic analysis becomes one of the most prominent methodologies applied in the humanities
and therewith economics quickly replaces the artes liberales of yesteryear as the core curriculum
for social scientists. “Economic imperialism”, indeed.
Taken together, the notion of human capital
and the widened scope of economics result economic activity is analysed in terms of human capital,
at the same time economics broadens its scope, colonises the all human action as economic action,
thereby effectively recasting every human activity as either the obtention of income, or the
appreciation or depreciation of human capital.11Homo oeconomicus - nomic analysis, is not made
to disappear (notwithstanding neoliberals’ insistence on the contrary)12 homo oeconomicus in
the classical liberal conception was a “partner of exchange” based on “a problematic of needs,”13 under
neoliberalism homo oeconomicus becomes modelled on the enterprise, that is, a business sought
in “the mechanisms of competition.”14 consist of capital and is likewise required to compete in markets.
Homo oeconomicus becomes “an entrepreneur, an entrepreneur of himself.”15 The entrepreneurial
self, in short, is the self who is constantly engaged in investing in her own human capital because
she must compete in a marketplace; it is the self “who incurs expenses by investing to obtain some kind
of improvement.”16 or otherwise.
The neoliberal subject for Foucault is thus the subject who invests, who competes, who appreciates
her human capital.17 This subject is considered to behave like an enterprise and, crucially, sees
herself as an enterprise. She is made to conform to entrepreneurial standards through an ethics
of the self and, indeed, the newly fashioned neoliberal “[h] omo oeconomicus is someone who is
eminently governable.”18 The point here is that whereas homo oeconomicus as the classical political
economists understood it had to be left alone (“one must lasser-faire”)19 the neoliberal subject
is so intimately tethered becomes easily conducted.
The neoliberal subject will always respond to socio-economic reality, because her survival, her income,
depends on her adaptation to changing cirto increase the value of their human capital, or more precisely,
to act on the way they govern themselves, by inciting them to adopt conducts deemed valorizing and to
follow One merely has to consider ‘welfare-to-work’ or ‘workfare’ programmes to understand how such
self-government unfolds in everyday life.21 Here ends Foucault’s account of the neoliberal subject.
Although he did not address the topic himself, we can use the framework he provides to ask what kind
of subject neoliberal rationality constructs after having become hegemonic. In what follows I will consider
the neoliberal subject’s moral agency, her political agency, and, somewhat more their theoretical underpinnings.
Moral agency
Neoliberal theory deals with private subjects who “do and permit what they will” according to their
own preferences and value orientations within the limits of legally permissible action. They are not
required to take any mutual interest for one another; they are thus not equipped with any moral sense
of social obligation. The legally requisite respect for private liberties that all competitors are equally
entitled to is something very different from the equal respect for the human worth of each individual.
J. Habermas, The Postnational Constellation
When neoliberal rationality becomes the hegemonic imaginary, a meaningful sense of that the neoliberal
subject, although purportedly non-gendered, is deeply gendered in fact. See the case.22 The argument
runs deeper, for the point is that neoliberal rationality undermines the very possibility of any non-instrumental
moral agency by reconstructing the subject exclusively along entrepreneurial lines. Let us see how this
goes. Firstly, and most importantly, the entrepreneurial logic neoliberalism commits its subjects to
turns them into unabashedly self-interested micro-enterprises. The place proper to enterprises, however,
is the marketplace. This means that subjects, whose activity is other human capitals), appreciation
or depreciation of their own capital, or the obten- But if all human activity is interpreted
as self-interested (as rational choice theory assumes)24 we thereby lose the ability to view anything
other than our own utility as an end in itself. This means nothing less than the inability to act
as Kantian moral agents, because for Kant only prescribes it, are moral in nature. Since neoliberalism
assumes that all action is spurred by individual interests, it becomes impossible, among other things,
to view other human beings (or indeed ourselves) as ends in themselves or to act according to our moral
duty as such. The neoliberal subject is, in effect, not an inhabitant of the Reich der Zwecken
Although this does not mean that the neoliberal subject is entirely divested of moral agency,
it does mean that the only moral agency she is capable of pertains to what developmental children. In
this sense, neoliberal morality is pre-eminently infantile.26 Neoliberalism inherited this utilitarian
understanding of morality from classical liberalism. Classical liberalism too denies that individuals
are anything other than desiring beplanning of supporting. ings, perpetually moving from one joy to
the next.27 The difference lies therein that while classical liberalism held that an individual’s desires
are given prior to any contact with
...For its bastard offspring self-interestedness is wholly tethered to market mechanisms. The self-interestedness
prescribed by neoliberalism is not the quasi-epicurean perpetual want-satisfaction Bentham and his liberal
fellow travellers celebrated; it is, rather, the injunction to be a productive, responsible, self-investing
speck of human capital.29 As Jacques Rancière explains, the neoliberal subject is “called on to be the
microcosm of the great noisy whole of the circulation and uninterrupted exchange of rights and capabilities,
of goods and the Good,” and is “required to see himself [sic own militant, as a small alliance-forming
energy, running from one tie to the next, from one contract to the next as well as from one thrill to
the next.” The neoliberal evisceration of moral agency should not surprise us;
it is inherent in the entrepreneurial logic neoliberalism submits its subjects to. In a critique of
corporate power, Joel Bakan writes that “[u]nlike the human beings who inhabit it, the corporation is
singularly self-interested and unable to feel genuine concern for others in any context.”
This leads him to conclude that if corporations were people, they would be diagnosed as psychopathic.
Surely he is right, and surely this is what neoliberal rationality wants every human being to model
their behaviour on. Neoliberal theory has never been very secretive about its simplistic understanding
of morality either. For while Adam Smith (whose Wealth of Nations, I imagine, is to be found
on every neoliberal’s night stand, while the fact that the same man authored The Theory of Moral
Sentiments is conveniently forgotten) once held that “[i]t is not from the benevolence of the butcher,
the brewer, or the baker that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest,”33
Bernard Mandeville, the political economist from whom Hayek derived his theory of spontaneous order,
actually celebrated the vices with splendid candour: Fraud, Luxury, and Pride must live, Hunger’s a
dreadful Plague, no doubt, Yet who digests or thrives without?34 The subtitle to Mandeville’s magnum
opus neatly sums up the neoliberal understanding of morality: Hayek, who is very much indebted to
the work of this “master-mind”35 - deville’s lessons to heart and indeed not only condemns all of the
cardinal virtues except for Prudence;36 it actively prescribes all of the cardinal vices, with
the exception of Sloth (more on Sloth below), as vices are imagined to be the fuel of History’s engine:
spontaneous (market) order. That this view of virtuosity is detrimental to any notion of ‘civic virtue’,
upon which many democratic theories rest, requires no elaboration. Moral agency and neoliberalism, in
sum, do not go together. The subject neoliberal rationality creates cannot be anything other than a
self-interested being, whose (literally) vicious behaviour is celebrated because, in neoliberal mythology,
the only way to progress as a species is for individuals to behave like wholly self-interested, atomistic
Benthamites.
Political agency
Voters and customers are essentially the same people. Mr. Smith buys and votes; he is the same
man in the supermarket and in the voting booth G. Tullock, The Vote Motive
Besides undermining the possibility to view themselves, others, and the world as ends in themselves,
neoliberal rationality thoroughly subverts subjects’ capacity for political agency. Although it is an
academic commonplace to refer to neoliberalism as a depoliti- Usually neoliberalism’s depoliticising
tendency is understood to lie in its penchant for rhetorically and institutionally reducing all problems
to market problems. Neoliberalism, in this sense, is indeed “the belief that the traditional questions
of the polis are best answered by the market.”37 This depoliticising logic is inherent in most
neoliberal theory, which as I argued above, tends to understand all human action as economic action:
everything is understood as either investment, consumption, competition, or income obtention (although
obtention of psychic income is literally equated with consumption). The creed underlying this ‘praxeological’
economics is that “[h]uman beings do not behave basically differently when they solve social and political
problems compared to when they turn to economic or legal tasks.”38 To be sure, this is certainly one
way in which neoliberalism depoliticises. If human beings are self-interested specks of human capital
all round, then it follows that in the ‘political marketplace’ they are just as entrepreneurial, self-interested,
and asocial as they are anywhere else. Many authors point to a second way in which neoliberalism depoliticises.
Because politics in a neoliberal era becomes solely about economic matters, which are far too complex
for mere mortals to even grasp let alone decide upon, citizens quickly avert their gaze to the more
interesting things in life. Neoliberalism, as Wendy Brown quite rightly points out, “reduces political
citizenship to an unprecedented degree of passivity and political complacency.”39 Although people are
still made to vote and perhaps even contribute to politics in other ways (protest, write articles for
newspapers), this politics revolves around banal or inconsequential policies and voting is increasingly
reminiscent of actual consumer choices. “In place of the citizen-participant,” as Sheldon Wolin explains,
“the new politics courts the viewer-consumer.”40 What this results in is “a cant politics of the inconsequential.”41
Meanwhile, actual political processes are submitted to comhegemony, as Rancière points out, “[t]he theme
of the common will is replaced by that of the lack of personal will, of capacity for autonomous action
that is anything more than just management of necessity.”42 The authors discussed here are certainly
right in signalling the way in which neoliberalism turns citizens into apathetic, one-dimensional men
(to borrow a phrase from Herbert Marcuse) and the state into a puppet controlled by today’s greatest
puppeteer: the Global Market. There is, however, another more fundamental way in which neoliberalism
depoliticises. Essentially, the point is that neoliberalism reconstructs both the subject and
democracy, turning them into an enterprise and a market respectively, thereby undermining the very
possibility of genuine political action. Here is how this goes. By casting subjectivity in economic
terms across all spheres of life, neoliberal rationality turns political activity into another strand
of the protean economic behaviour that investors), as is commonly pointed out, it also means that political
agency disappears. The consumer-investor cannot be a political subject, for the latter is a subject
who acts in an Arendtian sense, meaning appearing, speaking, expressing oneself in a public realm
human beings see themselves as citizens of a polis, who collectively act because such action
is a bonum in several subjects are naught but entrepreneurial and, as I already argued above,
are for this reason entirely self-interested, politics becomes, in Arendt’s terms, “no less a means
to an end than making is a means to produce an object,” which “happens whenever human togetherness is
lost, that is, when people are only for or against other people.” In these cases, “speech becomes indeed
‘mere talk,’ one more means toward the end.”44 However, while on the one hand the neoliberal subject
is incapable of viewing herself as anything other than a self-interested, entrepreneurial speck of human
capital, neoliberalism, on the other, denies and deconstructs the public realm that is a conditio
sine qua non for action of this sort. The counterfeit ‘public realm’ that neoliberalism constructs
in lieu of the one it deconstructed is nothing but a marketplace: an agora, not an ekklesia.45
This is to say, neoliberalism does not simply frame democratic institutions in market terminology;
its rationality in fact reconstructs them.
As recent examples of neoliberal jurisprudence in the US make clear, neoliberal rationality recasts
democracy as a "markeplace" . ..Speech, which is understood as a commercial good rather than as the
one capacity that distinguishes humans from animals (as Aristotle, Arendt, or Rancière would have rations,
monetary institutions, and the like. By recasting speech as a good bought with (which protects, inter
alia, free speech) to be interpreted as protecting not citizens from censure but the ‘democratic
marketplace’ from state interference.46
It likewise legitimizes far-reaching political inequality, because
one’s economic capital is translated directly into one’s ‘political capital’. The result: even as subjects
are disenfranchised, turned into apathetic, passive consumer-citizens, and made increasingly powerless
vis-à-vis the demands of global markets, the corporation is allowed into the realm of (what is left
of) politics.47 In effect, neoliberalism’s reconstruction of the subject is a blade that cuts both ways:
by recasting the subject as an enterprise, it simultaneously bestows upon actual business
enterprises a similar political subjectivity. Democracy becomes rule not by the people but by
capital (a redefinition that goes unnoticed by neoliberals themselves, because they understand
people as capital).
The ADL, always attuned to any indication that their subjects are getting restless, is
insisting that Tucker Carlson be fired. What brought on their ire was Tucker's use of the word
'replacement' in the context of a discussion of Joe Biden's Open Border policy. Mentioning
replacement in the context of immigration is pretty much in the same category as doubting that
all races have the same potentialities or the official holocaust narrative. Be prepared for
hatred. Tucker, as quoted in The Hill :
"I know that the left and all the little gatekeepers on Twitter become literally
hysterical if you use the term 'replacement,' if you suggest that the Democratic Party is
trying to replace the current electorate," Carlson said. "But they become hysterical because
that's what's happening actually. Let's just say it. That's true.
Of course it's true, and what's being replaced is the traditional White population of the
country. But Tucker couldn't say that without even more outrage. So he made it all about the
current electorate, which is certainly not just White people.
"I mean, everyone's making a racial issue out of it. Oh, the, you know, white replacement?
No, no, this is a voting rights question," Carlson added later, saying changes to the
population "dilute the political power" of current registered voters.
This is disingenuous but I suppose it's what you have to say to keep your job in the
mainstream media -- and even that might not be enough. Carlson's statement is consistent with
his repeated assertions of color-blindness, and he's careful to restrict his comments to
illegal immigration. His argument is completely color-blind: "every time they import a new
voter, I become disenfranchised as a current voter" -- an argument that would apply to any
American citizen no matter what their race. "How dare you think I care particularly about White
voters!" But isn't it obvious that such an argument would also apply to legal immigration?
Of course the ADL immediately labeled his comments as "white supremacy":
Not clear how replacement theory is "anti-Semitic," but I suppose that Greenblatt considers
anything he dislikes as anti-Semitism. After quoting Greenblatt's tweet, The Hill noted that "the ADL head explained that the "Great Replacement" theory
"is a white supremacist tenet that the white race is in danger by a rising tide of non-whites,"
linking to a Daily Beast article saying the whole idea was a "racist lie." But how much of a
"racist lie" is it when the White population is steadily dwindling, probably to around 60
percent, and the left wants to dramatically increase the rate at which it is dwindling?
Greenblatt also
emailed Fox News, writing "Carlson's full-on embrace of the white supremacist replacement
theory on yesterday's show and his repeated allusions to racist themes in past segments are a
bridge too far. Given his long record of race-baiting, we believe it is time for Carlson to
go." This assertion that Carlson is making a "full-on embrace of white supremacist replacement
theory" is a bald-faced lie, but obvious lies seem to be more and more common in high places
these days -- witness
Biden's lie about the new Georgia voting laws as "Jim Crow on steroids." A full-on embrace
of "white supremacist replacement theory" would at least reference a specific concern for White
people losing political clout. Instead, Carlson religiously repeats his mainstream
conservative, color-blind mantras firmly rooted in individualist ideology ("every time they
import a new voter "). Officially, he could care less about White people as White people. One
wonders if Fox would stand by their most popular talking head if he did come out and just say
it. I am pretty sure he believes it.
Officially, Carlson's heart is bleeding for all those Black, Brown, and Asian citizen-voters
whose political clout is being diluted. But of course, that would be wildly inaccurate,
particularly in the age of identity politics where non-Whites are strongly encouraged to
identify with their racial group and do all they can to advance its interests. The collective
power of non-Whites is being increased by immigration and everyone knows it, and White
political power is decreasing in an age when hatred of Whites is becoming increasingly obvious
-- at a time when Critical Race Theory is dominating the educational establishment and
corporate board rooms. CRT is a theory that essentially says it's fine for non-Whites to hate
Whites while at the same time encouraging White guilt about the supposed sins of their
ancestors. One can only imagine the horrors that await a politically powerless White
minority.
And it's not just White political power that is waning. There is clearly a program to
replace Whites as part of the American elite.
Given the voting behavior of non-Whites, it doesn't make much sense to say that America's
non-White voters are being replaced when they are being "replaced" by more non-White voters,
although I suppose one could make the argument that the traditional American Black population
will have less political clout given that the preponderance of immigrants are from Latin
America and Asia. But in any case, they ain't
White , and the ADL and the Democrats are quite well aware that all non-White groups
strongly skew Democrat. In general, the Democrats are in favor of increased legal immigration,
amnesty for illegals, and non-enforcement at the border, all of which are on the table with
Biden in the White House and a Democrat Congress. Putting these ideas into law along with
allowing no-ID voting would give Democrats more or less immediate and permanent hegemony given
that Texas and Florida are the largest destinations of immigrants -- as noted in my comments on
the January 6 "insurrection,"
The Left Will Now Enact Permanent Hegemony. " Their strategy also includes packing
the Supreme Court , in case some of their laws are challenged; Biden is already laying the
groundwork by establishing a commission packed with a
super-majority of liberals .
Biden's immigration plan calls for an increase in "diversity" visas to 80,000 from 55,000
and has an emphasis on family unification -- a code word for chain migration and a bedrock of
Jewish attitudes on immigration since the 1920s and continuing up to the 1965 immigration law (
here, p. 283) and
beyond. What this means is that one lucky visa recipient from, say, Africa, could bring in his
immediate (likely large) family and when they became citizens, they could bring in their
brothers and sisters outside the quota limit, who could in turn bring in their spouses and
children, etc. All these new people would be able to immigrate outside the quota system for
legal immigrants. And all could become citizens.
Tucker Carlson Is a Mass Murdering Terrorist!
Comment on the left has explicitly compared Carlson's mild comments to the manifesto of the
Christchurch and El Paso murderers.
I found the above clip from The Daily Show on Max Boot's
Twitter feed . Boot, former neocon (i.e., a liberal-leftie masquerading as a conservative
active in promoting U.S. fealty to Israel and moving the GOP to the left on social issues). And
now, because of obsessive Trump hate, now is firmly and explicitly ensconced on the left at
The Washington Post. Boot
wrote that Carlson "the top-rated host on Fox "News" Channel, has been attracting attention
for a while with his vile rhetoric against immigrants. Yet now he's reached a new low."
As the left-leaning Media Matters for America
has chronicled , Carlson has a long history of ugly statements. He has called Iraqis "
semiliterate primitive monkeys " and said that Afghanistan is "never going to be a
civilized country because the people aren't civilized." He has complained that an influx of
poor immigrants "
makes our own country poor and dirtier and more divided ." He has repeatedly described
immigration as an "
invasion ," and called the urgent threat posed by white supremacists a "
hoax " and "a conspiracy theory used to divide the country and keep a hold on power."
And that new low is that Tucker said something a mass murderer had said, implying, I guess,
that if Hitler said the sky is blue, it would be extremely racist for anyone else to say
it.
The Guardian
noted in 2019 that there were already disturbing parallels between Carlson's rhetoric and
that of white supremacist killers in El Paso, Tex., and Christchurch, New Zealand. For
example, in one of his books, Carlson wrote: "When confronted or pressed for details,
[proponents of diversity] retreat into a familiar platitude, which they repeat like a zen
koan: diversity is our strength. But is diversity our strength? The less we have in common,
the stronger we are? Is that true of families? Is that true in neighborhoods or businesses?
Of course not."
And here is what the fiend who killed 51 people at two Christchurch mosques said in his
manifesto: "Why is diversity said to be our greatest strength? Does anyone even ask why? It
is spoken like a mantra and repeated ad infinitum . But no one ever seems to give a reason
why. What gives a nation strength? And how does diversity increase that strength?"
On Thursday night, Carlson moved even closer to white supremacist ideology by
explicitly endorsing the Great Replacement theory, which holds that shadowy elites are
orchestrating a plot to replace native-born White people with immigrants of color. The New
Zealand shooter's
manifesto was literally headlined "The Great Replacement," and the neo-Nazis who marched
in Charlottesville chanted "Jews will not replace us."
In a
previous article I noted that Tucker Carlson's comments on 'replacement' in the context of
immigration had unleashed a torrent of hatred from the ADL and the liberal media. When the ADL
goes after public figures, the usual response is groveling apology in a typically futile effort
to prevent getting ostracized or fired. After all, the ADL's Jonathan Greenblatt had tweeted
that Carlson's comments were "anti-Semitic, racist, and toxic." Accusations of racism -- and
especially anti-Semitism -- are pretty much a death sentence for anyone so accused.
So I was gratified that Carlson didn't back down. Indeed, he doubled down, with a 20-minute
opening monologue elaborating on exactly why the Democrat Party is completely wedded to
importing a new electorate and has been doing so for decades. He also mentioned that Whites
(and Blacks) are being replaced as voters, that the entire project is immoral, and he called
out the hypocrisy of the ADL. As he notes, it's not about compassion as usually advertised, but
about power. And everyone with any brains knows it.
To date, Carlson's monologue is the most powerful and most explicit statement in the
mainstream media that Whites -- as Whites -- have an interest in immigration. Indeed, a vital
interest. In making his argument, he discussed states like California and Virginia that have
become reliably Democrat because of immigration, and he mentions Vermont that is now blue
because of disenchanted New Yorkers who brought their politics with them when they moved there.
He says the same thing is happening to Montana and Idaho as yoga instructors, Google
vice-presidents, and assorted rich White folks leave California for greener pastures. It will
happen to your state. And the result will be permanent hegemony of the left because
the imported electorate are reliable clients of the Democrat Party. 'Client' is the right word
(from the Latin for 'dependent') because these people come to the U.S. for better pay and all
the free stuff -- medical care, welfare if they have children, and the promise of eventual
citizenship and the right to bring in their relatives. This description applies at least to the
Mexicans, Central Americans, and Africans who have flooded our shores (that IQ thing again).
They remain toward the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder and dependent on the government.
Hence reliably Democrat. California went from being the envy of the world to having poverty
levels on par with Mississippi. Without explicitly mentioning Whites, he notes that the middle
class is leaving in droves, resulting in the cost of a U-Haul being five times higher for
people leaving the state as for entering. He portrays the middle class as one of the victim
groups of the Great Replacement as America is transformed into a society with a hostile,
ultra-wealthy elite who are politically supported by a dependent mass of Democrat voters.
Tucker also doubled down on his voter-replacement logic, but this time he was explicit about
White people's vote being replaced, noting that Whites went from 90 percent of Californians to
30 percent since 1960, which means that how White people vote matters much less than it used
to. It's shocking to hear someone in the mainstream media claim that Whites and their vital
interests are victims of the immigration tsunami. One can easily imagine a situation where,
even if White Californians woke up (far too many are still drinking the Kool-Aid), they
couldn't win a statewide election. And that's the whole point. Permanent hegemony.
But because the interests of Whites are definitely not supposed to be paramount, he
emphasized that Blacks in California have also been losing political clout rapidly, with very
large declines in cities like Los Angeles and San Francisco. In my previous article, I noted
that the voter replacement argument doesn't apply so much to Blacks because the people
replacing them have pretty much the same politics. But I stand corrected. Identity politics has
changed everything. Black Californian politicos like Maxine Waters, Willy Brown, and Kamala
Harris may well become a thing of the past. Harris was replaced by Alex Padilla, a Latino,
after being elevated to the vice-presidency, a result that was not
warmly greeted by the Black political establishment.
California progressives had pushed [Gov. Gavin] Newsom to appoint Representative Barbara
Lee [who is Black] or another like-minded Democrat. Mr. Newsom was also under pressure to
appoint a Black woman to take the place of Ms. Harris, the only Black woman in the Senate.
Representative Karen Bass and Ms. Lee were at the top of that list. The Congressional
Hispanic Caucus strongly backed Mr. Padilla. The L.G.B.T.Q. community and Equality California
lobbied for Robert Garcia, the mayor of Long Beach. Black Women United, a co-founder of Black
Lives Matter, and a range of Black elected officials pushed for Ms. Bass or Ms.
Lee.
As Blacks become less of a demographic force, they will also become less of a political
force. There will be less official sympathy for Black issues like BLM, reparations, dealing
with criminals, and centering on Black grievance in the educational system.
Tucker also did some dog-whistling on Jewish involvement by mentioning Michelle Goldberg's
NYTimes op-ed, "
We can replace them, " which celebrates replacing the White electorate by doing a screen
shot of Goldberg's statement: "The potential is there; Georgia is less than 53 percent
non-Hispanic White." He didn't mention Goldberg's ethnicity, but anyone who knows anything
about the media knows she is a strongly identified Jew writing for a Jewish-owned publication
that is the crown jewel of the elite liberal-left media. As Tucker noted, Goldberg is "a
New York Times columnist, not some QAnon blogger."
The left pretends that demographic replacement is an obsession on the right, but in fact,
it's an obsession on the left. "It's the central idea of the modern Democratic Party." So true.
And so refreshing to hear it in the mainstream media.
As always, the left pretends that their plan to replace the White population is a moral
imperative. In 2019 then-Senator Harris condemned Trump's plan to deport illegals on the basis
that Trump was trying to "remake the demographics of the country"; she tweeted that such
actions are "deeply reprehensible and an affront to our values." Of course, the left would
never think of remaking the demographics of the country!
What's immoral -- and obviously so -- is the left's scheme to remake the electorate in
opposition to the legitimate interests of the traditional White majority. Tucker confronted the
issue head-on, turning the tables on the leftist moralizers by framing their actions as
"cheating." This is an important message for Whites to hear. What is happening to the White
population of America is profoundly immoral. It's an important message because we Whites are
uniquely prone to framing our actions in moral terms. As often discussed here, a major weakness
of uniquely individualist culture characteristic of the West is that individualists are highly
prone to forming moral communities rather than
kinship-based communities typical of the rest of the world. It's a very exploitable weakness,
and our hostile elites have taken full advantage by defining the legitimate interests of Whites
as immoral, as Greenblatt and Harris do. Moral communities are fine as long as they serve the
community's interests, and in the long history of the West, they have indeed been a strength.
But the problem now is that the people who define the moral communities of
the West since World War are the hostile elite who have shaped academic and media culture,
i.e., strongly identified Jews and Jewish-owned mainstream media like the New York
Times. So now a substantial proportion of Whites think it's a moral imperative to replace
the White population. No other culture anywhere at any time has ever felt a moral imperative to
replace its founding population.
However, the best part about Tucker's monologue was that he confronted the ADL directly by
highlighting their lack of principle. Confronting any powerful Jewish organization is virtually
unheard of in American media and political culture where groveling, apologies, and firing are
the norm. And he chose a particularly glaring weakness in Jewish rationalizations of the
adversarial culture they have championed in the U.S.: Jewish hypocrisy in claiming the moral
high ground in America by insisting that any opposition to immigration is racist and hence
immoral, while legitimizing Israel's ethnocentric immigration policy because it threatens the
legitimate interests of its Jewish population. In fact, these activist Jews are consummate
ethnic nationalists -- exactly what they condemn in White Americans. White Americans deserve
just what the ADL and the rest of the activist Jewish community want for Jews, a safe homeland
that remains theirs.
Granted, Carlson didn't mention that the ADL was leading the charge against him, but anyone
paying the least bit of attention to this episode knows damn well that the ADL is leading the
campaign against him. Carlson quoted from the ADL website:
With historically high birth rates among Palestinians, and a possible influx of
Palestinian refugees and their descendants now living around the world, Jews would quickly be
a minority in a bi-national state, thus ending any semblance of equal representation and
protections. In this situation, the Jewish population would be politically -- and potentially
physically -- vulnerable. It is unreasonable and unrealistic to expect the Jewish population
to expect the state of Israel to voluntarily subvert its own sovereign existence and national
identity and become a vulnerable minority in what was once its own territory.
This is another recurrent theme on TOO -- that the traditional White majority will
become a hated and oppressed minority ( 58 articles )
because of the immigration of non-Whites in a culture dominated by an elite with a long history
of hatred toward the White majority of the U.S. We already see a multitude of examples of
hatred toward Whites emanating from the elite media, liberal-left politicians, and just
ordinary non-Whites (like this one from James
Edwards on Twitter), and hate crimes against Whites are ignored or quickly buried. Why would
anyone think this will stop if and when Whites become a minority? It will increase. But the ADL
thinks that Jews, who have been and continue to
be the leading force enacting a multicultural United States, beginning with their
influence in passing the
1965 immigration law , should retain sovereignty in Israel because ceding sovereignty would
be dangerous for Jews. This is massively hypocritical, as Tucker implies, and he invited
Greenblatt on his show to explain why the same principles that he champions for Israel should
not exist in the United States. I rather doubt that will happen.
In fact, Greenblatt repeated his attacks on Carlson in a letter to
Fox News , demanding that he be fired while never mentioning that Carlson had broached the
hypocrisy of the ADL. Pretty clearly he wants to avoid the issue like the plague. Fox News CEO
Lachlan Murdoch responded with a typical mainstream media mantra: "Fox Corporation shares your
values and abhors anti-semitism, white supremacy and racism of any kind." But he rejected the
argument that Carlson had endorsed "anti-semitism, white supremacy and racism," retreating to
Carlson's original voting rights argument. Always a safe move to refuse to avoid issues that
vitally affect White America by presenting them in non-racial terms.
In his letter to Murdoch, Greenblatt claimed that Carlson "did not accidentally echo these
talking points; he knowingly escalated this well-worn racist rhetoric. At a time of intense
polarization, this kind of rhetoric galvanizes extremists and lights the fire of violence."
Intense polarization indeed. That's what happens when there is a powerful attempt to
dispossess the founding population of the country. Ultimately the polarization is a result of
Jewish activism which has been a necessary condition for the immigration and multiculturalism
that is tearing the country apart.
Greenblatt thinks that Tucker's message will galvanize "extremists." Let's hope that it does
indeed galvanize the White population. In any case, it's important for Carlson to not let this
issue drop. It was courageous of him to broach the issue, but it needs to be repeated, just as
the messages of the left on race and multiculturalism are continually repeated on TV, movies,
print media, and throughout the educational system.
Individualists are less naturally ethnocentric, and the left has created a culture that
encourages Whites to inhibit expressions of ethnocentrism while encouraging non-Whites to be
ethnocentric. Because the media is dominated by the left and because even the conservative
media is terrified of appearing to advocate White interests, explicit messages that would
encourage Whites to become angry and fearful about their future as a minority are rare [and
when they occur, they are subjected to vicious attacks, as has happened to Carlson]. Indeed,
the media rarely, if ever, mentions that Whites are well on their way to becoming a minority.
And this for good reason: Whites in the United States and in Canada who are given explicit
demographic projections of a time when Whites are no longer a majority tend to feel angry and
fearful. They are also more likely to identify as Whites and have sympathy for other Whites.
[1]
In other words, while I have emphasized the ability of the higher brain centers to inhibit
ethnocentrism, explicit messages indicating that one's racial group is threatened are able to
trigger ethnocentrism. This is especially important because many Whites live far from the
areas of their countries undergoing the demographic shifts. Their day-to-day life of living
in an essentially White environment hasn't changed while the population centers of New York,
California, Toronto, and Vancouver have changed beyond all recognition from what they were 50
years ago. An obvious inference to be made is that pro-White activists should appeal to
Whites' higher brain centers with explicit messages emphasizing these transformations.
White replacement is our most powerful message. Let's hope Tucker continues to repeat it. We
certainly will.
Note
[1] H. Robert Outten, Michael T. Schmitt, and Daniel A. Miller, "Feeling threatened about
the future: Whites' emotional reactions to anticipated ethnic demographic changes,"
Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 38 (2011): 14–25.
Go Tucker Go.There is a lot of room to advance on this front. It shouldn't take much more
to expose the complete hypocrisy of their argument,but what has being right got to do with
it? We're talking about trillions upon trillions of "wealth,"not, "debt" and the self
absorbed,egotistical materialists will do everything under the sun to continue ignoring
reality,i.e.humanity.Money is "the GOD"and nobody should get in the way of "the PROPHET$"
that assumed divine authority after the black book was written.Gold, diamonds,private
jets,yachts,islands and lots of "faithful followers" to do all the work. They will
assassinate anything that threatens "THIS"religion,good luck.
Tuck has the moral high ground ..not only are we being replaced ..but Greenblatt's buddies
GLOAT openly about our replacement ..that doesn't really seem like being a light unto the
nations.
For a long time, Tucker has been more than just a political talk show host. He's become a
Man on a Mission; even more so since Biden's enablers stole what was left of our "democracy,"
and fixed November's election. Will Fox fire him due to growing Corporate and Jewish
pressure, or will the Murdoch's continue to have the guts to back him?
No one can know for sure. But Tucker, to a large extent, has Fox News over a barrel. He's
even recently expanded his reach, with his newest show on the subscription based Fox Nation,
where he is able to do long form interviews without commercial interruption. The Murdoch's
must be keenly aware that, if they fire their number one ratings star, they've just flushed
their consistently most watched cable news network down the toilet.
There's another huge issue, never mentioned on TV except with derision, that I'd love to
see Tucker address one day soon: SECESSION! It's the only way forward.
I think ol' Tucker may have bit off more than he can chew on this one. He touched the 3rd
rail pretty strongly on live TV and Big Jew doesn't like that whatsoever. Given that Israel
is supported by both right leaning Neocons and the more liberal Jonathan Greenblatts of the
world his days may truly be numbered now.
Tucker does a good job of poking holes in idiotic liberalism. However, I think it is
interesting that almost no one mentions the elephant in the room, which is that whites went
from a fertility rate of 3.7 to 1.7 in the space of 60 years. Americans in general started
murdering their babies, and swallowed all the jewish lies and "isms" hook, line and sinker.
That is why you have lost your country. The brown tide is a symptom of the problem, not the
cause. The problem is a nation given over to greed, foolishness, and perversion.
Since she first appeared as a talk show host on MSNBC during Obama's first presidential
campaign, Rachel Maddow has been bragging about how Democrats were going to ascend to a
permanent majority in the Congress and permanently control the presidency by virtue of
unhindered "minority" migration into this country. The concept had been floated before by
numerous analysts and even termed the "Reconquista" which Hispanic spokespersons
enthusiastically embraced as the rightful recovery of their stolen patrimony from the
Gringos.
I distinctly recall Maddow gloating about this anticipated outcome night after night while
she demeaned the incipient shrinkage of a "rump Republican Party" to complete irrelevance
when this desired scenario came to pass. She spoke excitedly about recruiting not only the
tidal wave of Hispanic migrants into the Democratic fold to cohabit with the long loyal
blacks, but also assumed that every foreigner, including all Orientals, East Indians, Middle
Easterners and Black Africans should naturally ally with the liberal Dem philosophies:
literally every immigrant but White Europeans (the "Eurotrash") would be a part of the coming
new Democratic Golden Age.
Nobody on the left ever thought of calling her and her bigoted ideas to be "racist," and
she is never called out for being "racist" when she spouts her totally hysterical
over-the-top Russophobia (or is "Russophrenia" a more correct descriptor?). Why doesn't the
ADL pick a bone with her while they are attacking Tucker Carlson who has always been much
less excitable and far more logical that Maddow even when she is sober and not fixing mixed
drinks on air.
A newly formed "America First Caucus" in Congress, supported by a
few far-right Republicans in the House of Representatives, is looking to recruit new
members with an old set of arguments.
These white nationalist tropes found a receptive audience in the American people.
Its platform, now circulating in Washington, is little more than a retread of the white
nationalist screeds of the 1910s and 1920s.
"America is a nation with a border, and a culture, strengthened by a common respect for
uniquely Anglo-Saxon traditions," asserts the section on immigration. "History has shown that
societal trust and political unity are threatened when foreign citizens are imported en-masse
into a country."
A century ago, these same sorts of arguments about the "Anglo-Saxon" character of the United
States and the threat that "foreign" elements would bring to its politics and culture were
quite widespread.
... ... ...
The popular panic over immigration and the pseudo-scientific justifications for nativism and
racism came together in the push for the National Origins Act of 1924, a quota-based measure
that drastically reduced immigration from southeastern Europe and banned all Asians from
immigrating entirely.
Kevin M. Kruse is a professor of history at Princeton University. A specialist in modern
American political, social and urban/suburban history, he is the author and editor of several
books, including "White Flight" (2005), "One Nation Under God" (2015) and "Fault Lines: A
History of the United States since 1974" (2019). He grew up in Nashville, Tennessee, and earned
his bachelor's degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and his master's and
doctoral degrees from Cornell University.
Contrary to the previous immigrants - who were economic immigrants (not religious
immigrants, as the official history of the USA states) - the post-war immigrants to the USA
are all political immigrants. They're the remnants of South Vietnam, Kuomintang, South Korea,
Mensheviks, Refuseniks, Zionism, Batista's Cuba, Latin American comprador elites. I remember
that once Hugo Chávez or the then president of Ecuador claimed that in Florida alone
were more than 2,000 wanted people (most of them compradores and generals) enjoying political
refugee status.
The only exception to the rule are the Mexican immigrants and some Central American
immigrants (El Salvador, Guatemala in some cases), which had their economies dollarized or
devastated by the advent of NAFTA, and were by chance close to the USA's territory.
@Beckow
ow quality Indian workers far less interesting to the profiteers that then get the same low
quality code and have to pay white/east Asian male wages.
It's funny how the tech companies are all about diversity until it means higher costs.
It will also be funny when the token blacks people hiring programs by the tech companies
mean that peak-diversity signaling, token hire Jamal realizes he'll be working with nothing
but Indians that hate anyone would who is not brainwashed by Jewish propaganda and speak
nothing but Hindi to each other and whom you can't understand when they actually try to speak
English,
Excellent analysis, entirely plausible. Lacking any survey of broad opinion, I'm apt to
project my own view as Trump's Waterloo: that while the political damage of poorly managing
the pandemic was mostly washed out by the emerging view that the economic damage (including
the rioting) of the severe course favored by the left has been more harmful than the virus, a
decisive fraction of his core demographic nevertheless arrived at the view – despite
the ceaseless scolding insistence of this by much of mainstream media – that their
president is indeed glaringly ill-suited for public office.
Perhaps it is due to living near Philly, but there is always fraud. Democrats are good at
it, and Republican Inc. loves it. Can't have any honest, straight shooter interrupt the long
standing political graft. Of course the Donald isn't really an honest man. Had he kept that
5% of the 2016 white male vote, any cheating would have been impossible. But hey we have
still have Israel first with President Kamala. Whew on that. However I don't look forward to
being uncomfortable in my house due to the Paris Accords mandates.
In defense of Maga, there are so many professional agitators in their ranks besides Qanon.
Call them dumb, but they really desperate for something called hope. Maybe that is the reason
I tend to think Trump was the bait to reel them in for the sporting catch and kill.
@prime
noticer Trump's a business man, not a career politician like Biden or Hillary. The system
wants the latter. Soros funds BLM, antifa, ect. It's safe to say the system was against
Trump. Much of his own party of sellout politicians weren't with him. Trump got through the
cracks once, the deep state wasn't going to let that happen again. To get 8 years in office
you have to be a total puppet. The Bush's, Clinton, and Obama were all hand-picked puppets.
Trump wasn't in the club. Trump as President was an accident they had clean up, even if he
was more than willing to betray the White men that voted him in and submit to the beast.
It is obvious why (((they))) wanted Trumpstein out, Trumpstein, despite being a cuckold to
the Zionist was threatening to bring our brave young men and women home, protect our borders,
and his base was about 98% White at the lowest. And many of those were common everyday
working class Whites, you know, the people who really made America great, the people who
actually grow food, build buildings, work and produce automobiles in factories, drive trucks,
you know jobs that are REAL JOBS, JOBS THAT ACTUALLY PRODUCE SOMETHING.
(((They))) didn't really hate Trump, they hated the typical Trump voter. Actually it has
already been pointed out, Trump did very little for the average White other than give them
hope, he really didn't deliver that much. Trump became uber popular by just giving the people
crumbs, now can you imagine how popular a man or woman will be when they come out of nowhere
and give the people the hundred per cent truth. It will take a fearless man or woman, someone
with nothing left to lose, because that is the way it has always been. I NEVER expected Trump
to do much, after all, this guy is the typical NYC businessman, think of who this guy has had
dealings with in his lifetime, hell, look at his in-laws. For all his, "I am not a
politician" rantings, Trump spent his life around politicians and pictures are all over the
place with Trump & Bill Clinton golfing together, Trump and Ghislane, Trump &
Epstein, Trump with his friend Baby Nut&Yahoo, etc. Sounds like the typical politician to
me. Trump was NEVER a man of the people and it will take a real man of the people to set
things right in America.
@Ano4
emonized, censored, attacked, and even murdered. I am glad to have sat this one out, between
who knows how many men like me and those 5% we brought this supposed contest to a standstill
and caused a nation of cope.
Wignats gave him 2016 and we turned 2020 into a shitshow in answer to his betrayal. Trump
only has himself to blame for doing almost nothing to stop censorship, clean up the FBI/DOJ,
prosecute Antifa, end birthright citizenship, end H1B, so many other opportunities
squandered. Trump supporters should start working toward something productive for their
interests.
Harris/Biden like Trump/Pence are Israel Firsters, so really all this hoopla over a
transition is not really called for when you think about it. Matter of fact, the 1st and 2nd
Amendment will continue to be under attacked just like it was with Trumpstein, now more than
ever. Anti-White racism will continue until Whites start standing up for their rights the
same way as everyone else. Trumpstein was never the savior for America, face it. Maybe things
will become so bad IF Harris/Biden take over that this country and Whites will gain a spine
again. Until then, new boss, same as the old boss, more or less. Still as bad as the Orange
Man was, IF you are "White" and voted for Harris/Biden, you have to be legally retarded.
Thanks to all the WINOs and white traitor trash out there. Brilliant you bunch of
retards.
A nice splash of cold water on the sadly losing side in the 2020 election. What you say is
mostly true. There are some significant points you don't acknowledge, such as the idea that
massive numbers of mailed ballots will certainly result in unauthorized votes being counted.
It's hard to say how many that is, but I suspect, like you, that it can't have made a
difference of hundreds of thousands across all the states necessary for a Trump victory.
Blame the phony virus for most of these results and I insist that shutdown policies have
been a gross overreaction designed to make Trump powerless to campaign.
Finally, one simply has to admit that Trump was unprepared to be an effective President
and never learned how. Saying things that sound populist over and over isn't governing.
We have a nice wall that's 400 miles long down on the Mexican border and that's about it.
At some point in the fast approaching future, it will have a plaque on it saying, "I am
Ozymandias Trump. Look on all that I survey."
Well?
What kind of pathetic miserable 17 intelligence agencies, with support of democratic party
and Judenpresse would be , if they would not be able to fix the election such way that their
mischief cannot be found. And on top of it Covid with mail in voting was a surefire help.
.
But than you sleep in the bed you make.
Very misleading and dis-informative post. It ignores the Democrats' history of fraudulent
elections and manipulation of Americans. From the beginning and before the elections, the
Democrats said that they will do everything to remove Trump from the White House, by violence
if necessary.
In reality, the only times the Democrats won fair elections were by JFK and Obama recently.
The reasons were because of the efficient and highly successful advertising campaigns
(propaganda) to manipulate Americans. In fact, Obama won a prize for his efficient
advertising campaign to con Americans and "win" the elections. He was far more criminal than
his predecessors.
@vk #110
You do realize that H1B is literal indentured servitude, right?
And that its purpose is nothing more than cheap(er) labor for the tech companies?
I know many people on H1B, as well as several people who specialize in H1B "hiring".
The good news: many of these people are smart and capable.
The bad news: they're stuck at the companies they start at for 7 years or more - and are paid
significantly (20% to 50%) under "market". If they leave, their green card process starts
anew even assuming they find another H1B sponsor.
More bad news: there are also a significant number of "body shops" who do nothing but enter
the lottery for H1B visas, then auction off the "wins" to the tech companies. The H1B people
in these situations are far worse off because they work for the "body shop", not the tech
company.
Most importantly: H1B, even at its peak, brought in less than 200K people (188K by law).
In comparison: in 2017 - legal immigration was
Family and Immediate Relatives: 748,746
Employment: 137,855
Refugees and Asylees: 146,003
Diversity and Other: 94,563
Total Visas Issued: 1,127,167
Over 1.1 million people came in legally without the H1B.
White House counselor Stephen Miller and CNN's Jim Acosta clash at the Wednesday press
briefing focused on the administration's new immigration proposal:
An estimated $24 billion of Venezuelan public money has been looted, and the Trump administration has used at least $601 million
of it to construct a militarized wall on the US-Mexico border.
By Ben Norton
In his new book "The Room Where It Happened," former Trump administration national security advisor John Bolton boasted
that the British government "was delighted to cooperate on steps they could take" to assist in Washington's coup efforts, "for
example freezing Venezuelan gold deposits in the Bank of England, so the regime could not sell the gold to keep itself going."..
####
Remember that Juan Guan is recognized by 50 UN states as interim President of Venezuela. But it's not the number that counts,
but who those countries are. It is an effective loading of more votes per country though the unofficial Law of the Jungle system
that the democratic West employs.
A bit off topic, but, personally, I'd really appreciate it if the Current Affairs-Jacobin
crowd would drop the childish open-borders fantasy stuff.
Marx himself figured out what the immigration game was all about back in the mid-1800s,
why do those who purport to represent the working class seem so intent on unlearning what was
patently obvious back then and continues to be so, today?
Yes, I get we all like to meet different people, learn up close about different cultures,
cuisines, and all that, but let's be clear-eyed that there's a cost to those things. It comes
in the form of rising rents/property prices and gentrification, disinvestment in the labor
force (why train workers when you can just import replacements?), degradation in local
environment.
Also, can we stop strip-mining the human capital of other countries?
Let's focus more on creating a right to 'stay in place' instead of 'freedom of movement'
fantasy stuff which sounds more like a right to tourism or something weird like that.
"I have regretfully come to the conclusion that The Hill, owned by one of Trump's close
personal friends, puts on Rising mainly for the purpose of trying to trick leftists into
softening on Trump & see nationalist racists as preferable to moderate Democrats"
Wow that is flat out ridiculous how stupid does he think people are?
Have you talked to people in public lately? They can't understand how you can be against
both republicans and democrats. Then spend the next hour trying to convince you to vote
democrat. Orrrrr they storm off in a fit.
Neoliberalism's support of very open boarders for both finance and labor arbitrage is
assumed to be always good because the American and English nomenklatura and their
apparatchiks implicitly. very often without any real thought, believe in the ideology of
neoliberalism. So, while there is often manipulation by whatever hidden authority is doing
it, most of the time there is no need. The writers have brainwashed themselves into
ignorance. 2+2=5
One of the groups that suffers most from open borders is African Americans. If Blacks in
Los Angeles, for example, lacked a college degree, they could nevertheless earn decent wages
in various sectors including construction and janitorial work, as two examples. Illegal
immigration ended that.
Borders are a problem only when capitalism prevails. Note the problems/objections you
cited having to do with wages, property prices, and other "market" features that would not
apply under socialism. When people rule themselves cooperatively and share the wealth that
presently is stolen from them and used against them, the problem of borders will cease to be
a problem.
The problem I have is that, even assuming you're correct, the utopian socialist crew
somehow thinks that open borders is compatible, in the actual capitalist world we live in,
with forwarding the interests of the working class. It's just not.
Certainly 'open borders' are not compatible with anyone's interests because they're a
contradiction in terms. The capitalists see the border (the real border, not the mythical
'open border') as a kind of valve which can be opened or shut as their interests require. It
also provides for ways of further disadvantaging certain portions of the working class and
thus reducing their wages and eliminating their rights. So the institution of the border
turns out to be a kind of variable form of coercion, as well as a myth to build racist and
classist politics on.
The media is more fascinating by the day if you try not to take it seriously. Really.
Trying to deconstruct who is the real audience, what is the underlying message (aka dog
whistle), how is the media doing plausible deniability, who is the real source (who is the
piece written to serve) and what is the motivation for the piece could take whole PhDs to
figure out sometimes.
And it's hard because I have biases, like everyone I guess, which can get in the way.
Every few days I get a lightbulb moment on something and that is fascinating.
But at the bottom of every media pronouncement is the money, so follow the money and the
power. Not so easy sometimes because the real hallmark of the powerful is the ability to pay
for invisibility. My CEO used to say that he had no real power. Now, he knew how to
operate.
Yes, this is now my approach. I still watch and read widely, but never (or hardly ever) in
the expectation that I'll either learn something or get told anything even vaguely related to
the unvarnished truth.
Much more interesting (but as you say, requiring adroit mental gymnastics and prone to all
sorts of misdirection) is trying to work out the answers to the inevitable questions:
-- Why am I being shown this at this time ?
-- What narratives are intended to be constructed by this "story"?
-- Who is trying to influence me and why, into doing (or refraining from doing) what?
-- Is it a false-flag or should it be taken at face value?
-- Is it supportive of existing norms or trying to change them (or, the old favourite
stand-by "controlled opposition")?
-- Is it organic (highly, highly unlikely) or is it the latest exciting instalment of the
ongoing oligarch v. oligarch grudge match?
-- What messaging / influencing technique is being employed (fear, guilt, appeal to ethics,
tribalism, family values et. al.)?
The last is usually the most intriguing. Is this the family-favourite Soros v. Putin title
fight? A Bill Gates v. Trump proxy war? The Clinton Democrats-in-name-only leftist faction v.
whoever Sanders constituency actually is? Globalist Internationalism capitalists v. disaster
capitalists?
I was going to write the following sentence at this point:
"Someone should publish " Top Trumps " (no irony intended) so we can
all work our way around who's who in all this
But then, can you believe it, reality trumped me because some
wisecracker beat me to it . Of course, the political power players Top Trumps pack really
needs additional categories to make it realistic. "Number of SuperPACs", "$Billions Grifted",
"Brown People in Far Away Places Blown to Pink Mist Total in Office", "Media Outlets Owned",
"MSM Actors on the Payroll" etc. etc. etc.
Thank you Clive for enunciating and listing so clearly the mental editing of reporting
that I too have been doing for decades.
My only addition: __'Who profits from this being accepted.'
There's a lot more recent papers on the issue than Marx. To put it shortly, it's almost
impossible to separate the effect of immigration on wages from the effects of "free trade"
and automatisation.
For example, in "The impact of massmigration on the Israeli labor market" in 2001 R.M.
Friedberg concluded that wages actually went up, when Russians migrated en masse to Israel,
though they did not migrate to seek employment.
Ottaviano and Peri in "Immigration and National Wages: Clarifying the theory and the
empirics" and Card in "Immigration and inequality" state that the models used to estimate the
wages are mostly too simple and very sensitive to how education levels are defined.
All economists seem to agree that in the least skilled or educated "class" the effect of
migration is lower wages or raising unemployment, if wages are the only way for
the economy to adjust.
I just don't think the issue is as clear cut as people make it to be.
Robinson is continuing a great British tradition where mediocrities from the Mother
country head for the colonies to wow the gullible colonists with their fancy ways. The guy is
such a lightweight, like fellow grifting Brits Niall Ferguson or Louise Mensch.
Robinson could refer not to Fox, but to Fox Butterfield . That has a quaint, somewhat
British-sounding aspirational upper class twit aspect that seems fitting. /s
Per wikipedia, Robinson moved with his family from the U.K. to the U.S. in 1995; he was
born in 1989. He's almost entirely the product of an American upbringing and education. He
hasn't dropped the accent because he doesn't want to. Frankly he's more of a Florida Man than
a Brit imo. (I say this as an admirer.)
I generally like Nathan Robinson -- most of the time he writes long detailed heavily
linked arguments that are worth reading and which I think most people here would agree with.
He is not liked by mainstream Democrats.
I was very disappointed with his Taibbi piece. But I tend to be disappointed by nearly
everyone at one point or another. When Robinson says he likes Taibbi, I think he is telling
the truth. He just thinks Taibbi is wrong in this case, while I think it is Robinson who is
wrong.
Why is everyone ignoring one of the most bizarre aspects of the Bernie Sanders campaign?
That his campaign staff and most prominent supporters were mostly members and supporters of a
small religious sect that comprises 1% of the US population, and they were not typical
members of this sect, but instead the most extremist ones.
Moreover this small religious sect that comprises 1% of the US population causes one half of
US terrorism deaths. Proof:
According to Wikipedia, between 2008 and 2016
right-wing terrorists caused 79 deaths
left-wing terrorists caused 7 deaths
jihadi terrorists caused 90 deaths
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorism_in_the_United_States#
Recent trends
Therefore Islamic terrorists actually killed MORE people than right-wing terrorists.
Furthermore, if we assume that right-wingers make up 10% of the US population, and Muslims
make up 1% of the US population, then per capita, Muslims accounted for TEN TIMES as many
terrorism deaths as right-wingers did. Furthermore Muslims accounted for ONE HUNDRED TIMES as
many terrorism deaths as non-Muslims did.
Bernie Sanders' campaign was run by Muslim extremists Faiz Shakir and Matt Duss.
But nobody seems to mind. Anyone who criticizes Islam is called a bigot. But Islam's holy
book says: "Muhammad is the apostle of Allah. Those who follow him are ruthless to
unbelievers, merciful to one another." (Qur'an 48:29) Is that bigotry or is that not
bigotry?
In 1946 the founder of the Muslim Brotherhood, Hassan al-Banna, praised Amin al-Husseini, the
leader of the Palestinian national movement, in the following words:
Germany and Hitler are no more, but Amin el-Husseini will fight on!
Source: Die Welt, Hamburg
https://www.welt.de/kultur/history/article107737611/Von-Deutschland-lernen-heisst-erinnern-lernen.html
Bernie Sanders represents left-wing ideas and programs that are ANATHEMA to this small sect
and ESPECIALLY to its extremist wing. Ideas like sexual freedom and religious freedom,
freedom to criticize religions, equality among religions and non-religions, and equality
between sexes, the idea that laws must be made by human beings elected by majorities through
democratic elections instead of by some divinity who is obviously merely a social construct
invented in order to exert tyrannical power over society. Those are all principles that
flatly contradict Islam and its legal code, sharia law, which CAIR has been doing its utmost
to protect from anti-sharia lagislation.
All of Bernie Sanders' most prominent supporters opposed ALL of his leftist ideas, because
they want a theocratic state where binary sexuality is the norm and criticism of their sect
is verboten.
They hopped onto the Sanders bandwagon and took control of it out of sheer opportunism,
because they see Sanders as the path firstly to liquidating Israel and thus achieving one of
the primary goals of the worldwide Islamist movement, namely to turn the Middle East into a
homogeneous Muslim region, and secondly in order to seize key political positions in the
political system of the US, DESPITE BEING SUCH A TINY MINORITY.
Matt Duss, Bernie Sanders' foreign policy adviser, is tightly linked through his family to
World Vision, a Christian charity that for decades has funded the FDLP, a Palestinian
terrorist group that is nominally secular, but in reality is Islamist. This is proved by the
fact that when some of its members killed 4 rabbis in Jerusalem a few years ago, they yelled
Allahu akbar. It was recently discovered that World Vision has financed Hamas with US
government money. Moreover Matt Duss together with Faiz Shakir, Sanders' Islamist campaign
manager, have campaigned in favor of sharia law, a legal system that claims divine authority
and is a product of 7th century Arabian society.
By contrast, 20% of Americans are secularists who -- at least in theory -- strongly oppose
the reactionary and obscurantist program of Bernie Sanders' principal supporters. But no
prominent secularist appeared among Sanders' most important backers. Now why is it that
Sanders relied principally on people who wholeheartedly oppose his program and ignored the
vastly greater number of Americans who support freedom and equality?
Proto -fascism? I rather think it might be here already, but in an American
guise.
(Sorry, I just couldn't decide where the sentences and paragraphs should be. Semicolons
were the solution.)
As the United States is its own unique blend; utopian, socialistic, religious, fascistic,
authoritarian or totalitarian, dysfunctional, increasingly hourglass shaped (oligarchy with
skilled workers, tiny middle class, and massive poor class) like any very corrupt Third-World
country; an increasingly oppressive police state trying to control a very diverse, well
educated, skilled "rightsized" people, often armed and getting more so, with a large number
retire military; everyone is angry or afraid and most know that it was laziness or stupidity
or the race/social group/Russians/Chinese/Space Elves that turned the prosperity, power, and
general competence of fifty into the economic hellscape, weakness, and near complete
incompetence of today; it is increasingly obvious that it was the wealthy with the help of
their courtiers and servants of the apparatchiks, and the intelligentsia/punditocracy.
Fear and self righteousness facing anger and desperation. What a situation to have.
Bookmarked for later. Nathan Robinson manages to insidiously smuggle Cold War propaganda
into articles that ostensibly argue against Russiagate. He appears to be the most dangerous
kind of propagandist.
Read that Taibbi piece and boy does he have links -- to back his sound and clear
narrative.
It seems like he always has a lot of research, way more than he makes his case with
Drawing fire, as a tactic for the well prepared, can be useful.
If NC wants to add a Media Whores Online section to Links or Water Cooler we won't object.
Of course this would probably inspire PropOrNot part deux. Those MSM journalists can dish it
out but not take it.
As I seem to recall MWO somewhat got the stuffing knocked out of it after 9/11. But when
it was really rolling it seemed to embodied what the internet was for and why many of us took
it up. Monica-gate followed by Bush v Gore offered a TINA media landscape begging to be
debunked.
MWO published what might have been my first blog comment, really just an email, and it was
on the Kaus affair, piling on with sarc mode set to high, another example of the 'hate' we
were apparently guilty of. It was the daily visit then that NC is now. It was important. The
creator remains a mystery, though Bartcop seems to deserve favouritism.
Looking at some of the MWO Wayback pages from 2002 took me back (though the whole of July
when the Kaus thing blew is missing). Lots of familiar names – digby, Alterman,
Marshall, Conason, Lyons, Pierce et al, all of whom I just stopped reading at some point,
probably about the same time I ceased to have any respect for the Clintons.
Color me skeptical when it comes to the wonders of Mr. Taibbi's observations. I find his
narratives full of sound and fury as often as they are sound and clear. But, like Craig
Murray or Glenn Greenwald, he can be a good read on the right topic. Sy Hersh and Thomas
Frank, however, I have a lot of time for.
By contrast I've always found that Taibbi always signifies something, but tries to do so
in a way that might enable him to avoid being cancelled or deplatformed. Sy Hersh has no such
concern. And last time I checked Thomas Frank was trying to signify to me that "maybe there
is a case for Joe Biden". With more than 40 years' experience of the man, I utterly
disagree.
"maybe there is a case for Joe Biden" is the headline and most of the article. It's
deception. Read to the last paragraph if you want to see what Frank actually thinks of Biden.
Quite a sucker punch! Though that does not fully capture the sticking and twisting of Frank's
shiv.
Yes I think Taibbi knows a lot more than he puts forward in his articles. How could he
not? Same with Frank, probably. Even Hersh censors himself, as evidenced by that recorded
phone conversation about Seth Rich.
The wonder of Mr. Taibbi's observations is that he's brave enough to keep making them.
Real journalism is rare these days because our corporate organizations have removed
journalists from the protected species list. Mr. Taibbi is just documenting the fallout from
the officially sanctioned behavior that leads to people canceling those who are discussing
actual injustice and real problems in our country. He's also trying, and failing, to show
Team Blue fans that their inability to accept reality hurts their electoral chances. For
example, the many attempts to scrub Hillary's problems from the media lead to a sense of
complacency in likely Democrat voters and made people voting for her opponent highly
motivated to turn out at the polls. Taking something like her "basket of deplorables" comment
and not discussing why it was just as problematic as Mitt Romney's "48% of people who are
voting for Obama don't pay income tax" comments was journalistic and political malpractice.
It remains to be seen whether the many attempts to shield Biden using similar tactics will
help or hurt him. Personally I think the Democrats will lose because they have rubber stamped
the reduction of voting access so much in so many states that the people who would like to
vote for them won't be able to vote. Which is a legitimately awful problem.
There are so many issues that Mr. Taibbi has discussed which bear repeating because unless
you're getting your news from sites like NC you just don't see it. A recent Useful Idiots
podcast episode that Matt Taibbi and Katie Halper did with Shahid Buttar noted that an
interview that Mr. Buttar gave which mentioned corporate democrats supporting the re-approval
of the Patriot Act under Trump was removed from YouTube and no reasons were given as to why
that occurred. Stuff like that makes me think we're living on a spectrum between Brave New
World and 1984, with class largely determining where you fall, and we have Cancel Culture
people in media running around playing the role of Fireman from Fahrenheit 451 to keep the
wrong people from asking too many questions regardless of class. As Mr. Buttar pointed out
during his UI podcast interview, the algorithms that FB and YouTube use to remove content
without due process catch all the videos of violent acts AND video evidence police abusing
citizens. That's by design. But you wouldnt even know about it without reporters like Matt
Taibbi.
Yes, thanks for taking the time to encapsulate what Taibbi represents for me.
I admire his relentless pursuit of the 'how' our world is being spun out of control.
That is a very interesting story. Call me paranoid, but IMO we are witnessing the collapse
of American society, where every institution is losing it's credibility for various reasons.
Personally, I think it is a combination of increased oppression from the threatened rulers,
resulting in increased conformity by its victims ((journalists and the public) This combined
with the privatization of information, ( ie everything becoming paywalled) is aimed at the
reduction of important information by making it unavailable. I fear all of this ends in a
veil of tears. This can only lead to fascism, where only the current accepted narrative is
permitted.
We face the criminal persecution and torture of Assange; the criminal persecution of Craig
Murray; the recent debacle at TruthDig; the demise of the Weatherunderground, the growing
numbers of pay walls and pop-ups pleading for money and email addresses all suggesting a most
unhappy outcome for the future. The consolidation and control of the major media is old
history. Reporters are becoming extinct. And there's the pollution of youtube, search
engines, and social media. Our society is devolving -- it is being dismantled, vivisected
before our eyes to no end but the end of social order.
I am not sure fascism is the result. We already live in what is technically a fascism
where State and Business share the same bed.
'The consolidation and control of the major media is old history. Reporters are becoming
extinct. And there's the pollution of youtube, search engines, and social media'
There should be a public option for the provision of information (surely up there with
food, water and shelter as an essential public good) that is not polluted. Of course it would
be derided (and feared) by the wingnuts, the Borg and finance capital as a vehicle for
progressive propaganda. Which it could well be given consistent polling indicating majority
support for many if not most progressive positions. That of course means that the Democrats
would hate it too.
Which segues into my next pipe dream: Abolish parties!
Ellsberg, like, Seymour Hersh and Thomas Frank, has been drummed out of town.
Interesting that those with a conscience are the ones "drummed out of town". Guess that
tells you everything you need to know about that "town".
As for Matt Taibbi, he is one of the VERY RARE journalists that I give the benefit of the
doubt is actually telling the truth (even though I still verify) as I usually assume most
"journalists" are lying (or trying to sell a particular story) and go from there. I also find
his podcast with Katie Halper entertaining and informative.
I read that article. I thought it was one of the best of his I've read. Hats off Matt
Taibbi. As far as I'm concerned once we lose the complexity that inhabits a serious regard
for the truth, we're done. I always appreciate being brought up short by my 'enemies.' It
means they might not be as hideous as I'd thought.
being consistently lied to by TV reporters, print media, and politicians not only breeds
cynicism, it births, welps, nurses, and rears. the limitation of news outlets until the
explosion of social media meant they could be parsed out in narrow sets of ideas and
language. Today big media is laid bare, McLuhan was so right, Today it is crucial to know
ones own biases, allow opinion and research in opposition into my field of view. As a trader,
I always searched for the refuting argument, chart, analysis that would tell me i was wrong,
saved me a lot of money. Inflaming passions today is crucial to getting buy-in, not just
voting, which is the tail trying to wag the dog. Taibbi has earned his stripes, fields
critics on twitter at least, faithfully and honestly.
I have been reading Taibbi since the eXiled. Robinson and Current Affairs I only found out
about more recently.
I view Taibbi as a real journalist with a proven track record. Current Affairs often has
some entertaining and thoughful content, but Robinson frankly seems to be more of a
lightweight, especially in comparison to Taibbi.
He specializes in "takedowns" of right wing grifters like Ben Shapiro and Jordan Peterson.
Not exactly difficult targets. His turning on Taibbi, and more recently Krystal Ball and
Rising, has been interesting to see. I don't know if he just grew tired of writing about only
right wing types, or if he's trying to raise his own profile by attacking better-known left
media figures (probably a bit of both). Either way, Robinson's shitck has gotten decidedly
old.
Robinson's not really an investigative reporter. More like a pundit for the over-educated
left. So it's not really fair to compare him to people like Greenwald and Taibbi. He's also
quite young, and every one his age has some big blind spots and youthful hubris that will
(hopefully) shrink in time.
And of course his shtick got tired. Anyone who's job consists of basically writing 2-3
op-eds a week is gonna run out of new material real fast. In a marginally more sane world
he'd have a nice job as the regular NYT lefty op-ed guy, and be pretty good at it I
think.
In any case, he's a sincere young man who does seem to listen and learn. I mostly side
with Taibbi in this kerfuffle, but maybe I wouldn't have 10 years ago. Given the large number
of truly horrible people in the public eye these days, the vitriol towards young Nate seems a
bit excessive. Frankly, if there's anyone who could get the PMC+DSA crowd to start
questioning identitarianism, it's probably him (as I believe they constitute the near
entirety of his readership), so lets work on helping him "recognize his own privilege" re:
the working class instead of bashing him or questioning his motives.
I forgot about the attack on Krystal Ball. I didn't like that either, but another person I
generally like, Adam Johnson, did the same.
I have just gotten used to the fact that there aren't going to be people I agree with on
every important issue 100 percent of the time. This isn't irony or sarcasm -- I really am
disappointed when otherwise smart and (IMO) clearly well intentioned people have opinions I
think are wrong. But it is possible I am wrong. ( This is all painfully earnest, as corny as
it sounds. )
I think you have the correct approach. People are far too hair triggered about certain
topics. A journalist has to churn out lots of copy, even the best will occasionally get it
wrong, or just happen to express beliefs that don't match up with what i or anyone else
believes. It is I think the sort of trap that IdPol people fall into – insisting on
increasing levels of purity from those on their side, and immediately casting them out if
they dare shift one inch from the narrative.
It should be possible to read and learn from good writers, even if you disagree with them.
And it's very important that progressives learn and develop by listening to those who have
respectful and intellectually coherent reasons not to buy into every precious shibboleth. I
think its very important to have voices like Taibbi and Stoller, people who aren't afraid to
make even fellow left progressives angry by taking strong positions.
As seen on TV, Frank Figliuzzi x Greenwald mistaking Figliuzzi's shingle advertising
body-man services, for a Wurlitzer. "Figliuzzi" is "small son" in Italian, a euphemism for
abandoned orphans, also known for working on behalf of the parents that raised them: The
State. Perhaps Figliuzzi's booking agency has insight into clandestine media control. It's
hard to decipher whether Taibbi's beef is that journalists' ethical lapses are not properly
coordinated or whether the lapses are not authentic enough. Which is the same criticism
leveled at the street demonstrators without acknowledging that higher levels of coordination
and authentic anger potentiate more physical harm. Spontaneity is the x-factor in both
pursuits. Last point. When the surveillance state is conceptualized as the ever-vigilant eyes
of BLM and the feverish archiving of Journos, rather than the underworld of the Police State,
the surveillance state-less becomes a mode for positive change. Vindication by security
camera. Can one be baffled by hope?
"What the heck is the correct pejorative for a member of the intelligence commumity? "
The intelligence communities must have there own terms for these people. "Agents of
influence"? Psychological warfare specialists? Propagandists? Minitrue Goodthinker?
I think the United States needs a mandatory high school class in "How to read propaganda".
Americans are probably the most propagandized people on the planet.
Some of the CIA are analysts, like Ray McGovern, albeit politicized ones. The CIA has
different departments. The best word for the CIA is probably "disgrace" or "national
shame".
Would love to hear Taibbi explain why the NY Times spent the summer of 2016 pretending to
care that Republicans pretended to care about Clinton's email protocols.
Speaking of the fake news NY Times, here is a good 2017 analysis of its decades-long
mendacity and war propagandizing. Here is a snippet:
"The CIA's brazen intervention in the electoral process in 2016 and 2017 broke new ground
in the agency's politicization. Former CIA head Michael Morell announced in an August 2016
op-ed in the Times: "I Ran the C.I.A. Now I'm Endorsing Hillary Clinton," and former CIA boss
Michael Hayden published an op-ed in the Washington Post just days before the election,
entitled "Former CIA Chief: Trump is Russia's Useful Fool." Morell had yet another op-ed in
the Times on January 6, now openly assailing the new president. These attacks were
unrelievedly insulting to Trump and laudatory to Clinton, even portraying Trump as a traitor;
they also made clear that Clinton's more pugnacious stance toward Syria and Russia was
preferable by far to Trump's leanings toward negotiation and cooperation with Russia."
Note where so many seemingly-disreputable people end up, and why. There is money , whether
to reward for past services, or to transfer in anticipation of legal defenses needed.
Money shows up in novel ways, like book deals and in plain old propagandizing ways, like
pundit spots.
And of course there really is such a thing as "Left Wing Hate" (for some definition of
"left," I admit).
Glad to see this qualifier added. I suspect the language that is necessary to have
meaningful discussions about political ideologies with people from different political tribes
is purposely corrupted by the conservative and liberal media establishments, probably at the
behest of the CIA.
Einstein's definition of madness "Doing the same thing again and again and expecting to
get a different result"
Do you remember the last time you let the robber barons and reckless bankers run riot in
the 1920s?
No.
Do you remember the last time you used neoclassical economics in the 1920s?
No.
Do you remember how bad it was in the 1970s?
Yes.
Do you remember how bad it was in the 1930s?
No.
During the 1920s there was a great consolidation of US businesses into often single
companies that dominated every sector.
This time this has happened in the media.
About six corporations control the US media, and they make sure you hear, what they want you
to hear.
We stepped onto an old path that still leads to the same place.
1920s/2000s – neoclassical economics, high inequality, high banker pay, low regulation,
low taxes for the wealthy, robber barons (CEOs), reckless bankers, globalisation phase
1929/2008 – Wall Street crash
1930s/2010s – Global recession, currency wars, trade wars, austerity, rising
nationalism and extremism
1940s – World war.
We forgot we had been down that path before.
I remembered where this path goes.
When the US needed an FDR, it got an Obama.
Now they've got Trump.
They've taken a more European approach this time.
Trying to maintain the status quo is not a good idea, they needed a New Deal.
Somewhat relevant. Don't threaten the narrative.
"Scott Alexander of Slate Star Codex (@slatestarcodex deletes his blog after a @nytimes
reporter threatens to doxx him, which could ruin his career as a psychiatrist and raises
serious safety concerns."
That said, anyone who believes the NYT was ever respectable, as in worthy of respect, not
as in "mainstay of the establishment", needs only harken back to Pulitzer's role in fanning
the Spanish-American War to understand how fundamentally depraved an institution it really
is.
His name was known to many readers of Slate Star Codex, and they were too polite to repeat
it. There is a decency and brilliance that would be sorely missed with any permanent
silencing of his unique voice and views.
Absolutely, its a brilliant blog, on so many levels. Its beyond belief that the NY would
insist on publishing his real name, when there is absolutely no reason or public interest in
doing so.
The NYT fancies itself an empire, dispensing and dispatching at will. Here is a Star Wars
quote from Obi-Wan applicable to those that the Grey Lady targets, or even purposefully
ignores:
I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices suddenly cried out in
terror and were suddenly silenced.
It is quite interesting, and positive, should I say, that nobody resorted to the argument
of "lefty" thinkers destroying themselves as the perennial malaise of the left. Regarding the
confrontation between Taibbi and Robinson it looks clear they do not represent 2 variations
of the same camp: They inhabit completely different camps though, as an outsider, I am not
able to establish clearly the limits between their audiences and their supporting
platforms.
It strikes me, as very well pointed, the similarities that Lambert brougth from Taibbi in
the ADDENDUM about the, IMO very likely, Trump reelection and the 2016 elections: he can
easily run away with his errors and the liberals look poised to make similar mistakes in 2020
as they did in 2016. They learnt nothing and forgot nothing.
On this I really would like a well informed discussion on some news pieces that have seen
linked here before indicating that Trump very much dislikes voting by mail "because of fraud"
though my opinion is that he just wants the election turnout to be the smaller the
better.
Regarding the vast U.S. media propaganda machine, Chomsky famously said long ago that
propaganda was MORE necessary in democratic societies. In a totalitarian regime, the
government can control the public with force and violence, imprisoning or executing
dissidents. But in a democratic society, citizens have the power to vote and change the
government. Therefore, it is more necessary in a democratic society to control how the public
thinks. Thus propaganda is the very essence of democracy. Propaganda ids thought control in
democratic societies.
There was a time when I went to the established media to learn things. Now, it feels more
like checking in on an evolving soap opera with a baffling plot and inconsistent characters.
There's a certain grim amusement in seeing the latest plot twist but that's about all. I get
my actual information from sites like NC and specialist sites and newsletters by experts. I'm
afraid that my gut reaction to clicking on a MSM story these days is: why is this bast**d
lying to me?
Likewise. The thing is, as a teenager back in the 1980's I'd read my Chomsky and a number
of radical media writers. My eyes had been opened when I was around 15, home on holidays and
bored watching afternoon TV when a particular incident occurred in NI. I remember watching
open mouthed as the narrative was completely twisted around 180 degrees by the time of the
evening news (I won't go into the details, but it started as 'brave mourners tackle
terrorists who drove a car into a crowd saving many lives' into 'barbaric Republicans lynch
two innocent soldiers who had lost their way' over the course of about 4 hours of reporting.
But I still, up to a few years ago, as a default tended to believe what I read in the
newspapers or watched on TV, unless I had a reasonably good reason not to do so. But no more.
I don't really know whether things have gotten much worse, or I've just become more
educated/cynical.
Fast forward to 2003, very much like the terrorist attacks in Atocha train station when
Aznar phoned all the media to say "it is certain it was ETA" and so the publications in Spain
went with this story. Thereafter, only the conservative media went on with a conspiracy
theory with the Spanish police in collusion with ETA to maintain their narrative even when it
was crystal clear it was a yihaddist attack.
So, regarding the media, it is the narrative what goes first and much more important than
facts. No matter if it is a conservative or a liberal outlet, they will stick to their
narrative. This has worsened with time.
I love this quote, so let me be a stickler. The actual question is: Why is this lying
bastard lying to me?. It was originally atributed to Louis Heron of the Times and
channeled by Paxman in an interview at the end of his Newsnight career. Otherwise, I am
depressed to say that I can do nothing other than agree with your view of the MSM in general,
although there are a few journalists who appear to be doing what they should be doing even if
they may not doing it as well as they probably could. As for the rest, some of them can't
even write.
Yes, I'm not sure whether Heron actually said that (accounts differ) but I remember
thinking when I first read it decades ago that it was silly: I spent a good part of my life
preparing politicians for interviews, and, at least then, you made sure they were briefed to
put the best spin on things, which is not the same as lying. But on subjects I was familiar
with, I used to reckon that most jobbing journalists (ie not the deep specialists) would get
things factually accurate about 50% of the time, and that the problems were more related to
ignorance and preconceptions than active attempts to mislead. I don't think that's the case
now. Journalists today, by contrast, actively tell lies, often for political reasons or to
conform to groupthink.
Taibbi is a national treasure. He is a funny, engaging writer who knows where the
boundaries are involving spin, humor and articulating a precise message. The fact that he has
been so clairvoyant about hundreds of issues (Political futility, Financial Crisis, Policing,
and changes in Media) is due to his unique willingness to talk to people in all walks of life
to understand the complexity of what he is writing about. And when he does not know
something, he owns it. Connectivity to people, and his marriage to journalism all breed more
and more trust (as well as puts a target on his back).
We live in a time of fracture (capital/labor, institutional decay, and the indelible scars
of markets taking over our lives at every level) means we need people to cut through the
noise, effectively -- reminding us of our fantastic thinking and proffering uncomfortable
truths. And nowhere has this been more apparent than the NL core of the democratic party on
the Left:
1. Russiagate Maddowers versus Mate-Blumenthal
2. Syria/Bolivia/Venezuela/Chile CIA media engineers vs The Grayzone and Greenwald
3. The Warren/Sanders rift. The Warren/Warren rift.
4. The night of 1000 Knives.
5. BLM and Democratic Party.
6. And left media puts out a hit against Taibbi – with very little serious discussion
of Hate Inc..
7. Leftist Fractures – N Robinson vs Krystal Ball, Lee Fang, Taibbi and an academic
accused of "bad research"
8. Attack on the show Rising – why would the left talk to the populist right
canard.
The left are playing a role in their own demise -- often at the behest of the NL center or
in concert to a more individualistic lens, separate of that to ordinary people. Kyle Kulinski
just did a 30 minutes on this too.
All in all, the group who needs to be shattered into a thousand pieces in the wind (the NL
core of both parties) just got stronger this election cycle -- and in my mind the fractures
on the left are just starting.
It did not have to be that way. Sickening to consider when you think about the opportunity
we had in January.
Over the years I have asked many people about press coverage of subjects they knew well. I
asked if, from their perspective, the press got all, most, some or none of the story right.
The long run average response is between some and none.
Then I ask, "Why, if your personal experience says the press rarely gets it right
concerning something you know a lot about, do you believe they get it right concerning things
you know little about?"
Taibbi is correct in that piece, undeniably so, but more than that it's the entire
Sanders-based social democratic movement that's coming apart. The media is mostly a
reflection of that. I had always hoped that the movement towards social democracy Sanders
fostered could survive beyond him as a viable candidate, but I must confess I no longer think
that likely. The whole movement is imploding in on itself, and people lashing out against
Taibbi is, to me at least, just more evidence of how much of his criticism hit the mark.
Even if the current left can survive the end of Sanders as a political figure on the
national stage, I see even less of a path for it once Trump is gone. Rabid anti-Trump
sentiment is the only adhesive that keeps the different parts of it together. They saw a boom
when Trump was elected, and I can only conclude there will be a big bust when he goes away.
If they put a lot of effort into publicly shilling for Biden, then it's even more likely,
because on some level they'll be bound to carry water for him while he's in office because
they advocated for him as a leader in the first place. No, it's not just the press that's
destroying itself it's also practically all of the liberal class and most of what flies under
the banner of the left too.
I have to disagree with your assessment about the movement towards social democracy. There
isn't a specific "leader" at present, but just the sheer number of people who protested in
the streets around the country (during a pandemic I might add) in regards to police
brutality, economic inequality, a better healthcare system such as Medicare For All, are all
fighting for social justice and democracy. This is coming from people who recognize what our
system is doing to them and others.
"Rabid anti-Trump sentiment is the only adhesive that keeps the different parts of it
together."
Once again, I have to disagree. The supposed "liberal" media, many "liberal" politicians,
and supporters who base their personal opinion on whatever is popular that particular day may
have "rabid anti-Trump sentiment".
But there are plenty of people who recognize we are going through a major "social
collapse".
Some people may not want to discuss these issues because they don't want to change the
current system (they would rather attack Matt Taibbi and others than discuss the legitimate
problems we have). These problems, including an economic collapse, are not going to disappear
the day Donald Trump is out of office nor will it improve with a "more of the same" Joe Biden
administration.
At this point, I tend to believe our country will either
a) become even more authoritarian where the citizens just accept they have no civil
rights and view police and military brutality as part of "everyday life" or
b) we continue on this trajectory of collapse with a very small percentage of people
doing quite well and the vast majority wondering or already in circumstances which lead
them to question how long it will be before they are homeless, without a job, how they will
feed their family and whether they can get any healthcare if they need it or
c) we finally wake up as a majority of citizens and demand a government (executive,
congressional, and judicial) responsive to the citizens which deals with social and economic
collapse. All of those with the current ideologies of the Democratic/Republican parties
need to go as they represent either their careers or moneyed interests. Then again, maybe the
level of corruption and greed is so far gone in this country that the only trajectory is
collapse.
Taibbi has been doing good work on this. This would seem to be another example. Krystal
and Saagar: CNN viewers REVOLT after journalist correctly says 'Biden is a flawed
candidate:
In Continental Europe the 'all together' theme is barely holding, and momentum is in the
opposite direction In fact migrant communities are growing afraid of backlash and eventual
anti-migrant campaigns, even eventual quasi-ethnic-cleansing
With social welfare systems strained to the breaking point given lockdown unemployment,
there is regret and anger building about public funds spent on migrant waves in recent
years
The lockdowns are often barely being enforced in migrant communities, for fear of riotous
explosion by youthful troublemakers if enforcement is attempted, as noted in the first
comment above by jbwilson24 re France French officials have explicitly said so, in effect
'just leave migrant areas alone'
Last weekend in Belgium, an age-19 youth of migrant heritage, confronted by police when
with others, tried to speed away on a scooter but in his haste hit a police vehicle head-on
and died, leading to two days of rioting and 100 or so arrests When a police vehicle was
attacked by a mob, at least one police firearm was removed by a rioter
As people watch these videos of migrant-origin youths rioting, whilst local people receive
heavy monetary fines for lockdown violations, emotions run high as lockdowns continue, or
with another wave in the autumn, it may get quite dramatic politically
This is sad for those of us with migrant-heritage friends, who think positively of a
certain degree of 'organic' (not forced or induced or manipulated) immigration
I am amazed that how many immigrants who migrated from a nation state, still love their
nation but hate when us nationalist. It's such a hypocrisy. The number one rule of any
migrant is to adapt the new country and culture and not the other way round. This whole PC
culture is going out of hands everywhere. I think every one should be forced to watch the
southpark to understand the irony of what we are becoming.
Democrats Ignore the Immigration Elephant in the Room
The most important issue of Trump's ascent has drawn silence from the Democratic Party, now
the party of the elites.
(Jim Larkin/Shutterstock )
January 17, 2020
|
12:01 am
Robert
W. Merry At Tuesday's Democratic debate sponsored by CNN and the Des Moines Register ,
nobody seemed to notice the elephant in the room -- or perhaps the candidates and moderators
just didn't want to acknowledge its presence. Whether it was out of blindness or stubbornness,
it tells us a great deal about the state of the Democratic Party in our time -- and also about
the state of American politics.
That elephant is immigration, and the issue it represents is the defining one of our time.
It is the most intractable, the most emotional, and the most irrepressible of all matters
facing Western societies. And yet it was almost totally ignored in the most crucial debate so
far in the Democratic quest for a presidential nominee. Two passing references was all the
issue got over two hours of polemical fireworks.
President Trump certainly came in for his share of opprobrium from the top six Democratic
candidates, yet nobody seemed to have the slightest awareness that the single most important
issue driving Trump's political rise four years ago was immigration. A Pew Research Center
survey revealed after the 2016 election that 66 percent of Trump supporters considered
immigration to be a "very big" problem, the highest percentage for any issue. For Hillary
Clinton supporters, the corresponding percentage was just 17. Also, fully 79 percent of Trump
voters favored building the border wall he advocated, compared to just 10 percent for Clinton
supporters.
During the 2016 campaign, the Washington Examiner called immigration "the mother of
all issues" -- touching on jobs, national security and terrorism, the public fisc, and the
cultural definition of America. That latter factor, said the paper, was a "nearly existential
question" involving the ultimate definition of a nation without borders.
Elsewhere in the West, we see the same political percolation. By most analyses, immigration
was the driving force behind Britain's 2016 vote for Brexit. The Atlantic ran a piece
in June of that year headlined: "The Immigration Battle at the Heart of Brexit." After the
vote, Slate rushed out to interview former British prime minister Tony Blair -- who, as the
website noted, "presided over the opening of Britain's borders." That had unleashed "a wave of
immigration unprecedented in [Britain's] history." Within a few years, noted Slate, "roughly
twice as many immigrants arrived in the United Kingdom as had arrived in the previous
half-century." The Brexit vote was in large measure a rebuke to that Blair project, pushed
avidly and relentlessly by the British ruling class.
Elsewhere in Europe -- Hungary, Poland, France, Germany, Italy, even Sweden, among other
nations -- mass immigration has emerged as the dominant issue, roiling the waters of national
politics and pushing to the fore various types of conservative populism. New parties have
emerged to join the issue, and old parties have gained new sway.
Many commentators and political analysts in recent years have posited the idea that a new
political fault line has emerged throughout the West, between the globalist elites and ordinary
citizens who are more nationalist in their political sensibilities and more culturally
protective. This is true. And while there are many issues that have come into play here, such
as trade, military adventurism, identity politics, and political correctness, immigration is
the key driver.
Generally, the open-border elites have been on the defensive since Donald Trump seized the
issue in 2015 and tied it to the emotional matters of terrorism and crime. Trump was probably
correct in the first Republican debate of the 2016 election cycle when he said that, were it
not for him, immigration probably wouldn't have been a major topic of discussion. It certainly
seemed as if the other candidates preferred to keep it out of the campaign debate so it could
be handled after the election in the more controlled environments of Congress and the courts.
By bringing it up, even in his crude and disturbing manner, Trump galvanized a large body of
voters who had concluded that the elites of both parties didn't really care about controlling
the borders.
Indeed, in their 2018 book, The Great Revolt , Salena Zito and Brad Todd posit that
Trump got an extra boost from working class Americans put off by the attacks on him from
prominent politicians of both parties who called his immigration concerns "unhinged,"
"reprehensible," "xenophobic," "racist," and "fascist." Zito and Todd write that many Trump
voters "saw one candidate, who shared their anxiety about immigration's potential connections
to domestic terrorism, being attacked by an entire political and media establishment that blew
off that concern as bigotry."
In this great political divide, the Democratic candidates at the debate represent the elite
preference for policies that embrace or nearly embrace open borders. An NPR study of candidate
positions indicated that, on the question of whether illegal crossings should be
decriminalized, four of those on the debate stage say yes, while the positions of the other two
remain "unclear." On whether immigration numbers should be increased, four say yes, while two
are unclear. On whether federal funding for border enforcement should be increased or
decreased, five have no clear position, while one says it should be decreased. A separate
Washington Post study on the candidates' views as to whether illegal immigrants should
be covered under a government-run health plan found that five say yes while one has no clear
position.
The Democratic Party has become the party of the country's elites -- globalist,
internationalist, anti-nationalist, free-trade, and open borders. Those views are so thoroughly
at variance with those of Trump voters that it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that we
have here a powerful issue of our time, perhaps the most powerful issue. Yet the journalistic
moderators at Tuesday's event didn't see fit to ask about it. And the candidates weren't
inclined to bring it up in any serious way.
Perhaps they thought that if they just ignored that elephant, eventually it would go away.
It won't.
Robert W. Merry, longtime Washington, D.C., journalist and publishing executive, is
the author most recently of President McKinley: Architect of the American Century (Simon &
Schuster).
A million Eastern Europeans (Poles) move to the UK, and this precipitates Brexit. A million
Ukrainians move to Poland, and it is hardly noticed there. There is a difference here which
the author did not notice, or care to notice, and I feel no obligation to explain;
Also, in 2016 some truly nasty things were said about the Mexican people, and they were
not said by the people on the left. Again, this post fails to mention any of that;
These two things suggest a myopia of American conservatism.
Mark, you really are a voice of reason. I enjoy engaging with you.
Agree with you entirely here. I think you'll notice that ethnocentrism I was talking
about in the previous conversation we had in Rod's post about BenOp for the humanities. The
ethnocentrism is in full display on that thread.
It's weird to call the democrats the party of the elites when about half, it not more of
the working class vote democratic. The Washington post just put out a poll on black
Americans and their hatred of Trump is almost universal. Most blacks are working clsss. The
vast majority of Hispanics are also working class and they sure aren't Trump voters
either.
Trump and the GOP: had a mandate for populist reform, passed a tax-cut-for-billionaires,
almost start a neocon war with Iran
Obama and the Dems: had a mandate and passed ACA, which BigMediPharma is totally fine
with, gave Wall Street a big bailout and no punishment for the derivatives crash
Both of the parties are owned by the elites with a few exceptions here and there, such
as Sanders and Gabbard. And of course those two are attacked quite a bit by the elites.
Both parties want to increase immigration, because they drive down wages and increase
profits. Both parties are funded by the same crew of the shareholding class.
Trump is an outlier in that he is willing to talk about the unmentionable, which got him
elected. Unfortunately, by calling Mexican immigrants rapists, drug dealers and murderers,
he associated the immigration issue with racism instead of wage issues. While that played
to an ugly subset of his supporters, it took the discussion of immigration off the board
for Democrats because they don't want the association.
Bernie Sanders has fought against open borders in the past because of the effect on
wages. But he can't discuss it now.
@Peripatetic
Commenter "He has built more wall than the last three presidents and is on track to have
one fully built by November next year. He has also reduced the amount of illegal immigration
into the US."
To date (August 2019), the administration has replaced about 60 miles of dilapidated
barriers with new fencing. And a major component of Trump's pledge -- that Mexico would pay for
the wall -- hasn't been part of the equation. U.S. taxpayers have paid the cost.
"So right now, 78 miles have been built, have been built where there was an existing form of
barrier," [Acting CBP Commissioner Mark] Morgan said, effectively admitting that none of the
wall that has been constructed has been in new areas.
For the record, I have no problem with rebuilding and/or replacing our border wall. But
Trump has failed to deliver on his campaign promise.
my grandfather's property in West Berlin was maybe 700 yards from the wall. With
binoculars, I could get a good view from my second floor bedroom. Of course the Berlin Wall
was a much more modest border than the inner German one.
Arguably, after upgrades were started in the late 60's, the inner German border became a
very effective barrier. One thing that made it effective (and mind you, it was a border
keeping people in more than a border keeping people out) was the exclusion zone extending 5km
from the border. Only people with special permits could live and work there.
In order to make the border more practical, entire villages were razed and parts of th
physical border were located back from the actual border to avoid difficult terrain. Throw in
the land mines, booby traps and 50,000 or so troops guarding about 870 miles of the inner
German border, and it came to an effective barrier.
So I don't want to say we can't "seal" the Mexican border. But I think the expense in land
seizures, manpower, and land mines is likely a lot higher for the 2000 miles of our southern
border than the 15-20 billion estimated for its construction.
Bismarck says that politics is the art of the possible. Given the huge demand, stamping out
drug running is impossible. For an adequate price, there will always be people willing to
meet the demand. At best, you drive up the price and make successful runners incredibly rich.
Dean Baker bruited this idea: http://cepr.net/blogs/beat-the-press/a-trade-war-everyone-can-win
"The alternative is simple: Mexico could announce that it would no longer enforce U.S.
patents and copyrights on its soil. This would be a yuuge deal, as Trump would say."
I agree sealing the border would be exorbitantly expensive. This would include not just a
big,beautiful wall and the manpower to watch over that wall, but a massive surveillance and
security presence along the Gulf, Atlantic and Pacific coasts. The expense would be similar
to the cost imposed on the home front during WWII. It will require widespread sacrifice,
probably a progressive tax structure similar to what we had during WWII. Maybe even
rationing. Would that make America great and please the great deplorable mass?
Colonel Lang's idea of killing all the drug cartel leadership wherever we find them for an
extended period of time would definitely be a cheaper proposition. I would call it the
Rodrigo Duterte plan. I think making sure a lot of bankers end up sitting in their big
leather chairs with bullet holes in their heads would do much to hasten the success of this
plan.
The point of the article is that a strategy of leadership decapitation of an organization,
whether it be a drug cartel or a jihadist group, does not lead to the destruction of the
organization. The original decapitation strategy was based on the premise that the targeted
organization was strictly hierarchical and could not function without an intact hierarchy. In
fact, most of these target organizations evolved into more distributed organizations. We
weren't quick to see this because we are also wedded to the need for a robust hierarchy in
our organization. This is where the article ends, but the story continued.
Our strategy also evolved in Iraq and Afghanistan. JSOC strike missions became more than
checking faces off a static organizational chart as a hit list. Each strike became an
information gathering mission. That information was quickly analyzed into "actionable
intelligence" resulting in ensuing JSOC strikes and more information gathering. This evolved
into a rapid cycle with often several strikes in a night. This strategy struct at the enemy's
growing resiliency and distributed organization. This is the present state of the art in JSOC
operations.
A few years ago, in response to the notion of a resolution naming English as the country's
official language, a prominent Democratic politician said it wasn't necessary -- it's already
obvious.
Is it set to remain so?
As
noted by ConservativeReview.com, a report
by the Center for Immigration Studies indicates there's a whole lotta people speaking somethin'
else, at least at home.
Conservative Review submits an interesting proposal:
Imagine if the American people were told in 1980 that the non-English-speaking population
in America would triple and rise to a level that is greater than the population of
France.
That statement comes in response to CIS's implication
of 67.3 million people speaking a foreign language at home in America.
As per
numbers from the 2018 American Community Survey, that's roughly 21.9% of U.S. residents.
It's not just the sheer number of foreign language speakers that is shocking; it's the
trend. The number has tripled since 1980 and doubled since 1990. The foreign-born population
has grown seven times as fast as the native-born population since 1980. But even since 2010,
when the foreign population had already ballooned, it has still grown twice as fast as the
native-born population over the past eight years.
If you're curious about the distribution of ESL (or English as No Language)
residents, in nine states, the digits top 25%:
California 45%
Texas 36%
New Mexico 34%
New Jersey 32%
New York 31%
Nevada 31%
Florida 30%
Arizona 28%
Hawaii 28%
How do things fare in the five largest cities? The buncha peeps eschewing the ways of
America's motherland at home breaks down like this obtener una carga de LA Sorry -- I
mean, get a load of LA:
Los Angeles 59%
Houston 50%
New York City 49%
Phoenix 38%
Chicago 36%
Among foreign-language use, in terms of popularity, Spanish dominates like the Dream Team at
the 1992 Olympics: Español's
grown 12% since 2010, and it hits the boards with approx. 62%.
In fact, there are more Spanish-speakers in the U.S. than in any Latin American country --
short of Mexico, Argentina, and Columbia.
Chinese snags 2nd place, with 3.5 million moving mouths.
The fastest growing languages: those from India and Islamic countries.
Arabic speakers have grown 46% in only eight years.
Since 2000, they've doubled.
If all this signals a mere skyrocketing of bilingualism, then good for America: It's
becoming more sophisticated.
On the other hand, if it points to a cave-in of
inglés , that's quite a different trajectory.
And with 2020 Democrats wanting to do away with that quaint notion of protected borders,
we're not sure to have millions more mastering the King's any time soon.
It seems to me that language is one thing we need to share -- it's the way we connect, in
order to be One Nation Under God.
Presently, we're on our way to One Nation Under
Dios/bog/Déu/xudo/Deus/Bondye/Ilaah/Tanrı/ღმერთი/परमेश्वर/하나님/พระเจ้า/الله.
And while all those words are, of course, beautiful to know and use, that's gonna be one
big-a** dollar bill.
"... Baudet also argues that establishment politicians push for immigration because they favor a globalized worldview under which national identities will disappear: "They genuinely believe we should move beyond religious and national identities to become global citizens." Baudet, however, thinks such policies would be disastrous, not only because they risk plunging Europe into "tremendous conflict," but also because they risk creating a "brain drain" from Africa and the Middle East. ..."
The leader of the Spanish Vox party, Santiago Abascal, argued that immigration is a
political euphemism for the trafficking of cheap labor into Europe so that multinational
companies and financial interests can increase their profits: "The establishment argues that
our system must be maintained in the face of an aging population, but mass immigration renders
work increasingly precarious." According to Abascal, the 2015 refugee crisis was used as a
pretext to further the economic ambitions of Brussels bureaucrats at the expense of Europe's
working population, especially its youth.
Baudet also argues that establishment politicians push for immigration because they favor a
globalized worldview under which national identities will disappear: "They genuinely believe we
should move beyond religious and national identities to become global citizens." Baudet,
however, thinks such policies would be disastrous, not only because they risk plunging Europe
into "tremendous conflict," but also because they risk creating a "brain drain" from Africa and
the Middle East.
The solution to this problem, many of these conservative leaders say, is to provide
motivation and assistance to Europe's young people so they have their own children. Abascal
uses Hungary as a model,
where , under Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, families that have three or more children
are given government grants to buy houses and no longer have to pay income tax. The state
finances free nurseries, allowing women to re-enter the workforce without having to worry about
childcare costs. In addition, Hungary has inscribed Christianity in its constitution to create
a strong religious identity, providing its youth with a sense of direction and meaning.
The problem of low birthrates ultimately lies internally, within Europe's culture and social
life. A young generation that doesn't aspire to have families and that's increasingly alienated
from any sense of community has driven much of the crisis. Whether Europe can be salvaged and
revived is yet to be seen.
Alessandra Bocchi is a freelance journalist focusing on foreign policy in North Africa,
Europe, and the U.S. She has been covering the protests in Hong Kong. Follow her on Twitter
@AlessaBocchi
.
"If minorities prefer Sharia Law, then we advise them to go to those places where that's the
state law.
Russia does not need minorities. Minorities need Russia, and we will not grant them special
privileges, or try to change our laws to fit their desires, no matter how loud they yell
"discrimination"
@J. O.
Step 1 in ending hunger in America:
Stop importing hungry foreigners who can't earn a living here.
Do that and somebody might take you seriously. As it is, you're morally despicable.
A new Homeland Security rule to screen out immigrants who are at risk of becoming
dependent on government benefits was put on hold by a federal judge until there's a final
decision whether the so-called green card wealth test is legal.
US District Judge George Daniels in Manhattan said Friday that the rule, which was set to
go into effect Oct. 15, can't be implemented nationwide.
The rule, announced in August, replaces a current policy that says immigrants shouldn't
receive more than half their income from cash benefits, such as Temporary Assistance for
Needy Families or Supplemental Security Income from Social Security.
Under the new more expansive definition, immigrants aren't supposed to use public benefits
like Medicaid, public housing assistance, or food stamps for more than 12 months over a
36-month period. Immigration officials will consider an immigrant's age, health, education,
and wealth to see if they are at risk of becoming a "public charge."
Immigrant rights' advocacy groups and several states have argued that the new rule
conflicts with existing immigration laws and would drive up the cost of providing health care
and other services to immigrants.
Daniels blocked the rule following a. August lawsuit filed by the states of New York,
Connecticut and Vermont and the city of New York, which alleged that the policy specifically
targets immigrants of color. He ruled that the Department of Homeland Security went beyond
its authority under federal immigration law.
"Defendants do not articulate why they are changing the public charge definition, why this
new definition is needed now, or why the definition set forth in the rule -- which has
absolutely no support in the histroy of U.S. Immigration law -- is reasonable," Daniels said,
calling the rule "repugnant to the American Dream of the opportunity for prosperity and
success through hard work and upward mobility." ...
Mexico. Mexican criminal groups based in Mexico smuggle bulk quantities of methamphetamine
via couriers traveling in private and commercial vehicles, usually equipped with hidden
compartments, or by foot through and between land POEs along the Southwest Border. These
criminal groups also smuggle small shipments (2 kg to 4 kg) via couriers aboard commercial
flights and via mail services. Methamphetamine shipments often are transported to stash sites
and staging areas, primarily in California and Arizona, before the drug is distributed
locally, regionally, or nationally.
Methamphetamine transported from production areas in Mexico to the Southwest Border
typically has been smuggled through and between POEs in California; however, recent data
indicate that more methamphetamine may now be smuggled through or between POEs in Arizona
than other Southwest Border states. According to EPIC seizure data, the combined amount of
methamphetamine seizures from 2001 through 2003 at or between POEs in California (1,725 kg)
was much higher than the amount seized at or between POEs in Texas (1,145 kg), Arizona (1,120
kg), or New Mexico (60 kg). However, in 2003 the amount seized in Arizona (640 kg) surpassed
seizures in the other Southwest Border states including California (593 kg), Texas (484 kg),
and New Mexico (16 kg) possibly because of specific law enforcement operations conducted in
Arizona (see Figure 11).
-------
Pick an index then call it something vague like crime.
Are these immigrants importing meth? Mostly, immigrants crossing back and forth across the
border.
The number of murders and armed robberies committed by people addicted to methamphetamine
is "truly frightening", Western Australia's Chief Justice says.
Justice Wayne Martin said 95 per cent of armed robberies and up to half of all murders
could be attributed to people taking methamphetamine, also known as ice or crystal meth.
---
The number I hear is about half of all crime.
So, sure, pick a particular index, generate the result you want, and if it meets the
delusional demands of Economist View then it is printed.
I didn't even need to read it, I already know what result he engineered, otherwise it
never would have appeared here.
Non-citizens accounted for 64 percent of all federal arrests in 2018, according to new data released
on Aug. 22 by the Justice Department. The surge was driven largely by immigration -crime arrests, which have soared
to the highest level in at least two decades.
Federal authorities conducted 108,667 arrests for immigration crimes in 2018, up more than
five times from the 20,942 arrests in 1998. Immigration arrests accounted for 95 percent of the
total increase in the number of federal arrests over the past 20 years, the data shows.
That data also
shows a flip in the percentage of arrests of noncitizens compared to arrests of U.S. citizens.
In 1998, arrests of citizens accounted for 63 percent of the total arrests. By 2018, arrests of
noncitizens had grown to 64 percent of the total.
In a press
release accompanying the data, the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) noted that while
noncitizens accounted for 7 percent of the U.S. population, they committed 24 percent of all
federal drug arrests, 25 percent of all federal property arrests, and 28 percent of all federal
fraud arrests.
... ... ...
In terms of prosecutions, more than 78 percent of noncitizens were prosecuted for illegal
reentry, alien smuggling, and misuse of visas. The most common prosecutions of noncitizens
outside of immigration-related offense dealt with drugs, at 13 percent of the total, and fraud,
at 4 percent.
Weall, they say it right out. 78% of those noncitizen arrests were for illegal
immigration, a "victimless" crime. Most prosecutions for robbery, murder, rape, assault, and
even drug trafficking are prosecuted under state laws. They'd only move it to federal court
specifically because non-citizens or cross-border activity was involved. So what this
really says is, "Hey, folks. Trump is actually enforcing immigration laws." That's it.
The only crimes that foreigners really commit more than citizens are immigration violations.
That and, historically, organized criminal gangs have used connections in other countries,
whether Mexico or Sicily, to escape American justice and facilitate smuggling of whatever's
profitable.
US: Noncitizens Commit Crime At 2.5X Their Population Share (2018)
"At least 21 percent of people convicted of non-immigration crimes in the United States
between 2011 and 2016 were non-citizens -- 2.5 times their share of the population, a new
study has shown."
High Numbers Of Indian Nationals Crossing Into US At Southern Border (2019)
"In the 2018 fiscal year, 8,997 people from India were apprehended at the Southwest
border -- more than triple the number from the year before, when 2,943 Indian migrants were
apprehended."
That NYT article is not for the proles.. it is for the ten percent. They want their
hairdressers, lawn maintenance, nannies, and home health aides to make $10 an hour. It is
better for them to have a lower class pool of people's to do this work. This is why the
author didn't question the "$10-12 an hour for a CNA" statement. He/she wants that cheap
labor for themselves.
Typo in the text for your link s/b 44.5 million. The report makes a further adjustment for
illegal immigrants to obtain a total of "likely 46.4 million" immigrants. Then, from your
link:
Between 2010 and 2017, 9.5 million new immigrants settled in the United States. New
arrivals are offset by roughly 320,000 immigrants who return home each year and natural
mortality of about 2ha90,000 annually among the existing immigrant population.2 As a
result, growth in the immigrant population was 4.6 million from 2010 to 2017.
So net average about 12.6K per week, though the detail shows numbers increasing over the
time span.
As far as "overloading the social systems, welfare and finances" it would be helpful to
see some detail. There are often studies showing factors like the overall contribution of
immigrant labor to the economy, and comparative immigrant uses of social services which
illustrate these issues, pro and con. For example, a
recently proposed change would make it more difficult for military veterans to obtain a
green cards for themselves and their families if they had accepted public benefits, though
some would argue that military service is a valuable contribution to the country.
A key consideration for me is that there are powerful politicians, and those who vote for
them, who favor even the most inhumane versions of gutting or ending immigration who also
favor gutting or eliminating social programs and workers rights for non-immigrants.
This is NOT about immigration. Get the terms right and you can see the problem clearly.
Allow others to define the vocabulary and you get the mess we are in where illegally
trafficked, quasi-slaves are lumped together with legal immigrants.
The difference is rights. A legal immigrant has the right to a minimum wage, safe working
conditions, a vote and all of the other protections afforded a native born citizen. And guess
what, both government and corporations work hard to make legal immigration difficult. It
costs thousands of dollars, takes years and if, at any time throughout that period you, or
– more likely your now teenaged kid – makes a mistake involving law enforcement,
then YOURROUT.
On the other hand we have human traffickers trawling around Guatemala, Nicaragua and
probably rural Mexico selling the American dream for your teenage son. And all you have to do
to get him trafficked to a life of luxury working fifteen hours a day in a battery chicken
shed for 4 bucks an hour .. is to give over the deeds of your Guatemalan shack. So if kiddo
doesn't work hard enough or, heaven forfend, says forget this and bails, then you're all
homeless.
Unfortunately, open borders proponents are partly to blame for the terminological
murkiness.
Pro illegal immigration advocates typically use slogans affirming the value of immigrants and
immigration. They correctly note that immigrants make the country great, etc. No argument
there. But they use these slogans and line of argumentation to advocate for illegal
immigration. They deliberately conflate the two processes of legal and illegal
immigration.
"The difference is rights. A legal immigrant has the right to a minimum wage, safe working
conditions, a vote and all of the other protections afforded a native born citizen "
They..the legal immigrants also often enjoy protections from their original country and
dual citizenship. They have an escape route
Leaving the US citizen ass out with ZERO protections.
Just, ugh, to seeing rightwing talking point anti-immigrant comment thread on NC. Sorry.
Thanks to anyone attempting to correct the stirring-up-of-reactionary-resentments with some
critical thinking. Right now, I can't even.
That's fair, but you pay taxes at full rate with no rights for a decade, then you pay
thousands in legal fees to keep your legal status correct and you can't leave the job your in
till you get the green card – which can take years.
The "right" to go back to your own country" is indeed true. But now you have American kids
and likely/eventually American grandkids who know nothing of your "old country" – which
is itself unrecognizable from when you lived there – and maybe that "right" is less
valuable than you think.
Anyway, my aim was to point out the difference between a legal, organized system of
immigration and a cynical nasty system of wage suppression using quasi- slavery. They are
different things and conflating them serves to hide what is going on
"Why a Banking Heiress Spent Her Fortune on Keeping Immigrants Out"
'Newly unearthed documents reveal how an environmental-minded socialite became an ardent
nativist whose money helped sow the seeds of the Trump anti-immigration agenda'
By Nicholas Kulish and Mike McIntire...Aug. 14, 2019
"She was an heiress without a cause -- an indifferent student, an unhappy young bride, a
miscast socialite. Her most enduring passion was for birds.
But Cordelia Scaife May eventually found her life's purpose: curbing what she perceived as
the lethal threat of overpopulation by trying to shut America's doors to immigrants.
She believed that the United States was "being invaded on all fronts" by foreigners, who
"breed like hamsters" and exhaust natural resources. She thought that the border with Mexico
should be sealed and that abortions on demand would contain the swelling masses in developing
countries.
An heiress to the Mellon banking and industrial fortune with a half-billion dollars at her
disposal, Mrs. May helped create what would become the modern anti-immigration movement. She
bankrolled the founding and operation of the nation's three largest restrictionist groups --
the Federation for American Immigration Reform, NumbersUSA and the Center for Immigration
Studies -- as well as dozens of smaller ones, including some that have promulgated white
nationalist views."...
On a Friday afternoon in late July, a crowd of techies, military types and a few civilians
deployed to the new Irvine, Calif., headquarters of Anduril Industries, a defense tech
start-up, to sip hibiscus margaritas and admire the sensor towers and carbon-fiber drones on
display. Dave Brubeck tinkled over the sound system, and the dress code skewed office casual
and pastel, offset by the bright red pop of a lone "Make America Great Again" hat by the taco
bar.
After an hour of socializing amid surveillance equipment, Palmer Luckey, the company's
26-year-old near-billionaire founder, mounted a stage for the ribbon-cutting. Luckey had
wanted to use the company's namesake sword -- a legendary weapon in "The Lord of the Rings"
wielded by the hero Aragorn -- for the ceremony. ...
Armed instead with large scissors, and wearing his trademark uniform of Hawaiian shirt,
cargo shorts and flip-flops, he dropped some Tolkien on the audience.
"Anduril," he said, leaning into the long Elvish vowels, "means Flame of the West. And I
think that's what we're trying to be. We're trying to be a company that represents not just
the best technology that Western democracy has to offer, but also the best ethics, the best
of democracy, the best of values that we all hold dear."
Along remote stretches of the U.S.-Mexico border, and on the perimeters of military bases
around the world, Luckey's vision was already becoming reality. Customs and Border Protection
is using Anduril's high-tech surveillance network as a "virtual wall" of interlinked,
solar-powered sentry towers that can alert agents of suspicious activity, and the company has
signed similar deals with U.S. and U.K. military branches. ...
Much depends on the flow via particular area. If the flow is low this is probably a viable
technological solution.
Cheaper then the physical wall as spacing between towers can be hundred yards or even
more.
Solar powered towers is an interesting feature suitable for this particular area, where
sun is abundant during the year.
Drones add flexibility of following intruders "from above" until they are captured, but
how efficient they are at night remains to be seen. Again this presupposes a very low flow in
the guarded area.
In any case the main task of walls and other entrance barriers is to slow down the flow
not to eliminate it completely.
So that those who manage to penetrate the barrier can be dealt with more quickly and
efficiently.
A Supreme Court decision to allow President Trump to redirect $2.5 billion in Pentagon funds
towards his long promised border wall will "really accelerate" progress on the project,
according to Acting DHS Secretary Kevin McAleenan in Sunday appearance on Fox News .
The 5-4 decision will allow for the construction of more than 100 miles of fencing - the
most significant step yet, according to
Bloomberg .
McAleenan said while the court's ruling was "a big victory" to build more of the wall, "
we do remain in the midst of a border security crisis " with migrants flooding the region and
that Congress must take more action to deter crossings.
"We made very clear the targeted changes in law that we need," McAleenan said. -
Bloomberg
... ... ...
The wall segments in Arizona, New Mexico and California would give Trump a tangible
achievement to tout in his re-election campaign. Until now, congressional and court
resistance had thwarted significant progress toward a stronger barrier on the almost
2,000-mile frontier.
During his campaign, Trump said Mexico would pay for the wall. On Saturday he said the
U.S. would be "fully reimbursed for this expenditure, over time, by other countries." He
didn't say how. -
Bloomberg
'Accelerate border wall progress'-- give me a fuckin' break. Trump has had almost three
years to secure the border but has done nothing but blame the Demotards and our ***-infested
jewdiciary for why he can not perform his sworn constitutional duty as POTUS to protect our
borders/citizens. Christ, he must think that he has to have their permission and go on bended
knee before them with his begging bowl in hand. Trump is a god-damned waste. He is what he
described politicians in his campaign-- All talk and no action.
I voted for the guy and supported him. I will not support him in the next go round. Time
to get a fuckin' crazed loon Demotard in office to motivate us to cross the line and start
the shootin'. I ain't gonna end up a slave to jews/niggers/beaners/muslims/hindus/illegal
alien mudmen just because I am a normal Christian Heritage American white guy. **** that
noise. I no longer slumber in The *** Matrix.
Trump should award contracts to 10 contractors and immediately disburse the funds so
libtards can't stop the building.
100 miles isn't near enough and we've seen areas where replacement walls are being put up
at over a mile a day by one contractor. He could get 10 contractors or more building a couple
hundred miles a month. Trump needs to build faster!
Donald Trump's false comments connecting Mexican immigrants and crime
By
Michelle
Ye Hee Lee
July 8, 2015
"When Mexico sends its people, they're not sending their best. They're not sending you. They're not sending you. They're
sending people that have lots of problems, and they're bringing those problems with us. They're bringing drugs. They're
bringing crime. They're rapists. And some, I assume, are good people."
–Real estate mogul Donald Trump, presidential announcement
speech
,
June 16, 2015
"I can never apologize for the truth. I don't mind apologizing for things. But I can't apologize for the truth. I said
tremendous crime is coming across. Everybody knows that's true. And it's happening all the time. So, why, when I mention,
all of a sudden I'm a racist. I'm not a racist. I don't have a racist bone in my body."
–Trump, interview on Fox News' "Media Buzz," July 5, 2015
"What can be simpler or more accurately stated? The Mexican Government is forcing their most unwanted people into the
United States. They are, in many cases, criminals, drug dealers, rapists, etc."
–Trump,
statement
about
his June 16 comments, July 6, 2015
Several readers asked us to fact-check Trump's initial comment, which has drawn outrage from Latino groups and led to
breakups with his corporate partners distancing themselves from the inflammatory remarks.
This posed a conundrum for The Fact Checker. We had
fact
checked most of his statements
from his news conference announcing his effort to win the GOP presidential nomination,
but many of those were in the realm of domestic and international policy. We tend not to wade into fact checking incendiary
comments that some might label opinion.
But Trump's statement -- which he repeatedly has defended -- underscores public perceptions that can drive immigration
policies. For example, the 2010 murder of a rancher by a suspected smuggler in an Arizona border city
fueled
public and political pressure
on then-Gov. Jan Brewer to sign the controversial anti-immigrant Senate Bill 1070 into
law.
What do the data tell us about the criminal threat of immigrants?
The Facts
Data on immigrants and crime are incomplete, but a range of studies show there is no evidence immigrants commit more crimes
than native-born Americans. In fact, first-generation immigrants are predisposed to lower crime rates than native-born
Americans. (The Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates for restrictive immigration laws, has
a
detailed report
showing the shortfalls of immigrant crime data.)
Immigration and crime levels have had inverse trajectories since the 1990s: immigration has increased, while crime has
decreased. Some experts say the influx of immigrants contributed to the decrease in crime rates, by increasing the
denominator while not adding significantly to the numerator.
In his July 6 statement, Trump clarified that he was referring to cases where undocumented immigrants commit violent crimes
or smuggle drugs. He pointed to the
recent
incident in San Francisco
, where an undocumented immigrant and a repeat felon who had been deported five times to
Mexico was arrested on suspicion of fatally shooting a woman.
Trump's campaign pointed to data from the
U.S.
Sentencing Commission
, which tracks citizenship of offenders in federal prisons by primary offense, which is the
offense with the longest maximum sentence when a person is convicted of multiple offenses. Of 78,022 primary offense cases
in fiscal year 2013, 38.6 percent were illegal immigrant offenders. The majority of their cases (76 percent) were
immigration related. Of total primary offenses, 17.6 percent of drug trafficking offenses and 3.8 percent of sex abuse were
illegal immigrants. Of 22,878 drug crime cases, 17.2 percent were illegal immigrants.
But these numbers are not indicative of general crime trends of non-citizens. Federal prisoners made up
10
percent
of the total incarcerated population in the United States in 2013. When asked how the data are indicative of
the Mexican government sending criminals to the United States, or that there is a crime wave coming across the border, a
Trump campaign adviser said: "The data speaks for itself."
The
Congressional
Research Service
found that the vast majority of unauthorized immigrants do not fit in the category that fits Trump's
description: aggravated felons, whose crimes include murder, drug trafficking or illegal trafficking of firearms.
(Congressional Research Service)
CRS also found that non-citizens make up a smaller percentage of the inmate population in state prisons and jails, compared
to their percentage to the total U.S. population.
An analysis of 2010 Census data in a
report
from
the American Immigration Council, a pro-immigration group, shows that 1.6 percent of immigrant males 18 to 39 years old
were incarcerated, compared to 3.3 percent of native-born males. That disparity in incarceration rates has been consistent
in the decennial Census since 1980, the report says.
The trend holds when comparing less educated Mexican, Salvadoran and Guatemalan men -- who make up the bulk of the
undocumented immigrant population -- to their native-born counterparts, as shown below:
(American Immigration Council)
Are countries like Mexico "not sending their best"?
Immigration offenses account for
the
largest portion
of federal convictions of immigrants (the majority of whom were from Mexico), followed by drug and
traffic violations. Sex offenses comprised 1.6 percent of total crimes in 2013.
Inmate legal status is not always tracked at local jails or state prisons. The Government Accountability Office's
2011
analysis
collected reports from 2003 to 2009 to the Department of Justice's State Criminal Alien Assistance Program,
through which states and localities get reimbursed for convicting and incarcerating inmates of illegal or unknown
immigration status (mainly from Mexico).
The GAO found that drug offenses made up the majority of convictions in fiscal year 2008 in the five states (Arizona,
California, Florida, New York and Texas) with the largest populations of such inmates. These convictions were both felony
and misdemeanor crimes, including use/under the influence, manufacturing, transporting and possession of paraphernalia.
Cartel- and gang-related arrests along the Texas southern border decreased after a border surge in 2014, the
Houston
Chronicle reported
. In 2013,
the
Center for Investigative Reporting
found that four out of five arrests for drug smuggling involved U.S. citizens.
The Department of Homeland Security in recent years has targeted immigration enforcement to those who committed serious
crimes through efforts like Secure Communities, rolled out per county from 2008 through 2012. But a
recent
study
showed that increased enforcement didn't lead to decreased crime, calling into question whether serious crimes
were prevalent.
Researchers found Secure Communities did not result in a meaningful reduction in the FBI's overall index crime rate or in
rates of violent crimes. There were modest reductions in burglary and motor vehicle theft, not serious crimes like
homicides or violent crime. (This program is now
on
its way out
.)
The theory is that immigrants generally have a stronger incentive than native-born Americans to stay out of legal trouble --
especially undocumented immigrants, who risk deportation. And those who legally are in the United States (or are pursuing
legal status) are required to pass a criminal background check.
"Immigrants in general -- unauthorized immigrants in particular -- are a self-selected group who generally come to the U.S.
to work. And once they're here, most of them want to keep their nose down and do their business, and they're sensitive to
the fact that they're vulnerable," said Marc Rosenblum, deputy director of the U.S. Immigration Policy Program at the
Migration Policy Institute, a non-partisan think tank.
Interestingly, crime rates increase as generations of immigrants assimilate into America. Second-generation immigrants, who
are born in the United States and have at least one foreign-born parent,
are
more likely to
commit crimes than first-generation immigrants, and have similar crime rates as native-born Americans.
The Pinocchio Test
It's difficult to connect any crime with illegal immigration, by its nature. Drug smuggling and violent crimes do exist,
but the cases are not indicative of larger trends in the immigrant population. What we do know about crime rates among
non-citizens and inmates with unknown or unauthorized immigrant statuses show Trump's assertions about a crime wave are not
accurate.
Trump's repeated statements about immigrants and crime underscore a common public perception that crime is correlated with
immigration, especially illegal immigration. But that is a misperception; no solid data support it, and the data that do
exist negate it. Trump can defend himself all he wants, but the facts just are not there.
"... On the other hand, more open immigration policies will mean more workers, which will of course take jobs away, especially from the poorest in our own societies. Similarly, more open trade will more jobs in poorer countries and fewer jobs here, again taking jobs, especially from the poorest in our societies. this is morally wrong: we should feel solidarity with our own poor. ..."
"... Further, more open immigration policies are what capitalism 'wants': more workers will necessarily drive wages down, and so produce greater profits for corporations and the rich, and therefore greater inequality in our society overall. ..."
There is a fundamental difficulty here which progressives have not fully faced. It is that
more open trade and welcoming immigration policies are, on the one hand, a progressive and
moral good (we should feel solidarity with people from the global south; it feels wrong to
bar them from our countries and stop them from benefiting from our economies).
On the other
hand, more open immigration policies will mean more workers, which will of course take jobs
away, especially from the poorest in our own societies. Similarly, more open trade will more
jobs in poorer countries and fewer jobs here, again taking jobs, especially from the poorest
in our societies. this is morally wrong: we should feel solidarity with our own poor.
Further, more open immigration policies are what capitalism 'wants': more workers will
necessarily drive wages down, and so produce greater profits for corporations and the rich,
and therefore greater inequality in our society overall. Comfortably well-off liberals can
appear and feel progressive by supporting more open immigration, while in fact this support
aligns with capitalist policies that benefit them and exploit those who are worse off.
We need a progressive movement that can resolve this and square the circle.
Honestly, no, beyond stressing the fact that more open and welcoming immigration policies
are not unalloyed morally good things: they lead to lower wages for the poor and middle
class, and lead to greater inequality, since lower wages translate into greater profits for
corporations and their owners.
Perhaps if a progressive argument towards tempering and
controlling immigration can be made, based on the fact that open immigration leads to greater
inequality and in the end benefits the 1% the most, then we can get some sort of
progress.
s="comment-renderer-text-content expanded"> I'm part Jewish, but consider myself
Russian above everything else, as Russia is my home country. I don't entirely agree with this
lady, but on some issues she's spot on. Twenty million Russian civilians were exterminated by
Germans and millions of Chinese died at the hands of the Japanese, but how come we only hear
about 6 million Jews all the time almost 70 years after the war? It's only evoked to
victimize Israel, not to benefit Holocaust survivors in any way.
You're so brainwashed. The Zionist jews of Israel are treating the Palestinians like the
jews were treated in Germany just before the holocaust. That's why you see the REAL jews
protesting against their Israeli government and the occupation of Palestine
Helen Thomas is old but that shouldn't mean the less intelligent interviewer should
talk down to her. Thomas is right Israeli people should go back to Poland or Germany, they
were pushed out of there unfairly sixty years ago. I think that she was misinterpreted
because she should've added that second part. Likewise now Israel are doing the same thing to
Palestine. I find it hard to sympathize with journalists and writers especially nowadays but
Helen Thomas was wrongly interpreted in my view.
She spoke the truth & they didn't like it. What they would like to hear is continuous
lies, then u get a pat on the back. Start talkin the truth & bam they're all over you.
She exercised her freedom of speech & they shut her down.
ent-renderer-text-content expanded"> It's amazing how unable to process logic that
stupid host woman is. Everything Helen Thomas said is obvious truth, but she acts as if she
is hearing another language. "Oh but the Jews are sensitive because of WW2!" is literally her
only response, as if that is justification for anything that's happened in the past 50 years.
Why does this view persist in America? Are they all so afraid of offending Jewish people?
They sure don't care about offending anybody else.
ent-renderer-text-content expanded"> She is talking about the Zionist Jews. The is
those Jews who own these networks trying to discredit a wonderful old woman for stating the
truth. Israel is Zionism and its disgusting that the world turns their eye to the atrocities
happening to the Palestinians.
My heart goes out to them. I pray that one day the world will open their eyes. I pray that
I am alive to see it come to pass. Zionism is going to lead to WWIII and it so many are blind
to that fact
comment-renderer-text-content expanded"> lol america is the exact place indians got
almost wiped out and black got enslaved. should you give them a land some where? hell no !!
please wtf and know what? they come back to germany with israeli pasports and gert german one
too and every year they flood the streets with israeli flags no one attacks them! they could
have stayed lol but now we might wonder what the fuck they really want!
She may be old but she is not there for the taking. Although i disagree with the way helen
spoke because israel exists and that is that, i think she is fighting against current
injustices that are happening in palestein. Some people hate injustice and helen is not one
to turn her back on what she believes in so kudos to her.
le"> It is a sin against the Torah to support the "State of Israel" in any way. Thus,
no Jews support Israel, only Zionists. Many Jews who lived in Palestine prior to the Zionist
reign of terror (Irgun, Stern Gang) that drove the Palestinians (including those Jews who
lived there peacefully, often communally with their Muslim and Christian neighbors) off the
land ended up in New York, and are known now as the Neturei Karta. Google them and learn why
Rabbis burn the Israeli flag for Purim.
@SaarVardi Let me show you the difference..... they [ the Palestinians] will bring upon
themselves a bigger 'shoah' [a Hebrew word for catastrophe and a synonym for the Nazi
Holocaust] because we will use all our might to defend ourselves." Israel's deputy defense
minister Matan Vilnai told Army Radio on Friday, February 29, 2008
v> @SaarVardi But using the "Holocaust" as a means and way to take land from someone
else is wrong. The crap the Israeli army does to kids over there is wrong. Kids throw rocks
at "TANKS" and the Israeli army breaks their arms. It's crazy. I'm a Native American the
estimates are that we lost up to 20 million native Americans when the "white dudes" took over
America...you don't see me crying about it. It sucks but just get over it and stop using it
as a reason to do whatever you want.
v> @SaarVardi Jews yes have been living in the Palestine area forever. But they were a
very small percentage of the population. After World War II, the "Big Three" sent all the
Jewish refugee's and the one's calling for a Homeland to what is now Israel. Palestinians
have whipped out actual land deeds, not archeological evidence. As you say the Jews were
there before....yes again as a small percentage of the people within the area.
v> @SaarVardi Mexico is not called Spain,and there live Mexicans (many from Indians),
Most of South America people are Indians (Bolivia, Colombia...). U.S. is an other story: most
of the space was empty but yes, there was an extermination (is that ok for you?) we are not
in the 1500 or 1700, Israel is from 1947 (yesterday) and they are killing people right now.
Israel was left empty in the Diaspora (70A.C.).You cant go back now and kill the people who's
livin there for 2,000 years
"... Trump issued an executive order, according to which a schedule of tariffs will be implemented unless Mexico polices its borders and ups its dismal rate of deportation, currently at 10 to 20 percent. ..."
"... Beginning on June 10, " a 5 percent tariff was placed on all imports from Mexico, to be increased by five percentage points each month until it hits 25 percent in October." ..."
"... Lo and behold, Mexico quickly promised to arrest Central American migrants headed north. Agreements may soon materialize with Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, to which Trump has already cut off foreign aid, in March ..."
"... How free and fair is trade anyway? Are unfettered markets at work when Canada, for instance, taxes purchases of American goods starting at $20, while America starts taxing Canadian goods at $1000? Hardly. ..."
"... There needs to be a huge turnaround in the number of illegals crossing the border if Trump wants to avoid being a one term president. It's hard to see the republicans staying relevant as well if the current numbers continue. They might hold the Senate for a little while but the presidency and a majority in Congress will be out of reach forever. ..."
"... In 2018, there were 70 million refugees, seeking safety from the world's conflict zone. One person was forced to flee their home because of war and violence every two seconds. ..."
"... Trump should have made reducing LEGAL immigration (and building the Wall to stop illegals) his #1 priority as soon as he was inaugurated. Instead, he dithered with personnel issues, then Obmacare (betrayed by rot-in-hell you bastard McCain), then tax cuts, Kavanaugh, loss of House, the End. ..."
If President Trump doesn't waver, his border deal with Mexico will be a victory. The Mexicans have agreed to quit serving as conduits
to hundreds of thousands of central Americans headed for the U.S.A.
Despite protests from Democrats, stateside -- Mexico has agreed to significantly increase enforcement on its borders.
At first, Mexico was as defiant as the Democrats -- and some Republicans.
Democrats certainly can be counted on to argue for the other side -- any side other than the so-called sovereign people they swore
to represent.
In fairness to the Democrats, Republicans are only notionally committed to the tough policing of the border. And certainly not
if policing the porous border entails threatening trade tariffs against our neighborly narco-state. Some Republican senators even
considered a vote to block the tariffs.
Nevertheless, to the hooting and hollering of the cretins in Congress and media, Trump went ahead and threatened Mexico with tariffs
.
More than that. The president didn't just tweet out "strong words" and taunts.
Since Mexico, the party duopoly, and his own courts have forced his hand, the president proceeded to "retrieve from his arsenal
a time bomb of ruinous proportions."
Or, so the Economist hyperventilated.
Trump issued an executive order, according to which a schedule of tariffs will be implemented unless Mexico polices its borders
and ups its dismal rate of deportation, currently at 10 to 20 percent.
Beginning on June 10, "
a 5 percent tariff was placed on all imports from Mexico, to be increased by five percentage points each month until it hits
25 percent in October."
Lo and behold, Mexico quickly
promised
to arrest Central American migrants headed north. Agreements may soon materialize with Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, to which
Trump has already cut off foreign aid, in March
It remains for Trump to stick with tough love for Mexico and the rest. If the torrent of grifters from Central America does not
let up, neither should the tariffs be lifted or aid restored.
Trump's trade and tariff tactics are about winning negotiations for Americans; they're not aimed at flouting the putative free-market.
How free and fair is trade anyway? Are unfettered markets at work when Canada, for instance, taxes purchases of American goods
starting at $20, while America starts taxing Canadian goods at $1000? Hardly.
Free trade is an unknown ideal, to echo Ayn Rand's observations. What goes for "free trade," rather, is trade managed by bureaucratic
juggernauts -- national and international -- central planners concerned with regulating, not freeing, trade; whose goal it is to
harmonize labor, health, and environmental laws throughout the developed world. The undeveloped and developing worlds generally exploit
labor, despoil land and kill off critters as they please.
The American market economy is massive. Trump knows its might. The difference between the president and his detractors is that
Trump is prepared to harness the power of American markets to benefit the American people.
But what of the "billions of dollars in imports from Mexico" that are at stake, as one media shill
shrieked
.
Give me a break. The truth about what Fake News call a major trading partner, Mexico, is that it's a trade pygmy -- a fact known
all too well to Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and his foreign minister, Marcelo Ebrard.
The reason these leaders were quick to the negotiating table once a schedule of tariffs had been decided upon by the president
is this.
Via the Economist :
"Only about 15 percent of the United States' exports go to Mexico, but a whopping 80 percent of Mexico's exports head the other
way. 'There is nothing we have in our arsenal that is equivalent to what the United States can do to us,' says Andrés Rozental, a
Mexican former diplomat and minister."
Next, President Trump must compel Mexico to accept "safe third-country status." Translated, this means that the U.S. can expel
any and all "asylum seekers" if they pass through Mexico, as Mexico becomes their lawful, first port-of-call.
Thinking people should realize that Trump's victory here is a Pyrrhic one. For what the president has had to do is convince the
Mexican president to deploy his national guards to do the work American immigration police is not allowed to do.
The U.S. must turn to Mexico to police its border because the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has, to all intents and purposes, outlawed
immigration laws.
Congressional quislings, for their part, have sat back and grumbled about the need for new laws. But as Daniel Horowitz
argues
convincingly, this is "a separation of powers problem." Unless the Trump administration understands that the problem lies with
the lower-court judges [exceeding their constitutional authority] and not the law -- there will be no fix.
For President Trump, the executive order serves as a way around the courts' violation of the constitutionally enshrined federal
scheme, within which the role -- nay, the obligation -- of the commander in chief -- is to defend the country.
Although they're temporary fixes, executive orders can serve to nullify unjust laws. As I argued in my 2016 book,
"The Trump Revolution: The Donald's Creative Destruction Reconstructed," executive
orders are Trump's political power tool -- justice's Jaws of Life, if you will -- to be used by the Executive to pry the people free
from judicial oppression.
Understand: The right of a nation to stop The World from flooding its communities amounts to upholding a negative right. In other
words, by stopping trespassers at their borders, Americans are not robbing invaders of the trinity of life, liberty and property.
All Americans are asserting is their right to be left alone. What we are saying to The World is what we tell our disobedient toddlers
every day, "No. You can't go there."
If you believe Mexico is going to squelch the flow of humans into America -- the same humans who are wiring $25BILLION per year
back to family members in Mexico -- I've got a fleet of taco trucks with square tires to sell you.
There needs to be a huge turnaround in the number of illegals crossing the border if Trump wants to avoid being a one term
president. It's hard to see the republicans staying relevant as well if the current numbers continue. They might hold the Senate
for a little while but the presidency and a majority in Congress will be out of reach forever.
The more this nonsense carries on, the more I empathize with Stalin. Sometimes you gotta bulldoze your way through. Democracy
produces nothing but obstacles. Time to put the keys into the caterpillar.
I applaud this move by Trump, and will of course vote for him in 2020 (for a patriot, what is the alternative?). But unless we
end the LEGAL immigration invasion, all this is for nought, and Trump will likely be the last non-leftist Republican President.
I have fought immigration for 40 years without success, except for CA Prop 187 in 1994, quickly overturned by a dirty Muslim
immigrant Federal judge. Immigration of racial and cultural and (now it's clear to everyone, as I knew by the 80s in CA) ideological
aliens is simple invasion, imperialism by non-military means. We needed Pat Buchanan in the 90s; instead, the stupid Christianists,
with whom I used to argue in the 80s-90s-00s endlessly wrt their insane priorities, worried more about abortion and queers (how'd
that work out, morons?) than alien conquest – with the obvious result that "globohomo" is stronger than ever – AND we have another
50+ MILLION race aliens voting 8-1 Democrat.
Sadly, Trump and the all-GOP 2017-18 Congress were America's very last chance to stop the invasion and save our (and the GOP's)
future. Trump blew it, utterly. Now the USA as a unitary, Occidental, Constitutional, capitalist nation-state cannot be salvaged
and/or restored. The only hope for American patriots is White conservative territorial ingathering and eventual racial secession
and new sovereignty.
Unless the Trump administration understands that the problem lies with the lower-court judges [exceeding their constitutional
authority] and not the law -- there will be no fix.
This is the crux. And this is true, too..
Free trade is an unknown ideal, to echo Ayn Rand's observations. What goes for "free trade," rather, is trade managed by
bureaucratic juggernauts -- national and international -- central planners concerned with regulating, not freeing, trade; whose
goal it is to harmonize labor, health, and environmental laws throughout the developed world. The undeveloped and developing
worlds generally exploit labor, despoil land and kill off critters as they please.
In 2018, there were 70 million refugees, seeking safety from the world's conflict zone. One person was forced to flee their home
because of war and violence every two seconds.
"And I'll huff and puff and bow your house down," said the Big, Bad Wolf.
When stories about the record number of illegals flooding in stop hitting the news cycle, and we no longer get possibly Ebola
infected Congolese with wads of $100 bills, I might believe your assumptions.
Africans Coming Across The Southern Border Have "Rolls Of $100 Bills"
One more thought: Remember that hot air the Big, Bad Orange wolf blew that ICE was going to start rounding up millions of
illegals
on Tuesday? Here it is Friday and no action.
How many times will people fall for Trump's BS promises where nothing gets done or he backtracks?
Madame Mercer, I suspect the real reason behind your story is that Trump is the best POTUS for Israel since the traitor
LBJ and that a certain group wants to keep Tubby the Grifter in the WH so he can keep acting as Israel's de facto real estate
agent.
The simpleton Mercer misses what is really going on. The re-election push is on and Trump will roll out "plans" to deal with immigration.
They will never come into fruition as they are mere "boob bait for bubba". The drug cartels run Mexico and people trafficking
is a bigger business than drug trafficking. If you think they are going to stop, you are as delusional as Ms Mercer. By the way
the politicians work for the drug cartels in Mexico. Of course the advice that Mercer gave to South Africa led to the current
situation where the ANC runs the country and whites are disenfranchised. But what else would you expect from a Jew who sell the
goyim down the river every chance they get.
@sarz Grade:
D+ (every other President since Kennedy: F)
Trump should have made reducing LEGAL immigration (and building the Wall to stop illegals) his #1 priority as soon as he was
inaugurated. Instead, he dithered with personnel issues, then Obmacare (betrayed by rot-in-hell you bastard McCain), then tax
cuts, Kavanaugh, loss of House, the End.
America is gone as not only a White nation, but within 25 years, even a semi-civilized and First World one. Diversity is what
destroyed us. We could have integrated (more or less) the blacks, but the sheer numbers of mostly clannish nonwhite colonizers
since 1968 has doomed us. America was its White, Christian, Anglo-Nordic majority. Without that majority, American dies.
The border situation is so outrageous it appears like something out of a black comedy. "We
are in a full blown emergency," said acting Customs and Border Protection Commissioner John
Sanders, "and I cannot say this stronger: the system is broken". [ 32% increase
in migrants encountered or arrested at the southern border in May, by Priscilla
Alvarez, CNN, June 5, 2019] Why is this happening? Migrants all
over the world from Guatemala
to
Angola know the loopholes in immigration border enforcement imposed by a
treasonous Leftist
kritarchy , especially the claim of "
credible fear " potentially qualifying people for asylum.
[ While everyone sleeps, the courts are abolishing all immigration enforcement, by Daniel Horowitz, Conservative Review, March 11, 2019] Thus, most migrants
are not sneaking across the border: they are eagerly turning themselves in at ports of entry,
knowing they will soon be released into the country on the promise, which they intend to break,
that they will show up for adjudication.
Remember, President Trump has the authority to solve this problem without Congress. The
Supreme Court has already ruled that the president can impose a
travel ban on certain countries . Conservative Review's Daniel Horowitz argues the
president has inherent powers under Article II to exclude asylum applicants from entering the
country, authority that has been reaffirmed by Congress and repeatedly sanctioned by the
Supreme Court. [ No
judge has jurisdiction to erase our border, ConservativeReview, November 26,
2018]
But Trump won't do it -- partially because he has inexplicably surrounded himself with
political foes who won't back strong action . Instead, he's blaming the Democrats for not
undertaking the "simple" measure of closing the "loopholes."
The most optimistic explanation: Trump intends to use immigration as an election issue in
2020. Yet his fecklessness in office will be as unappealing to many voters as the Democrats'
extremism. [ Trump Is
Vulnerable to Biden on Immigration, by Michael Brendan Dougherty, National
Review, June 11, 2019] After all, Trump
began his campaign vowing to solve the immigration problem almost exactly four years ago --
but essentially nothing has been done.
The "maximum pressure campaign," as it has been called, puts Iran in the position of either
accepting a humiliating surrender or striking out where it can [ Maximum
pressure on Iran Means Maximum Risk of War, by Ilan Goldenberg, Foreign
Policy, June 14, 2019].
... ... ...
There is also a deeper fundamental question. Our country is crumbling. The border is
non-existent; entire communities are being overrun. There’s something perverse about even
entertaining a dangerous and costly military intervention halfway around the world. It’s
akin to a Roman emperor declaring he will conquer India while barbarians are crossing the
Rhine.
The common migrant cannot be tasked with improving the politics, the financial aspects,
the pay scale, the opportunities for work, the safety of his family in his home country.
The USA has prepared his country the way that it endeavors it to be. That is a vassal,
saddled with World Bank, IMF Debt and currency with ever-declining value pegged to the us
dollar.
Often the US controls his country via election rigging, coups, military intervention,
black ops, etc.
He must do that which best serves his family. That is find the most efficient solution -
which is migration.
Rapid DNA testing has revealed that almost 1/3 of illegal migrants apprehended at the southern US
border
were not biologically related to the children they were traveling with,
nor were they
cases of step-fathers or adoptive parents, according to the
Washington
Examiner
.
The findings were a result of a pilot program conducted by Immigrations and Customs Enforcement
(ICE) in El Paso and McAllen, Texas.
The number of migrants tested and how they flagged people for testing is unknown,
while
the official added that some migrants refused the cheek-swab test and admitted that they aren't
related to the children they were with
after learning that their claim would be subject to
DNA proof.
After analyzing the results of the pilot, the Department of Homeland Security will consider
rolling out the rapid DNA tests on a broad-scale, according to ICE.
"This is certainly not the panacea. It's one measure," said the official.
One upside, the source said, was that in addition to verifying bogus relationships, it also
verified many when Homeland Security personnel were unsure.
The
Examiner
reported in March the Department of Homeland Security and ICE were
looking
at adopting the test, made by a company called ANDE
. On May 1, DHS announced it would launch
a pilot of the program in instances where ICE Homeland Security Investigations agents could not
verify a family unit's relationships. -
Washington
Examiner
In March, former DHS chief Kristjen Nielsen announced that
border crossers have been using "
child
recycling rings
" to trick US authorities
.
"We've broken up child recycling rings -- if you can believe it -- in the last couple of months,
which is where smugglers pick up a child, they give it to adults to present themselves as a family
once they get over -- because, as you know, we can only hold families for 20 days -- they send the
child back and bring the child back with another family. Another fake family," Nielsen told
Fox
News
's Tucker Carlson.
President Donald Trump is planning on using the Insurrection Act to remove illegal
immigrants from the United States, The Daily Caller has learned.
According to multiple senior administration officials, the president intends to invoke the
"tremendous powers" of the act to remove illegal immigrants from the country.
"We're doing the Insurrection Act," one official said.
Under the Insurrection Act of 1807 , the president
has the authority to use the National Guard and military in order to combat "unlawful
obstruction or rebellion" within U.S. borders. The act was last
invoked in 1992 by George H.W. Bush to quell the Los Angeles riots, and was also used by
Eisenhower in 1957 to enforce school desegregation in the south.
An official expressed concerns that Trump's use of the act's powers would face legal
challenges, pointing to the lawsuits against the president's travel ban from majority-Muslim
countries. However, as the official noted, the travel ban ultimately prevailed in the Supreme
Court.
In addition to the Insurrection Act, the president is also considering declaring the
country full and insisting that the U.S. can no longer handle the massive influx of illegal
immigrants. 2019 is currently on pace
to reach the highest levels of illegal immigration in a decade.
"If you take a ship and it holds 1,000 people maximum -- one more person and the ship is
going to collapse," the official explained. "The country is full."
"Our hospitals are full, our detention centers are full," they added."
"... Americans have made this clear twice: in the election of Donald J. Trump and in the equally unexpected rise of Ross Perot, an unprecedentedly successful Third Party candidate in the Nineties who rocketed to prominence by boldly condemning "the giant sucking sound of jobs going across the border to Mexico." ..."
"... Maybe, Perot would have done the same thing as Trump if he had made it to the White House. But people like Ann Coulter are popular because -- like Perot -- they articulate in no uncertain terms crucial, popular points that most politicians are just too cowering to even address verbally, much less redressing voters' grievances with any real action. ..."
Americans probably don't understand Russia. Americans don't even mostly understand their own
history. With little education in our system of constitutional governance in formerly
politically apathetic -- now Woke -- public schools bereft of civics classes, the lack of
historical grounding is not surprising.
One thing Americans do understand, though, is the need to stop the mass flow of
welfare-assisted immigration, curbing the illegal kind entirely and reducing the legal kind
significantly. Americans have made this clear twice: in the election of Donald J. Trump
and in the equally unexpected rise of Ross Perot, an unprecedentedly successful Third
Party candidate in the Nineties who rocketed to prominence by boldly condemning "the giant
sucking sound of jobs going across the border to Mexico."
It just does not matter what Americans want in our rigged system. Whatever we vote for,
mostly for economic reasons but also a few other good reasons, Neoliberal economic Elites
ignore it, pursuing their own economic interests once in office.
Maybe, Perot would have done the same thing as Trump if he had made it to the White
House. But people like Ann Coulter are popular because -- like Perot -- they articulate in no
uncertain terms crucial, popular points that most politicians are just too cowering to even
address verbally, much less redressing voters' grievances with any real action.
On the campaign trail, Trump cleverly sidestepped the issue of immigration with mocking
comedy that could be conveniently repackaged in case of any victory. It was just a matter of
interpretation: whether you heard more Build The Wall or more Big Beautiful Door in the wall
in Trump's thunderous speeches. Trump's voters heard Build The Wall, and many did not show up
to vote for Republicans in the midterms, whereas the Cheap Labor Lobby & the corporate
donor class heard Big Beautiful Door.
"... Jared is more focused on protecting Israel's expanding borders from Palestinians remaining in their homes and homeland, than protecting America's borders. ..."
President Donald Trump was elected on a platform of America policing its own borders, not
the world. His reelection may depend on how well he has fulfilled those campaign promises,
which distinguished him from the bipartisan political class he so eloquently described as the
swamp.
So far, the results are not encouraging. While Trump
campaigned against regime change in the Middle East, his administration has been coy about
whether the authorization of military force to respond to the 9/11 attacks covers
toppling the government of Iran mere days after labeling the Islamic Revolutionary Guard
Corps a terrorist organization. Meanwhile, the situation at the border is deteriorating, with
the number of illegal crossings
approaching the bad old days of the early to mid-2000s. More of these immigrants are likely
staying in the country as the composition of new migrant inflows increasingly shifts from
single men to
families with children .
Single men can be more easily detained and quickly removed from the United States. Families
with children and unaccompanied minors face a
different set of rules -- and, as the White House learned last year, create a
different set of political problems .
One key difference remains, however: on foreign policy, Trump is receiving advice almost
exclusively from officials whose instincts run
counter to the "America First" agenda from the 2016 campaign. On immigration and border
security, there is more of a
split . That's why there's so much at stake in Trump's recent immigration shake-up.
The ouster of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and her deputy Claire Grady has
been
widely reported as an example of senior advisor Stephen Miller consolidating control of his
immigration portfolio. But it may not be Miller time just yet. The moves come after Jared
Kushner, the senior advisor who is also Trump's son-in-law, has been pushing a plan to
increase
legal immigration .
Trump has praised Miller as "excellent," "wonderful," and "brilliant," but clarified that he alone
runs the show on immigration. (It's possible that some of the sourcing for stories putting
Miller's fingerprints all over the Nielsen sacking actually came from his own enemies inside
the White House.) Trump described Kushner's unannounced
immigration ideas as "very exciting, very important." The president recently called for
increased immigration himself, ad-libbing this line in his last State of the Union address: "I
want people to come into our country in the largest numbers ever, but they have to come
legally."
Yet a bill Trump endorsed
at the White House last year would eventually cut legal immigration in half. Freshman Senator
Josh Hawley joined Trump-aligned Senators Tom Cotton and David Perdue to reintroduce this bill
in an apparent attempt to
thwart Kushner's coming push to expand immigration. On the stump, Trump has railed against
"chain migration" and picking immigrants by "lottery" rather than a "merit-based system." But
like a lot of Republicans, he tends to focus on legality versus illegality, rather than the
number and composition of immigrants entering the country overall.
There was a point last year when a sufficient number of Democrats -- mostly red-state
senators up for reelection that November, like Hawley's since-vanquished opponent Claire
McCaskill -- might have voted to fund Trump's border wall in exchange for the reinstatement of
Barack Obama's amnesty for young illegal immigrants who arrived in the country as minors. The
White House, on advice often attributed to Miller, floated a different compromise. Amnesty
would be provided for an even larger number of young undocumented immigrants in exchange for
the legal immigration reforms in the Cotton-Perdue RAISE Act and border security measures
including wall funding.
Politically, trading the
wall for Dreamers would have given Trump a high-profile border victory at the cost of a
much smaller amnesty than the Gang of Eight plan. The failure
to take that deal, assuming Democrats would have actually accepted it, will always be
regarded
as a mistake . On the merits, however, there were strong reasons to offset the amnesty with
immigration cuts elsewhere while adopting reforms that would make it less likely we would be
debating yet another legalization program for undocumented minors a few years later.
In one of the many examples of how this president has unsettled our politics, David Frum,
author of the Never Trump screed Trumpocracy , endorsed precisely this policy mix in an
important
cover story for The Atlantic. Frum's piece appeared at roughly the same time that
Ann Coulter, author of In Trump We Trust , was excoriating
Trump for failing to keep his immigration promises and filling his administration with people
who constantly undermine them.
Frum, regardless of my other
disagreements with him , has stuck to his skepticism of uninterrupted mass immigration
despite his profound alienation from the Trump-era GOP. Coulter, ridiculed for her pro-Trump
polemics during the campaign, has actually done far more to hold the president accountable than
most denizens of MAGA-land (she was also more prescient about the election than most of those
sneering at her). It was Frum, in a prior Atlantic piece, who credited Coulter,
in a previous book, with opening Trump's eyes to the force of the immigration issue.
Trump and Coulter are now estranged over precisely this issue. The White House palace
intrigue matters. Does Francis Cissna stay or go? Does Kris Kobach
have a chance at DHS? Will Julie Kirchner join Miller or does Ken Cuccinelli come aboard ? But
another question is even more important.
If given the chance for a wall and an amnesty do-over, is the average Trump voter closer to
Kushner or Coulter?
W. James Antle III is editor of .6 Responses to Trump's Immigration
Choice: Kushner or Coulter?
Trump -- ""I want people to come into our country in the largest numbers ever, but they
have to come legally.""
I don't. I don't want that. I voted for you because I thought you were against it too, you
^^^^ing ripoff artist. Now I'm going to help get you the ^^^^ out of the White House.
For the average voter, even the average Trump supporter, immigration is not as big an issue as
many imagine. Among Trump supporters I know, gun rights, support of Israel, dislike of Hillary
and the PC state in general all are more important than immigration. Kushner, being family,
will beat Coulter on the immigration issue and it will make no difference to Trump's support
level. As long as we have prosperity and just the right amount of tension at home and abroad in
2020, Trump will probably beat whatever array of Demo and third party candidate he has to deal
with.
Jared is more focused on protecting Israel's expanding borders from Palestinians remaining
in their homes and homeland, than protecting America's borders.
Coulter. Hands down. And I have always been a 'lefty'.
Immigration shapes a nation more than any other driver (education, health, defense, etc),
short of outright conquest by another nation.
Allow liberals their unconstrained 'open borders' importation of 'multi-cultural diversity',
and you get colonised fast. Especially when migrants breed faster than locals. Look at Europe.
Or Canada.
Lottery and chain migration must be canned, and retrospectively (ie deport past chain
migrants) – they never had a claim to migrate in the first place. And institute random
audits (with deportation) for fraudulent migration claims. With rising jail terms the more
times they try to re-enter illegally.
You have to have spine to defend your nation. Trump may do. Coulter does. Kushner works for
liberal capitalism, which wants a colonized US, flooded by cheap migrant labor.
"... Trump's failure here is his alone. Closing the border could be accomplished with a simple executive order. It has happened before: Reagan ordered the closing of the border when DEA agent Enrique "Kiki" Camarena was murdered on assignment in Mexico in 1985, for instance. ..."
"... Trump's empty threats over the past two years have had real-world consequences, prompting waves of migrants trying to sneak into the country while they still have the chance. His recent move to cut all foreign aid to Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador is another empty gesture that will probably have similar consequences. The funds directed to those countries were used for programs that provided citizens with incentives not to migrate elsewhere. (The situation was not ideal from an isolationist point of view, but a wiser man would have built the wall before cutting off the aid.) ..."
"... Trump's betrayal of American workers is perhaps best encapsulated by the fact that one of the members of the advisory board of his National Council for the American Worker (which claims to "enhance employment opportunities for Americans of all ages") is the CEO of IBM, a company that has expressed a preference for F-1 and H-1B visa holders in its job postings. ..."
"... There are more former Goldman Sachs employees in the Trump White House than in the Obama and Bush administrations combined. ..."
"... It is hard to escape the conclusion that Trump is not actually interested in curbing immigration and reversing America's demographic decline. He is a con artist and a coward who is willing to betray millions of white Americans so that he can remain in the good graces of establishment neoconservatives ..."
"... As Ann Coulter has put it, "He's like a waiter who compliments us for ordering the hamburger, but keeps bringing us fish. The hamburger is our signature dish, juicy and grilled to perfection, you've made a brilliant choice . . . now here's your salmon. " ..."
"... Third, he put an end to American funding for Palestinians. This coincided with the passing of a bill that codified a $38 billion, ten-year foreign aid package for Israel. Trump also authorized an act allocating an additional $550 million toward US-Israel missile and tunnel defense cooperation. ..."
"... Trump's track record on Israel shows that he is capable of exercising agency and getting things done. But he has failed to address the most pressing issue that America currently faces: mass immigration and the displacement of white Americans. The most credible explanation for his incompetence is that he has no intention of delivering on his promises. There is no "Plan," no 4-D chess game. The sooner white Americans realize this, the better. ..."
"... We elected America's first Jewish president, nothing more" ..."
"Unlike other presidents, I keep my promises," Trump boasted in a
speech delivered on Saturday to the Republican Jewish Congress
at a luxury hotel in Las Vegas. Many in the audience wore red yarmulkes emblazoned with his name. In his speech, Trump condemned
Democrats for allowing "the terrible scourge of anti-Semitism to take root in their party" and emphasized his loyalty to Israel.
Trump has kept some of his promises. So far, he has kept every promise that he made to the Jewish community. Yet he has reneged
on his promises to white America – the promises that got him elected in the first place. It is a betrayal of the highest order: millions
of white Americans placed their hopes in Trump and wholeheartedly believed that he would be the one to make America great again.
They were willing to endure social ostracism and imperil their livelihoods by supporting him. In return, Trump has turned his back
on them and rendered his promises void.
The most recent example of this is Trump's failure to keep his promise to close the border. On March 29, Trump threatened to close
the border if Mexico did not stop all illegal immigration into the US. This would likely have been a highly effective measure given
Mexico's dependence on cross-border trade. Five days later, he suddenly retracted this threat and said that he would give Mexico
a " one-year warning
" before taking drastic action. He further claimed that closing the border would not be necessary and that he planned to establish
a twenty-five percent
tariff on cars
entering the US instead.
Trump's failure here is his alone. Closing the border could be accomplished with a simple executive order. It has happened
before: Reagan ordered the closing of the border when DEA agent Enrique "Kiki" Camarena was murdered on assignment in Mexico in 1985,
for instance.
Trump's empty threats over the past two years have had real-world consequences, prompting waves of migrants trying to sneak
into the country while they still have the chance. His recent move to cut all foreign aid to Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador
is another empty gesture that will probably have similar consequences. The funds directed to those countries were used for programs
that provided citizens with incentives not to migrate elsewhere. (The situation was not ideal from an isolationist point of view,
but a wiser man would have built the wall before cutting off the aid.)
The past two years have seen a surge in illegal immigration without precedent in the past decade. Since late December, the Department
of Homeland Security has released 125,565 illegal aliens into the country. In the past two weeks alone,
6,000 have been admitted. According to current projections, 2019 will witness around 500,000 to 775,000 border crossings. Additionally,
about 630,000 illegal aliens will be added to the population after having overstayed their visas. By the end of the year,
more than one million illegal aliens will have been added to the population:
These projections put the number of illegal aliens added to the U.S. population at around one to 1.5 million, on top of the
11 to
22 million illegal aliens who are already living across the country. This finding does not factor in the illegal aliens who
will be deported, die over the next year, or leave the U.S. of their own will. As DHS data has revealed, once border crossers
and illegal aliens are released into the country, the overwhelming majority are never deported.
In February, Trump signed a
bill allowing the DHS
secretary to add another 69,320 spots to the current H-2B cap of 66,000. On March 29, DHS began this process by announcing that it
would issue an additional
30,000 H-2B visas this year. The H-2B visa program allows foreign workers to come to the US and work in non-agricultural occupations.
Unlike the H-1B program, a Bachelor's degree is not required; most H-2B workers are employed in construction, maintenance, landscaping,
and so on. The demographic most affected by the expansion of the H-2B program will be unemployed working-class Americans. This flies
in the face of Trump's promise to protect American workers and stop importing foreigners.
Trump has indicated that he has plans to expand the H-1B visa program as well. "We want to encourage talented and highly skilled
people to pursue career options in the U.S.," he said in a
tweet in January.
Trump's betrayal of American workers is perhaps best encapsulated by the fact that one of the members of the advisory board
of his National Council for the American Worker
(which claims to "enhance employment opportunities for Americans of all ages") is the CEO of IBM, a company that has
expressed a preference for F-1 and H-1B visa holders
in its job postings.
Trump has been working on legal immigration with Jared Kushner, who has quietly been crafting a
plan to grant
citizenship to more "low- and high-skilled workers, as well as permanent and temporary workers" (so, just about everyone). Kushner's
plan proves the folly of the typical Republican line that legal immigration is fine and that only illegal immigration should be opposed.
Under his plan, thousands of illegal aliens will become "legal" with the stroke of a pen.
There is a paucity of anti-immigration hardliners in Trump's inner circle (though Stephen Miller is a notable exception). Trump
has surrounded himself with moderates: the Kushners, Mick Mulvaney, Alex Acosta, and others. There are more former Goldman Sachs
employees in the Trump White House than in the Obama and Bush administrations combined.
The new DHS secretary, Kevin McAleenan, who was appointed yesterday following Kirstjen Nielsen's resignation, is a middle-of-the-road
law enforcement official who served under Obama and Bush and is responsible for the revival of the "
catch-and-release " policy, whereby
illegal aliens are released upon being apprehended. It was reported last week that Trump was thinking of appointing either Kris Kobach
or Ken Cuccinelli to a position of prominence (as an "
immigration czar "),
but this appears to have been another lie.
Trump's failure to deliver on his promises cannot be chalked up to congressional obstruction. Congress. As Kobach said in a recent
interview , "It's not like we're powerless and it's not like we have to wait for Congress to do something. . . . No, we can actually
solve the immediate crisis without Congress acting." Solving the border crisis would simply demand "leadership in the executive branch
willing to act decisively." Kobach recently outlined an intelligent
three-point plan that Trump could implement:
Publish the final version of the regulation that would supersede the Flores Settlement. The initial regulation was
published by the Department of Homeland
Security in September 2018. DHS could have published the final regulation in December. Inexplicably, DHS has dragged its feet. Finalizing
that regulation would allow the United States to detain entire families together, and it would stop illegal aliens from exploiting
children as get-out-of-jail free cards. Set up processing centers at the border to house the migrants and hold the hearings in one
place. The Department of Justice should deploy dozens of immigration judges to hear the asylum claims at the border without releasing
the migrants into the country. FEMA already owns
thousands of travel trailers and mobile homes that it has used to address past hurricane disasters. Instead of selling them (which
FEMA is currently doing), FEMA should ship them to the processing centers to provide comfortable housing for the migrants. In addition,
a fleet of passenger planes should deployed to the processing centers. Anyone who fails in his or her asylum claim, or who is not
seeking asylum and is inadmissible, should be flown home immediately. It would be possible to fly most migrants home within a few
weeks of their arrival. Word would get out quickly in their home countries that entry into the United States is not as easy as advertised.
The incentive to join future caravans would dissipate quickly. Publish a proposed Treasury regulation that prohibits the sending
home of remittances by people who cannot document lawful presence in the United States. This will hit Mexico in the pocketbook: Mexico
typically brings in well over $20 billion a year in
remittances , raking in
more than $26 billion in 2017. Then, tell the government of Mexico that we will finalize the Treasury regulation unless they do two
things to help us address the border crisis: (1) Mexico immediately signs a "safe third country agreement" similar to our agreement
with Canada. This would require asylum applicants to file their asylum application in the first safe country they set foot in (so
applicants in the caravans from Central America would have to seek asylum in Mexico, rather than Canada); and (2) Mexico chips in
$5 billion to help us build the wall. The threat of ending remittances from illegal aliens is a far more powerful one than threatening
to close the border. Ending such remittances doesn't hurt the U.S. economy; indeed, it helps the economy by making it more likely
that such capital will be spent and circulate in our own country. We can follow through easily if Mexico doesn't cooperate.
It would not be all that difficult for Trump to implement these proposals. Kobach still has faith in Trump, but his assessment
of him appears increasingly to be too generous. It is hard to escape the conclusion that Trump is not actually interested in
curbing immigration and reversing America's demographic decline. He is a con artist and a coward who is willing to betray millions
of white Americans so that he can remain in the good graces of establishment neoconservatives . At the same time, he wants to
maintain the illusion that he cares about his base.
As Ann Coulter has put it, "He's like a waiter who compliments us for ordering the hamburger, but keeps bringing us fish.
The hamburger is our signature dish, juicy and grilled to perfection, you've made a brilliant choice . . . now here's your salmon.
"
Nearly everything Trump has done in the name of restricting immigration has turned out to be an empty gesture and mere theatrics:
threatening to close the border, offering protections to "Dreamers" in exchange for funding for the ever-elusive wall, threatening
to end the "anchor baby" phenomenon with an executive order (which never came to pass), cutting off aid to Central American countries,
claiming that he will appoint an "immigration czar" (and then proceeding to appoint McAleenan instead of Kobach as DHS secretary),
and on and on.
While Trump has failed to keep the promises that got him elected, he has fulfilled a number of major promises that he made to
Israel and the Jewish community.
First, he moved the American embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Trump claimed that the move would only cost $200,000, but in
reality it will end up being more than
$20 million . The construction
of the embassy also led to a series of bloody protests; it is located in East Jerusalem, which is generally acknowledged to be Palestinian
territory.
Second, he pulled the US out of the Iran nuclear deal. Netanyahu
claimed on Israeli TV that Israel was responsible for convincing him to exit the deal and reimpose sanctions on Iran. (Both Trump
and Netanyahu falsely alleged that Iran lied about the extent of its nuclear program; meanwhile, Israel's large arsenal of chemical
and biological weapons has escaped mention.) Third, he put an end to American funding for Palestinians. This coincided with the
passing of a
bill that codified a $38 billion, ten-year foreign aid package for Israel. Trump also authorized an act allocating an additional
$550 million toward US-Israel missile and tunnel defense cooperation.
Fourth, he recognized Israel's sovereignty over the Golan Heights (in defiance of the rest of the world, which recognizes the
Golan Heights as Syrian territory under Israeli occupation). Trump's Golan Heights proclamation was issued on March 21 and was celebrated
by Israel. Trump's track record on Israel shows that he is capable of exercising agency and getting things done. But he has failed
to address the most pressing issue that America currently faces: mass immigration and the displacement of white Americans. The most
credible explanation for his incompetence is that he has no intention of delivering on his promises. There is no "Plan," no 4-D chess
game. The sooner white Americans realize this, the better.
If you haven't picked up a copy of Vicky Ward's book, Kushner, Inc.: Greed. Ambition. Corruption. The Extraordinary Story
of Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump , you really should.
I haven't read Mr. Graham's essay yet, but I thought those two links would fit in nicely. I stay in a low boil, like it is,
and having plodded through both those reviews, I can't stand reading too much on this topic at once.
Something's gotta give. Or are the brainless goy just going to let themselves be led off a cliff?
Oh, yes. There's an interview with Ward on
BookTV .
Yep. Trump's a lying POS pond scum like the rest of the DC swamp that he said he was going to drain, turns out he is one of them
all along. We elected America's first Jewish president, nothing more. He needs to change his campaign slogan to MIGA, Make Israel
Great Again, that was the plan of his handlers all along.
What I want to know is, who are those idiots who still keep showing up at his rallies? Are they really that dumb?
Even Sanders came out and said we can't have open borders. I've also heard him said back in 2015 that the H1b visa program
is a replacement program for American workers. If he grows a pair and reverts back to that stance, teams up with Tulsi Gabbard,
I'll vote for them 2020. Fuck Trump! Time for him and his whole treasonous rat family to move to Israel where they belong.
His "implicitly white" supporters would have abandoned him in droves, not wanting to be associated with a racist, thus pointing
up the weakness of implicit whiteness as a survival strategy. And is it actually a survival strategy? A closer look at it makes
me think it's more of a racial self-extermination strategy. After all, what kind of a survival strategy is it that can't even
admit its goals to itself? And it's exactly this refusal of whites to explicitly state that they collectively want to continue
to exist as a race that is the greatest impediment to their doing so. It's an interesting problem with no easy solution. How
do you restore the will to live to a race that seems to have lost it? And not only lost its will to live, but actually prides
itself on doing so? Accordingly, this "betrayal" isn't a betrayal at all. It's what American whites voted for and want. Giving
their country away and accepting their own demographic demise is proof of their virtue; proof of their Christian love for all
mankind.
You are definitely onto something here.
Still, I feel it's not that deep and complicated. It could be that they simply don't believe that the danger is closing in.
Boils down to wrong judgment. People who haven't had the need to think hard about serious things tend to develop that weakness.
I guess that boils down to "good times make weak men."
Hard times are coming and they'll make hard men.
The catch is simple: will be enough of them in time ?
Switching to the Democrats is no solution. The DNC has proven itself to be a criminal organization through sabotaging Sander's
campaign and then being instrumental in creating Russophobia, in collusion with Obama, the CIA, the FBI, and the DoJ. The DNC
has rules in place stating that super delegates – elitists aligned with the DNC – can vote if one nominee does not win on the
first ballot at the National Convention.
Because we have a HUGE number of hats in the Democratic ring, the chances that the nomination
will not be decided on a first vote are extremely high, with the result being that the Democratic nominee is not going to be decided
by voters in the primaries but by super delegates, i.e., the elitists and plutocrats.
Democracy exists when we vote to support
candidates chosen by the elites for the elites; when we stop doing that, the elites turn on democracy. It is a sham; we will have
a choice in 2020: between Pepsi and Coke. You are free to choose which one you prefer, because you live in a democracy. For more
on the rigging of the democratic primaries for 2020, see
"... Jared sold himself as the only man who could make a deal between Dems and the GOP. He pointed to "his" recent success with prison reform as proof of his bonafides. ..."
"... Of course, he blew it as usual. He told his side that Dems would vote for Trump's $5.7 billion "wall, or whatever you want to call it" -- and they didn't. He said the Dems would break ranks -- and they didn't. ..."
"... The Senate votes came, and the Trump proposal got FEWER votes than the Democratic proposal, which managed to get 6 GOP Senators to jump ship. Kushner had not only failed; he'd embarrassed the boss. ..."
"... Of course, it was Donald who appointed Jared, and gave him the reins on this critical project -- ignoring the fact that Pence had actually served in Congress, knew the players, and knew the game. Even after two years' worth of evidence that a political neophyte cannot solve all the nation's most intractable problems just because he sleeps with the boss's daughter, the First Con fell for a con man. ..."
Jared sold himself as the only man who could make a deal between Dems and the GOP. He pointed to "his" recent success with
prison reform as proof of his bonafides.
Of course, he blew it as usual. He told his side that Dems would vote for Trump's $5.7 billion "wall, or whatever you want
to call it" -- and they didn't. He said the Dems would break ranks -- and they didn't.
It appears that Kushner talked to a few junior Dems, who were too wet behind the ears to tell the president's son in law that
he needed to change his meds. He read their silence as meaning they were prepared to commit mutiny and, putting all his chips
on that bet, stopped talking to both Pelosi (where the real power lies) and Schumer.
Then he told everyone he'd cracked it.
The Senate votes came, and the Trump proposal got FEWER votes than the Democratic proposal, which managed to get 6 GOP
Senators to jump ship. Kushner had not only failed; he'd embarrassed the boss.
As others have said below, Trump always finds someone to blame for his mistakes. But in this case there were very good reasons
for pointing the finger at Kushner.
Of course, it was Donald who appointed Jared, and gave him the reins on this critical project -- ignoring the fact that
Pence had actually served in Congress, knew the players, and knew the game. Even after two years' worth of evidence that a political
neophyte cannot solve all the nation's most intractable problems just because he sleeps with the boss's daughter, the First
Con fell for a con man.
Incompetent, cowboy style foreign policy is the hallmark of Trump administration. they can only bully, they can't hold a constructive
negotiations. As one commenter observed "American diplomacy still consists of behaving like a bull in a china shop: do what
we say or die."
His appointment of Bolton and Pompeo means that Trump is a neocon in foreign policy and/or does not control foreign policy
of his administration. .
Notable quotes:
"... This is just a hunch but I have a feeling it was undermined by Bolton and Pompeo from the start. ..."
"... Every time I hear a Neocon say this on FOX / CNN I want to strangle the host for not asking any follow up question as in, 'like what?' What has the U.S. given up. ..."
"... Why does the USA keep economic sanctions on DPRK? This article helps to explain it: Despite himself Trump admits the superiority of China's socialist economy to capitalism ..."
"... Jong-un Kim has an advantage his predecessor didn't: he has China. He doesn't need to invent nothing: he already has the long-term solution next door. ..."
"... My guess is the USA and South Korea know if the sanctions are lifted, North Korea will become a mini-powerhouse under China's sphere of influence. They have to create a situation equal to Libya's, where they can invade the North militarily and quickly occupy its territory, thus using its population as cheap labor force for the American multinationals and South Korean chaebols. ..."
"... The US military/foreign policy establishment wants North Korea to disarm so that it can give them a Carthaginian peace. Until then, they are content to do their cushy jobs and rake in the money from South Korean businessmen. ..."
"... An excellent article from Tom Engelhardt on Consortium News, in which he attempts to explain how the USA had the world at its feet, and squandered the chance to do good and instead went on a series of further Imperial military adventures: https://consortiumnews.com/2019/02/21/the-neocons-have-their-caesar/ ..."
"... American diplomacy still consists of behaving like a bull in a china shop: do what we say or die. ..."
"... summit was derailed by last minute attendance of Bolton, who added demands for NK to also report chemical/biological weapons, in response to which NKs increased their demand for sanctions relief in Korean ..."
"... No surprise that the US is always 'all or nothing'. It thinks it is 'uber alles'. ..."
"... IMO, the key was laid bare by Trump: "Basically they wanted the sanctions lifted in their entirety, and we couldn't do that." [My Emphasis] ..."
"... as you and many others have noted, the US argument seems to be "give up your nukes so we can Libya you into oblivion". if venezuela had nukes would they be putting up with the incessant stupidity of the "blob"? they'd still have sanctions but i doubt the dumb twats running the surrounding countries would be as eager to aid and abet US hijinks. ..."
"... And it seems Trump lied about the impasse that led to Kim walking out, proving that Kim's initial assessment of Trump as dotard was 100% correct. ..."
"... When did Bolton's coups and intimidations ever work? He is, in essence, a megalomanic mustache. ..."
"... I think that Trump represents a pivot from containment of China/Russia to one of "Quick, pull what pieces of empire we can defend/control together." ..."
"... I think that the West is delusional to think they can defeat any alternative that doesn't have profit as its God. That said, that monotheistic myth of "better than others" runs deep as evidenced by some of the opinions expressed in this venue ..."
"... Any nation which still trust any promise coming from the USA and its European, Australian and Canadian poddles deserves to be colonized and destroyed. ..."
twhstmmwmafilwwwww , Feb 28, 2019 8:13:44 AM |
link
This is just a hunch but I have a feeling it was undermined by Bolton and Pompeo from the start. They know the DPRK wasn't
gonna give up its nuclear deterrent unilaterally, so the next best thing behind a the dream of a Libya situation is to once again
have an aggressive relationship with the North to be able to continue to justify all sorts of "defense" maneuvering around China
now that foreign policy has now officially pivoted away from terrorism and towards China(+Russia).
Similar to AEGIS Ashore in Eastern Europe in order to "defend" Europe from "Iran".
We've given up everything, they have given up nothing
Every time I hear a Neocon say this on FOX / CNN I want to strangle the host for not asking any follow up question as in,
'like what?' What has the U.S. given up.
We talked to them giving them legitimacy, OMG, as if we have some kind of glorious halo that is worth a billions of $ or even
more. This makes me want to puke when I heare this.
The N. Koreans have stopped ALL nuclear and ballistic missile testing. We the U.S. have put in place even more draconian sanctions
under Trump than were in place before. We raised the ante. We have more room to give then the N. Koreans do.
Believing Trump is or ever was open to breaking with US imperialism is Trumpery. He wants to sweat the subordinates, wants them
to spend more on the military, buy more US weapons, do more fighting. But to make things look good he will say anything, and renege.
Some people think Trump etc. are trying to detach the north from a Chinese alliance. There are two problems here. First, there's
no sane reason to think the Chinese aren't engaged in economic warfare against the north. Not wanting to squeeze hard enough to
cause a total collapse is not supporting the north. Second, if that's what Trump wanted, he'd actually try offering the north
concessions.
The issue in the background is whether Trump will let the south out of the US orbit. It's an easy question to answer: He won't.
Empires don't give up their territory until they're made to. The Soviet withdrawal from central Europe is not an exception, as
the USSR was not an empire. (Yes, everyone who says "Soviet empire" and means it is a shithead.)
Formally, the Korean War was between Chosôn on the one side and The United nations and Hangok (Daehan)on the other. The UN security
council is the ones to have instituted tthe sanction regime and thus in practice committed a crime against Humanity by inflictin
starvation the people of the North. In practice it was a US & their allie's war against the entire population of Korea. Formally,
peace must be signed by Chosôn and the UN and sanctions lifted by the latter. In Practice, the US must be made to abide with agreements.
Jong-un Kim has an advantage
his predecessor didn't: he has China. He doesn't need to invent nothing: he already has the long-term solution next door.
My guess is the USA and South Korea know if the sanctions are lifted, North Korea will become a mini-powerhouse under China's
sphere of influence. They have to create a situation equal to Libya's, where they can invade the North militarily and quickly
occupy its territory, thus using its population as cheap labor force for the American multinationals and South Korean chaebols.
The US military/foreign policy establishment wants North Korea to disarm so that it can give them a Carthaginian peace. Until
then, they are content to do their cushy jobs and rake in the money from South Korean businessmen.
Moon would probably like to unite the two Koreas and kick US out. But then, the US mil/fp would sanction him and all Korea.
This was yet another photo op on the road to nowhere with our reality show presidency. As Conway Twitty sang, "it's only make
believe." The path to "normalisation" with NK winds through SK.
An excellent article from Tom Engelhardt on Consortium News, in which he attempts to explain how the USA had the world
at its feet, and squandered the chance to do good and instead went on a series of further Imperial military adventures:
https://consortiumnews.com/2019/02/21/the-neocons-have-their-caesar/
American diplomacy still consists of behaving like a bull in a china shop: do what we say or die.
Time to grow up, it's not the 1990's. You're just another country, and we're not so frightened any more.
Kevin Gray @DrKevinGray Former SK
unification minister Chong Se-hyun suggests that summit was derailed by last minute attendance of Bolton, who added demands
for NK to also report chemical/biological weapons, in response to which NKs increased their demand for sanctions relief
in Korean
We've given up everything, they have given up nothing. Every time I hear a Neocon say this on FOX / CNN I want .. follow
up question {answered} as in, 'like what?' What has the U.S.[ A given up. [please note that unless you are a member of
the 527 persons that make up the USA, you the " WE does not include you. Americans get to elect by a vary strained highly
polarized (Republican vs Democrat) process, 525 persons under Article I, but not the two persons who are the CEOs that govern
the USA ?
Americans cannot elected the CEOs that make all of the decisions. The CEOs of the USA are elected by persons who many or may
not be Americans, have a look PLEASE!
... ... ...
The N. Koreans have stopped ALL nuclear and ballistic missile testing. We the U.S. have put in place even more draconian sanctions
under Trump than were in place before. We raised the ante. We have more room to give then the N. Koreans do.<= once again I remind
you that the " WE d/n include you..
Posted by: Christian Chuba | Feb 28, 2019 8:22:32 AM | 5
So we give up nothing, not even a temporary ease in sanctions and they give up their nuclear weapons program in whole, what a
deal.
Its obvious that even if Trump went there with the intention of making a realistic two sided deal the permanent war state would
just scuttle it anyway by refusing to follow the plan or staging some new provocation like some war games or bomber fly over.
DPRK has to see that after Iran complied with the inspections regime and abandoned its civilian nuclear program the goal post
was moved to not even being allowed to have ballistic missiles.
What I don't understand is how long before South Korea demands we respect its sovereignty in it's own military affairs and
asks us to remove a sizable chunk of our war machine so a lasting peace can be made. Can South Korea not forge its own tit-for-tat
peace plan with the North that makes sense to both sides and tell the US not to interfere, sabotage or ask it to leave? It seems
the opportunity is ripe to exclude the empty suit Trump and his group of Neo-con madmen and forge ahead with opening up trade
and mutual thawing of feeling in Koreas, but is there political will to do so in South Korea?
The link @12 is another form of apology for Trump. Essentially, an insanity defense:
All of this not only gave Americans a visibly unhinged president -- think of him, in axis-of-evil terms, as a rogue state
of one -- but an increasingly unhinged country. You can feel so much of this in Trump's confused and confusing attempts to
both end American wars and ratchet them up . . .
[So] ... think of this piece as an obituary of sorts ... not as an obituary for a single loopy president, a man who ...
was elevated to a strange version of power by a troubled republic showing signs of wear and tear [but of a nation] .
. . whatever Donald Trump does, the Caesarian die was cast early in this century as the neocons crossed their own Rubicon.
It's not Trump's fault - it's the neocons! They constructed a system that allowed for the election of this "loopy" President and
are using him for their own ends.
Sure, the neocons deserve much blame but the Deep State and their US President compatriots (Bush Sr., Clinton, Bush Jr., Obama,
and Trump) are also guilty just as the driver of the getaway car is just as guilty as the bank robbers.
IMO, the key was laid bare by Trump: "Basically they wanted the sanctions lifted in their entirety, and we couldn't
do that." [My Emphasis]
Wouldn't or couldn't? Using "couldn't" tells me that possibility was zero to begin with and Bolton's appearance had nothing
to do with anything other than the fact that the impasse was pre-determined. Kim knew it would happen; I was 99% sure it would
happen; and of course Trump knew. And that's where it will likely remain until 2021, although there's a slight possibility that
the UNSC sanctions will be modified and lessened.
Escobar's
recap of recent events seems rather bland, although between the lines I think he's saying that solving Kashmir is more important
than solving Afghanistan, an important point overlooked too long.
So, Koreans are left to their own devices and will continue their unification drive, while the quadrangular relations between
China, Russia, and the two Koreas will grow tighter; all of which serve to increase pressure on Abe and Japan to drop the Empire's
line.
It would be easy to be put off by the failure of the summit under the Americans' blatent treachery, but it is probably better
that way.
Consider what would happen if the US and NK were to have a "fantastically successful" summit with agreements signed - what
are the chances that the US would subsequently honour their commitments? NILL. What would be the effect on NK if NK does not honour
it's commitments? Devastating at best.
Because of the US' well-established behaviour patterns, it is hard to imagine how NK could benefit from signing an agreement
with the US - any concrete agreement - the US will ignore it's commitments, while forcing NK to abide by its commitments.
Therefore a situation in which the US clearly shows itself to be the treacherous partner while the NK side is beyond reproach
is the perfect outcome for NK, allowing her to establish a good reputation in world public opinion and - hopefully - together
with SK find their own way to achieve peaceful reunification without the US.
Peaceful reunification with US blessing was never on the cards and never will be.
Fortunately Kim Jong-Un has thus far been truly masterful in playing his cards, getting the geostrategic benefits at each throw,
while the US only succeed in clearly establishing their treachery and progressively undermining their geostrategic hand.
With support from China and Russia, may the two Koreas eventually successfully achieve their own peaceful reunification without
the US!
thanks b... aside from liking what @26 psychohistorian said, i wonder who really benefits from these sanctions the usa is so quick
to use as a tool against others impose or maintain? the usa appears to be built on this system of financial sanctions and can't
function without it.. is it that the thought of north and south korea working together means the usa gets cut out of the action?
is that a big part of it?? at some point it is going to happen anyway... same deal russia and the rest of europe and same deal
iran and the rest of the world... it seems to me the usa is squandering all the promise they might have had at one time by catering
to whoever profits from these financial sanction routines..
so yeah.. it is back to rome didn't fall in a day, and the usa's time is coming soon enough..
A large impediment to North Korea achieving a lifting of sanctions is the long list of UNSC resolutions establishing global unanimity
for a sanctions regime.
The US has managed to corral China and Russia to join these sanctions.
However, a case can be made that since no nuke testing has transpired, no missile tests have continued, and the threat to neighbors
and the region is now flat-lined, North Korea should be acting, not with the US alone, but with all the UNSC and other nations,
in a way that demonstrates it is walking from nuclear development and ICBM achievement.
We shall see if Russia and China can press this argument in order to pursue economic development as a reward for international
inspection and IAEA control of the NK nuclear program.
What the US wants is to get Moon out of the picture and retain fanatical South Korean leadership that would be against North
Korea development. Trump may see the potential in North Korea, but the MIC and Deep State absolutely do not want to have to leave
South Korea as a base.
To the posters who think Russia should intervene everywhere... Just reading on Orlov's blog and he pointed to an article he wrote
about Russia and Putin in 2014 from a Valdai meeting---Putin--
"5. Russia has no intention of going fishing in the murky waters created by America's ever-expanding "empire of chaos,"
and has no interest in building a new empire of her own (this is unnecessary; Russia's challenges lie in developing her already
vast territory).
Neither is Russia willing to act as a savior of the world, as she had in the past."
as you and many others have noted, the US argument seems to be "give up your nukes so we can Libya you into oblivion". if
venezuela had nukes would they be putting up with the incessant stupidity of the "blob"? they'd still have sanctions but i doubt
the dumb twats running the surrounding countries would be as eager to aid and abet US hijinks.
i know it's based in "realism" or "realpolitik" or whatever euphemism for "do what we say or be murdered" people prefer, but
south korea not telling the west to kiss the tastiest part of its ass and siding with the dprk and china to settle things is just
absurd. other than financial punishment, what are they afraid of? no more disgusting tainted beef? no more deliveries of WWIII-level
military gear without permission? a drop in sex tourism among pasty white anglos?
at least this does away with all pretense of trump being a "peace president" in the slightest. that was always a fantasy of
the MAGA/"we liek him cuz hes xtian lol" crowd to begin with but now even the suggestion of such is laughable.
i despise trudeau and all, but this oddly timed "scandal" is based on nothing but one woman's testimony (as believable as she
is) and the screeching of the scumbag conservatives along with their bootlickers in the media. global and CTV have always been
conservative party infomercials but lately it's just ridiculous.
saying "a canadian politician did a corrupt thing" is like saying "we caught water being wet". odd how canada has a reputation
as being "smarter" than the US yet its citizens have already forgotten the ten years of dripping, oily sleaze under harper and
his coterie of fat doughy apes (the fattest and oiliest of which - jason kenney - has been oozing from the telly screen on a constant
basis on said channels).
with his repulsive bootlicking on the huawei affair and venezuela, it's easy to want justin out yesterday . but any
conservative taking his place will be harper 2.0 and therefore trump's maple mini-me.
ot - @36 karlof1... next election is oct 2019... it probably doesn't matter as i doubt very much he gets elected in october..
it is kinda true what the pair is saying @40 too... we will get getting our version of trump, as we are one cycle behind the usa...
some conservative jackass will be running canada towards the end of the year to make matters even worse.. canucks are not all
that bright, lol..
South Koreans, where are you? You should be camping 24/7 in front of the U.S. embassy, demanding the immediate removal of sanctions.
The unification will never happen if you don't take a more active stance.
The international community wants it, North Koreans want it, it all comes down to you. Kick the American troops out, break
up your chaebols, and start the unification process. Any sanctions the U.S might impose on you will be more than offset by cheap
Russian pipeline gas, a rail link to Europe, and an economic boom due to integration with the North. What are you waiting for?
You may never have another chance like this.
@38 b:
Thank you very much for the update, b. I am pleased that the DPRK called the press conference. It is a pity the video has been
viewed only 1179 times.
The 1st part is the prepared statement read out by foreign minister Ri Yong Ho with english translation following. The 2nd
part of the interview consists of Q&A (sound quality v bad). It mainly reiterates the 1st part, but from 10:25 on, she says that
(an) American Inspector(s) visited a factory called "Yun Soo" within the Yong Byon. She wanted to emphasise that that factory
was put on the table for closure as well by DPRK.
Given that the sanctions the DPRK was seeking to be lifted were not US imposed sanctions, but UN sanctions, can the UN Sec
Gen intervene (kind of like what happened in Yemen)?
It does make one wonder why POTUS said that DPRK was seeking the removal of ALL sanctions. Was he expecting something like
this? It is so easy to refute that the fact it was said at all is intriguing.
Otto B@33 - I suppose I can't argue with your logic - especially if this was part of an 'Art of the Deal' seminar. I will simply
point out that your premise completely ignores what US citizens think is in THEIR best interests.
Pulling out all of our forces from South Korea permanently and ending sanctions on North Korea would be more than enough for
them to denuclearize (and probably unify with the South). THAT is in US citizens' best interests, period. Chickenhawks within
the US government are the only ones demanding an eternal occupation of South Korea and an eternal standoff with North Korea. They
sell this as a necessary price to pay for 'security', except we're damn tired of hearing about our psychopathic leaders' manufactured
enemy and we don't need protection from it.
Same goes for Iran, despite their nuclear capabilities, or lack thereof. 'Protecting US interests' is not 'protecting the US'.
No amount of marketing or propaganda is going to make Iran a credible threat to the US or its citizens EVER. We don't need protection
from a manufactured enemy. Three million people (give or take a million) were slaughtered in Southeast Asia to protect us against
the last manufactured enemy: those homicidal CHICOMs. I don't recall seeing any fresh, bloody human heads mounted on pikes in
downtown Hanoi during the talks this weekend. How is that possible?
I don't need a better Iranian 'deal'. I need my psychopathic leaders to stop antagonizing the hell out of Iran and stop punishing
the Iranian people. Israel's psychopathic obsession with destroying Iran or somehow containing its regional influence has NOTHING
to do with the security of US citizens - despite the incessant narrative. Are you honestly expecting the little people in the
US to believe the DC chickenhawks or the MSM again?
RT editorial savages BigLie Media
for the usual reasons--but--in choosing to highlight
Susan Rice's NY Times op/ed
in an attempt to discredit her, she actually suggests the very sort of incremental moves agreed to in the initial summit's Declaration:
"To move the needle, the United States and North Korea will need to agree on a series of incremental, reciprocal steps that
would build mutual confidence as part of a road map to full denuclearization."
Oops!! All in all, the editorialist misrepresents Rice, which is what he accuses BigLie Media of doing--OUCH!
Rice's conclusion will surprise a few here:
"In Hanoi, Mr. Trump has an opportunity to achieve incremental progress toward denuclearization. Unfortunately, history suggests
that Mr. Trump will be content with another colorful photo opportunity and more diplomatic shadow boxing that perpetuates the
illusion of success, while running down the clock on a nearly intractable challenge."
And it seems Trump lied about the impasse that led to Kim walking out, proving that Kim's initial assessment of Trump as
dotard was 100% correct.
@27 Jose Garcia: "My question. What will South Korea do now?"
Well, they only have two choices:
Option 1: Continue to be the USA's loyal lapdog, in which case several million of them are doomed to die in the (increasingly
inevitable) replay of the 1950-2 war.
Option 2: Hold secret talks with North Korea that lead to the surprise signing of a peace treaty that contains a clause that
says "Both Koreas agree that no foreign forces shall be stationed on the Korean Peninsular". Then brace themselves to be sanctioned
within an inch of their lives.
They'll go hungry under Option 2, and it will be inevitable that they flip into the "Chinese orbit". But they'll still be alive,
which is not nothin'.
They'll make a stab at Option 2, because under Option 1 they'll all end up dead.
Actually there is one sane reason to think the Chinese aren't engaged in economic warfare against the north: a Shengyang
rail link to Seoul via Pyongyang. This could be constructed in less than 3 years and will take some pressure off congestion in
the Bohai Sea-Yellow Sea shipping lanes. And provide efficient transport of materials, goods & people in new & expanded markets.
I'm sure there are others.
Thank you b for the timely update on the latest theatrical entertainment, Nobel Peace Prize episode
Agreed ff but regarding the Trump timeline from afar he has deliberately and methodically filled the white house staff with
more and more extreme people. Slowly boiling the frog comes to mind. We are supposed to be acclimatized to this huckster being
surrounded by hawks whereas he and his entire family are predators more deadly than hawks.
S #42
Thank you, you nailed it. Perhaps the assembled mass of South Koreans in front of the US embassy could wear a vest symbolising
healing or unity. Perhaps they could assemble around a UN flag demanding that it back off from being a USA puppet. I don't recall
having seen a UN flag burned yet but it would be an appropriate symbol from South Korea, or Haiti, or Libya, or......
Thank you again b and all the comrade writers, it has been a great read.
What I can't understand is why NK would give up its nuclear capability without requiring the empire to do the same. It isn't equitable
for NK to give up its nukes for the mere promise of the empire to not place nuclear weapons on the Korean peninsula. The empire
could still strike Nk from outside the peninsula. What's good for one country is good for the other.
For your Option #2 to fly, the existing treaty with Outlaw US Empire must be negated along with the entire arrangement with
UN that's existed since 1950. Given Imperial intransigence combined with ever escalating political will within RoK, such a happening
may occur before 2020 begins.
The most
recent article on reunification I was able to find in English is 3 months old and provides grounds for optimism given the
concept's positive direction. IMO, Moon and Kim need to continue down the path they've made for each other,, while the diplomatic
action moves into the UNSC which is where most of the sanctions were born and the only venue where they can be rescinded.
I always check my comments in preview, often many times. The URL seemed to be fine. It works. However, I'll be more cognizant
in the future with any long URLs.
For South Korea to do as you suggest, Japan must do exactly the same. The South Koreans are more afraid of what Japan
would do if they (SK, that is) were to throw out the Americans, downsize their own military and start a reunification or a "one-state-two-systems"
process, and Japan does not follow suit with demilitarisation.
I want to add some more thought to those I shared with Jen. What about the Philippines? I think that at this time in history all
of the outposts of empire are at risk.
I think that Trump represents a pivot from containment of China/Russia to one of
"Quick, pull what pieces of empire we can defend/control together."
I think that the West is delusional to think they can defeat any alternative that doesn't have profit as its God. That
said, that monotheistic myth of "better than others" runs deep as evidenced by some of the opinions expressed in this venue
Are we going to see the dominoes of empire fall? I damn well hope so!
Is it not funny how the boss Bolton shows up at negotiations and El Presidente falls into (his unrealistic) line? El Presidente
de la republica bananera is just a low level employee of his own staff BullbyTon and Pompous Maximus.
Nobody asked this here yet, but how did we get to US negotiating against NK on behalf of UN Security Council ?
Who did China and Russia on the Security Council serve, did they get anything for their service to the republica bananera?
One can recognise how ruthless US is, but one also has to recognise how worthless China and Russia are. US ignores UN
Resolutions it does not like and uses UN Resolutions it initiated as a head-club for achieving its goals whilst China and Russia
go along. This is exactly why the things are as they are - the Selfish Human Condition.
Oh, we are all so happy when someone does not do like the majority of the worthless humanity does (Russia out of own interest
in Syria). Otherwise, back to being the usual shitbags.
@60 Karlof1 As ever, it is instructive to read the text of a treaty.
In this particular case the treaty between South Korea and the USA contains within it the answers to your concerns.
1) either party can end the treaty with 12 month notice.
2) the stationing of US troops is by mutual agreement I.e. if South Korea "No longer agrees" to US troops stationed on its soil
then those troops have to leave.
Uncle Sam would have no grounds to refuse, as the treaty itself says that both signatories have to agree. And, no, the treaty
doesn't have to be "renegotiated" to produce that outcome: the South Koreans need only say "we don't agree any more".
That's what the treaty says, so that's what the treaty means.
Nothing will change until S Korea decides to be an independent country instead of a low vassal. Watching a foreign country
negotiate peace in your own civil war without being at the table must be deeply humiliating to at least some S Koreans surely?
As for the sanctions, if the Koreas re-united as ROK and the DPRK disappeared as an entity, I assume the UN sanctions on extinct
entity would be void.
It's significant that the current PM of Japan is a grandson of a politician with a very dark past, and moreover idolises his
grandfather and believes the policies he followed were right.
You and I live in the year 2019 but the issue is whether Shinzo Abe does.
For that reason South Korea is unlikely to demilitarise and get rid of its US bases unless Japan commits to doing the same.
The two countries also continue to dispute the ownership of a set of islands called the Liancourt islands in the Sea of Japan,
midway between the two nations.
Former SK unification minister Chong Se-hyun suggests that summit was derailed by last minute attendance of Bolton, who added
demands for NK to also report chemical/biological weapons, in response to which NKs increased their demand for sanctions relief
South Korea is a puppet government of the US. Its constitution was written by the US and its early leaders were those who worked
with the Japanese during the occupation. Anyone against the government and continued occupation by foreign forces was labelled
Commmunist and shot. Up until the late 80's South Korea was under martial law
While much of the population is aware of this being humiliated by foreign powers has been a way of life for over a century.
Reunification is a pipe dream unless the North is under the Empires control and the US will not pull out even then because its
conveniently located at Russia and Chinas borders
I can imagine Trump talking to Kim and asking him how he would like to live like him and the global elite. It worked with Gorbachev
and Deng. Just need to adopt the neoliberal religion and loot the resources of your own people (bottom 95%) for eventual handover
to the Empire (privatization or sending cash back to buy Treasuries and other investments).
My guess is Kim and NK elite live pretty well already, but who knows. In any event he knows he cant trust them.
[sigh...] Yes, you're right. I suppose I got kind of got carried away there. But I can't believe the polls
'50% approval rating' for the Syrian retaliatory strike, at least in my little world.
Most people I encounter through the day, especially college kids and millennial debt slaves, don't care about Syria
or Israel and never will. Zero expectations of their government and can't understand why some old people are concerned about distant
wars.
They feel absolutely no responsibility for the actions of the US government any more than they feel responsible for the actions
of their next door neighbors. Society is slowly devolving itself in toad freak show!
I posted this over at TAE. It might resonate with some few. Any one who has held on to their sanity, surely sees the fantastical
reality created by twisted people and their twisted ideals. If that accurate vision is the context from which the U.S. is framed;
then its true health is obvious.
A sick society ruled by equally sick fascisti
Record numbers of U.S. citizens are leaving for distant places they view as an improvement. If in fact they find respite; it
will likely not last, until and unless the U.S. is brought to ground.
May I suggest there is a small matter of war reparations owed by the USA that needs immediate resolution well prior to any
yak yak about denuclear strategies. Ms Susan Rice's piece also blithely ignores that question. And so do all the yankees as they
are fully liable for an unwarranted assault on Korea - both north and south - and reparations are immediately owed to the north.
Pay up yankees.
Will someone tell that to John Bolt-on. I would love see his mustache quiver.
@77 Karlof1 "Guess I need to find a way to create more time to do stuff as I know I'm skimming way too much."
It's not difficult to dig out the source text, and most international treaties relating to Int'l Humanitarian Law are not exactly
dense reads.
The Kellogg-Briand Pact is a mere three articles long, with the first two being single sentences. The Mutual Defense Treaty
between the USA and South Korea consists of only six articles.
The NATO Charter is but fourteen articles long. The Hague Regulations are a comparatively hefty fifty-six articles, but even
the UN Charter - an outlier if ever there was one - contains only 111 Articles.
The Geneva Conventions are much longer but, boy, do the Swiss like to talk.
But none are like slogging through some Hemingway or Melville. Simple prose, as unambiguous as possible while still satisfying
all the negotiators.
I've just read two articles that in one fell swoop can explain a large part of Trump's behaviour, together with policies to eliminate
nuclear arms control, first strike policies, apocalyptic policies towards Iran and North Korea, policies towards Israel, policies
aimed at blowing up the Middle East, willingness and eagerness to precipitate destruction and chaos on a global scale, precipitate
policies towards Russia and China, support for Islamic jihadism, anti-environmentalism, and climate denial:
The key are the so-called "Rapture Christians" nuts - of whom there are 12 in Trump's cabinet [out of how many?]. I've never
looked into this obscure sect of insane nutcases before, but people urgently need to understand this phenomenon - they are an
obscure sect, but they hold the keys to political power in the US, and have determined the key political events of the last several
decades!
These nutters are a million times more dangerous than Islamic jihadists - they have no fear of all-out nuclear war, global
destruction, climate change, environmental devastation or all the things that wise people with foresight advise against - on the
contrary they are eager to bring all these things on as soon as possible, because they associate these things with the return
of Jesus, and ascent to heaven for all the sect's believers.
A key fact in understanding this phenomenon is that they deny evolution, and a scientific basis for reality in its entirety,
and therefore are completely closed to rational argument.
Quote from the second article: 'In an April 2 Bible study, Drollinger focused on the "huge and dire error" of "radical environmentalism".
He argues that humans are incapable of destroying the earth on their own, because it is up to God to "continually renew the face
of the earth until He forms a new heaven and a new earth in the end times."'
They support Trump because they believe he is the "tool of God".
For that reason South Korea is unlikely to demilitarise and get rid of its US bases unless Japan commits to doing the same.
Posted by: Jen | Feb 28, 2019 10:54:54 PM | 74
That seems like a strange argument to me. The US is not in Korea to protect Korea from Japan, nor are they in Japan either
to protect Japan from Korea nor to protect Korea from Japan. In both cases the true target is China.
If the two Korea's unite it will necessarily be under the military protection of Russia and China - there is no other possibility,
because they need protection from the US. Both Koreas are obviously much safer under Russian and Chinese protection than under
US "protection" - the latter being no more than mafia style "protection".
In this case Japan would clearly oppose such an arrangement - in allignment with the US - therefore the last thing [imperialist]
Japan would want would be the pull-out of the US (what ordinary Japanese people might want is another matter - unfortunately they
have no say).
Mig-21-Block 70-2022 , Mar 1, 2019 7:34:39 AM |
link
N.K. should just ask Russia to buy 1000 warehoused MIGs 21 refurbished for year 2023 and thats it!
Kim should go for a No deal with the US.
Mig 21s just shot down brand new f-16s over in India.
Whole world world including Chinese airmen are laughing.
Well maybe except the starving Greeks threw 1 bill. eu out of the window for a new deal with Trumps Lokheed for f-16 modernizations.
The trio of Trump, Pompeo and Bolton, quite frankly spells failure. The leader has zero capacity to learn and understand the motivation
behind North Korea and their very exacting understanding of the English language. Every single word written has a clear and precise
meaning tied into complete sentences. The fact that is written on paper and executed by both parties memorizes the document. Trump
literally has not read the first agreement as executed. To place any faith in this trio of clowns to negotiate with the North
Koreas is laughable. The basic fact is that North Koreans will never trust the US as we literally tried to bomb all their cities
out of existence during the Korean intervention. Trump's trio does not understand the lasting impact that those actions burned
into North Korean souls. Trump is completely out his league on the world stage he has made a fool of the US.
That was my thoughts as well. The real reason Trump handlers sent him to Viet Nam was to not be around for a damning testimony.
Scotch Bingeington , Mar 1, 2019 9:42:07 AM |
link
Tom Luongo claims that Bolton's spoke in Trump's wheel was to add chemical & biological weapons to US demands (
Link
). There, just like that. Pretty clever actually. Bolton may be the king of scumbags, but he sure is resourceful. The picture
they have in the article of Bolton watching over Trump is scary and probably very telling.
"Trudeau was detonated today by his former Attorney General, Jody Wilson-Raybould, Canada's first Aboriginal A-G. She just
testified in Parliament, in meticulous detail, how Trudeau and his staff tried to get her to drop criminal charges against a corrupt
company that he liked."
Posted by: karlof1 | Feb 28, 2019 1:15:41 PM | 36
I've just finished reading the article on the testimony in the National Post, linked in Karlof1's link:
Wow! Everybody should read this! This lady is someone who deserves a lot of respect! This text is fascinating in how it details
the arm-twisting that goes on in power - nothing that would surprise us that it happens, but here it is described in black and
white by a former government witness - including even such titbits as:
"if Jody is nervous, we would of course line up all kinds of people to write OpEds saying that what she is doing is proper."
Hey, James, you have some good Ministers over there in Canada, despite the more famous ones. Erm, well, one. Erm, well, had.
I am interested in some of the things she is declining to speak about (due to confidentiality of counsel issues), and am wondering
if that might include the Huawei CFO issues, for which she was in a pertinent position. Any connections to the dates 11th February,
and 19th February? (Actually I was travelling at that time so was out of the loop). Then there is the meeting with the PM on 17th
September, requested 2 weeks earlier, which seems to have been intended primarily about something other than the SNC affair. The
Huawei CFO was arrested in early December, I think, so that should be something else.
"...Mig 21s just shot down brand new f-16s over in India.Whole world world including Chinese airmen are laughing.Well maybe
except the starving Greeks threw 1 bill. eu out of the window for a new deal with Trumps Lokheed for f-16 modernizations."
Maybe laughing but maybe not, this fellow seems to feel they are evenly matched depending on their respective upgrades and
concludes by saying it comes down to pilot expertise. BTW he considers Pak as having superior pilots.
reply to Scotch Bingeington 93
"....The picture they have in the article of Bolton watching over Trump is scary and probably very telling."
Yes, I am inclined to think Bolton was foisted upon him. I do think he chose Pompeo though.
Another very telling photo is that of Trump at Bush Sr.'s funeral, in the row behind him was Chaney, the look on Chaney's face
as he stared at Trump's back was very interesting to me, he looked almost afraid.
President Moon's confidence remains strong despite summit outcome.
He tweeted this [machine translation] earlier today:
"Independence of spirit and national integration based on the 'faith based system'considerably.
Please gather all the power of the people.
Peace on the Korean peninsula will drive new economic growth across the North and South, encompassing Northeast Asia, ASEAN and
Eurasia."
Today marks then 100th anniversary of the Declaration of Korean Independence, and Moon makes clear
in his speech that there was and is
only one Korea and one Korean people:
"One hundred years ago today, there was no South and North Korea.
"From Seoul and Pyeongyang to Jinnampo, Anju, Seoncheon, Uiju and Wonsan, loud chants of [the masses] erupted on the same day,
and these calls for independence spread like a wildfire to every corner of the country.
"For two months from March 1, [mass] protests took place in 211 out of the total 220 cities and counties across the country
regardless of the region – whether they belonged to what is now a part of South or North Korea."
Gotta love Moon's optimism in his closing remarks:
"The history of the past 100 years proves that we can achieve changes and innovation if we do not lose hope no matter how difficult
our present reality is.
"Over the next 100 years, the growth of the people will directly lead to the growth of the nation. When unity is achieved from
within by moving beyond ideological confrontations, and when peace and prosperity are accomplished from outside, genuine independence
will be completed."
I'd be very interested in discovering what Kim did today. Hopefully, he, too, gave an address similar to Moon's.
@94 BM - maybe Jody Wilson-Raybould can run for the prime ministers job if she can get on the top of the heap of the liberal party..
chances of this are slim!
If so, economics will suffer and chances for Trump for re-election are much lower, of exist at all due to all his betrayals
In the fable of "The Boy Who Cried Wolf," the wolf actually arrives at the end. Never forget that. Peak oil will arrive. We don't
know when, and we are not prepared for it.
Shale play without more borrowed money might be the next Venezuela. .
I am now of the opinion that 2018 will be the peak in crude oil production, not 2019 as I earlier predicted. Russia is slowing down
and may have peaked. Canada is slowing down and Brazil is slowing down. OPEC likely peaked in 2016. It is all up to the USA. Can
shale oil save us from peak oil?
OPEC + Russia + Canada, about 57% of world oil production.
"I am now of the opinion that 2018 will be the peak in crude oil production, not 2019 as I earlier predicted. Russia
is slowing down and may have peaked. Canada is slowing down and Brazil is slowing down. OPEC likely peaked in 2016. It is all
up to the USA. Can shale oil save us from peak oil?"
IEA´s Oil 2019 5y forecast has global conventional oil on a plateau, i.e. declines and growth match each other perfectly
and net growth will come from LTO, NGL, biofuels and a small amount of other unconventional and "process gains".
Iran is ofc a jocker, since it can quickly add supply. Will be interesting to see how Trump will proceed.
I am quite original in my opinion about Peak Oil. I think it took place in late 2015. I will explain. If we define Peak Oil as
the maximum in production over a certain period of time we will not know it has taken place for a long time, until we lose the
hope of going above. That is not practical, as it might take years.
I prefer to define Peak Oil as the point in time when vigorous growth in oil production ended and we entered an undulating
plateau when periods of slow growth and slow decline will alternate, affected by oil price and variable demand by economy until
we reach terminal decline in production permanently abandoning the plateau towards lower oil production.
The 12-year rate of growth in C+C production took a big hit in late 2015 and has not recovered. The increase in 2 Mb since
is just an anemic 2.5% over 3 years or 0.8% per year, and it keeps going down. This is plateau behavior since there was no economic
crisis to blame. It will become negative when the economy sours.
Peak Oil has already arrived. We are not recognizing it because production still increases a little bit, but we are in Peak
Oil mode. Oil production will decrease a lot more easily that it will increase over the next decade. The economy is going to be
a real bitch.
Interesting thesis, keep in mind that the price of oil was relatively low from 2015 to 2018 because for much of the period
there was an excess of oil stocks built up over the 2013 to 2015 period when output growth outpaced demand growth due to very
high oil prices. Supply has been adequate to keep oil prices relatively low through March 2019 and US sanctions on Iran, political
instability in Libya and Venezuela, and action by OPEC and several non-OPEC nations to restrict supply have resulted in slower
growth in oil output.
Eventually World Petroleum stocks will fall to a level that will drive oil prices higher, there is very poor visibility for
World Petroleum Stocks, so there may be a 6 to 12 month lag between petroleum stocks falling to critically low levels and market
realization of that fact, by Sept to Dec 2019 this may be apparent and oil prices may spike (perhaps to $90/b by May 2020).
At that point we may start to see some higher investment levels with higher output coming 12 to 60 months later (some projects
such as deep water and Arctic projects take a lot of time to become operational, there may be some OPEC projects that might be
developed as well, there are also Canadian Oil sands projects that might be developed in a high oil price environment.
I define the peak as the highest 12 month centered average World C+C output, but it can be define many different ways.
Our capability to store oil is very limited considering the volume being moved at any time from production to consumption.
I understand that it is the marginal price of the last barrel of oil that sets the price for oil, but given the relatively inexpensive
oil between 2015 and now, and the fact that we have not been in an economical crisis, what is according to you the cause that
world oil production has grown so anemically these past three years?
Do you think that if oil had been at 20$/b as it used to be for decades the growth in consumption/production would have been
significantly higher?
I'll give you a hint, with real negative interest rates and comparatively inexpensive oil most OECD economies are unable to
grow robustly.
To me Peak Oil is an economical question, not a geological one. The geology just sets the cost of production (not the price)
too high, making the operation uneconomical. It is the economy that becomes unable to pump more oil. That's why the beginning
of Peak Oil can be placed at late 2015.
The economic system has three legs, cheap energy, demographic growth, and debt growth. All three are failing simultaneously
so we are facing the perfect storm. Social unrest is the most likely consequence almost everywhere.
If prices are low that means there is plenty of oil supply relative to demand. It also means that some oil cannot be produced
profitably, so oil companies invest less and oil output grows more slowly.
So you seem to have the story backwards. Low oil prices means low growth in supply.
So if oil prices were $20/b, oil supply would grow more slowly, we have had an oversupply of oil that ls what led to low oil
prices. When oil prices increase, supply growth will ne higher. Evause profits will be higher and there will be more investment.
It is you who has it backwards, as you only see the issue from an oil price point of view, and oil price responds to supply
and demand, and higher prices are an estimulus to higher production.
But there is a more important point of view, because oil is one of the main inputs of the economy. If the price of oil is sufficiently
low it stimulates the economy. New businesses are created, more people go farther on vacation, and so on, increasing oil demand
and oil production. If the price is sufficiently high it depresses the economy. A higher percentage of wealth is transferred from
consumer countries to producing countries and consumer countries require more debt. During the 2010-2014 period high oil prices
were sustained by the phenomenal push of the Chinese economy, while European and Japanese economies suffered enormously and their
oil consumption depressed and hasn't fully recovered since.
In the long term it is the economy that pumps the oil, and that is what you cannot understand.
The economy decides when and how Peak Oil takes place. If you knew that you wouldn't bother with all those models.
And in my opinion the economy already decided in late 2015 when the drive to increase oil production to compensate for low
oil prices couldn't be sustained.
Both supply and demand matter. I understand economics quite well thank you. You are correct that the economy is very important,
it will determine oil prices to some degree especially on the demand side of the market. If one looks at the price of oil and
economic growth or GDP, there is very little correlation.
The fact is the World economy grew quite nicely from 2011 to 2014 when oil prices averaged over $100/b.
There may be some point that high oil prices are a problem, apparently $100/b in 2014 US$ is below that price. Perhaps at $150/b
your argument would be correct. Why would the economy need more oil when oil prices are low? The low price is a signal that there
is too much oil being produced relative to the demand for oil.
I agree the economy will be a major factor in when peak oil occurs, but as most economists understand quite well, it is both
supply and demand that will determine market prices for oil.
My models are based on the predictions of the geophysicists at the USGS (estimating TRR for tight oil) and the economists at
the EIA (who attempt to predict future oil prices). Both predictions are used as inputs to the model along with past completion
rates and well productivity and assumptions about potential future completion rates and future well productivity, bounded by the
predictions of both the USGS and the EIA along with economic assumptions about well cost, royalties and taxes, transport costs,
discount rate, and lease operating expenses.
Note that my results for economically recoverable resources are in line with the USGS TRR mean estimates and are somewhat lower
when the economic assumptions are applied (ERR/TRR is roughly 0.85), the EIA AEO has economically recoverable tight oil resources
at about 115% of the USGS mean TRR estimate. The main EIA estimate I use is their AEO reference oil price case (which may be too
low with oil prices gradually rising to $110/b (2017$) by 2050.
Assumptions for Permian Basin are royalties and taxes 33% of wellhead revenue, transport cost $5/b, LOE=$2.3/b plus $15000/month,
annual discount rate is 10%/year and well cost is $10 million, annual interest rate is 7.4%/year, annual inflation rate assumed
to be 2.5%/year, income tax and revenue from natural gas and NGL are ignored all dollar costs in constant 2017 US$.
You do incredible work Dennis and I believe you are correct. Demand for oil is relatively inelastic which accounts for huge price
swings when inventories get uncomfortably high or low. If supply doesn't keep up with our needs, price will rise to levels that
will eventually create more supply and create switching into other energy sources which will reduce demand.
Why would the economy need more oil when oil prices are low? The low price is a signal that there is too much oil being
produced relative to the demand for oil.
You don't seem to be aware of historical oil prices. For inflation adjusted oil prices since 1946 oil (WTI) spent:
27 years below $30
13 years at ~ $70
18 years at ~ $40
10 years at ~ $90
5 years at ~ $50 https://www.macrotrends.net/1369/crude-oil-price-history-chart
And the fastest growth in oil production took place precisely at the periods when oil was cheapest.
You simply cannot be more wrong about that.
And your models are based on a very big assumption, that the geology of the reserves is determinant for Peak Oil. It is not.
There is plenty of oil in the world, but the extraction of most of it is unaffordable. The economy will decide (has decided) when
Oil Peak takes place and what happens afterwards. Predictions/projections aren't worth a cent as usual. You could save yourself
the trouble.
I use both geophysics and economics, it is not one or the other it is both of these that will determine peak oil.
Of course oil prices have increased, the cheapest oil gets produced first and oil gradually gets more expensive as the marginal
barrel produced to meet demand at the margin is more costly to produce.
Real Oil Prices do not correlate well with real economic growth and on a microeconomic level the price of oil will affect profits
and willingness of oil companies to invest which in turn will affect future output. Demand will be a function of both economic
output and efficiency improvements in the use of oil.
Also keep in mind that during the 1945-1975 period economic growth rates were very high as population growth rates were very
high and the World economy was expanding rapidly as population grew and the World rebuilt in the aftermath of World War 2. Oil
was indeed plentiful and cheap over this period and output grew rapidly to meet expanding World demand for oil. The cheapness
of the oil led to relatively inefficient use of the resource, as constraints in output became evident and more expensive offshore,
Arctic oil were extracted oil prices increased and there was high volatility due to Wars in the Middle east and other political
developments. Oil output (C+C) since 1982 has grown fairly steadily at about an 800 kb/d annual average each year, oil prices
move up and down in response to anticipated oil stock movements and are volatile because these estimates are often incorrect (the
World petroleum stock numbers are far from transparent.)
On average since the Iran/Iraq crash in output (1982-2017) World output has grown by about 1.2% per year and 800 kb/d per year
on average, prices have risen or fallen when there was inadequate or excess stocks of petroleum, this pattern (prices adjusting
to stock levels) is likely to continue.
There has been little change when we compare 1982 to 1999 to 1999-2017 (divide overall period of interest in half) for either
percentage increase of absolute increase in output.
I would agree that severe shortages of oil supply relative to demand (likely apparent by 2030) is likely to lead to an economic
crisis as oil prices rise to levels that the World economy cannot adjust to (my guess is that this level will be $165/b in 2018$).
Potentially high oil prices might lead to faster adoption of alternative modes of transport that might avert a crisis, but that
is too optimistic a scenario even for me.
China will be in outright deflation soon enough. Economic stimulus is starting to fail in China. They can't fill the so called
bathtub up fast enough to keep pace with the water draining out the bottom. So to speak.
Interest rates in China will soon be exactly where they are in Europe and Japan. Maybe lower.
In order to get oil to $90-$100 the value of the dollar is going to have to sink a little bit. In order to get oil to $140-$160
the dollar has to make a new all time low. Anybody predicting prices shooting up to $200 needs the dollar index to sink to 60
or below.
The reality is oil is going to $20. Because the rest of the world outside the US is failing. Dennis makes some nice graphs
and charts and under his assumptions his charts and graphs are correct. But his assumptions aren't correct.
We got $20 oil and an economic depression coming.
Peak Oil is going to be deflationary as hell. Higher prices aren't in the cards even when a shortage actually shows up. We
will get less supply at a lower price. Demand destruction is actually going to happen when economies and debt bubbles implode
so we actually can't be totally sure we are ever going to see an actual shortage.
We could very well be producing 20-30% less oil than we do now and still not have a shortage.
Oh and EV's are going to have to compete with $20 oil not $150 oil.
When do you expect the oil price to reach $20/b? We will have to see when this occurs.
It may come true when EVs and AVs have decimated demand for oil in 2050, but not before. EIA's oil price reference scenario
from AEO 2019 below. That is a far more realistic prediction (though likely too low especially when peak oil arrives in 2025),
oil prices from $100 to $160/b in 2018 US$ are more likely from 2023 to 2035 (for three year centered average Brent oil price).
My assumptions are based on USGS mean resource estimates and EIA oil price estimates, as well as BIS estimates for the World
monetary and financial system.
Your assumption that oil prices are determined by exchange rates only is not borne out by historical evidence. Exchange
rates are a minor, not a major determinant of oil prices.
Technically speaking. The most relevant trendline on price chart currently comes off the lows of 2016/02/08. It intersects
with 2017/06/19. You draw the trendline on out to where price is currently. Currently price is trying to backtest that trendline.
On a weekly price chart i'd say it touches the underside of that trendline sometime in April in the low 60's somewhere between
$62-$66 kinda depends on when it arrives there time wise. The later it takes to arrive there the higher price will be. I've been
trading well over 20 years can't tell you how many times i've seen price backtest a trendline after it's been broken. It's a very
common occurrence. And i wouldn't short oil until after it does.
But back to your question. $20 oil what kind of timetable. My best guess is 2021-2022. Might happen 2020 or 2023. And FED can
always step in and weaken the dollar. Fundamentally the only way oil doesn't sink to $20 is the FED finds a way to weaken the
dollar.
But understand the FED is the only major CB that currently doesn't have the need to open up monetary policy. It's really the
rest of the worlds CB ultra loose monetary policy which is going to drive oil to $20.
"... "If that was to happen and no energy source can cover the decline rate, wouldn't the world be pretty fucked economically thereafter? Hence one can assume or take a wild ass guess that the decline after peak would resemble something like Venezuela. So not a smooth short % decline rate." ..."
"... Realistically the global economy is already in a tight spot. It started back in 2000 when Oil prices started climbing from about $10/bbl in 1998 to about $30/bbl in 2000. Then the World Major Central banks dropped interest which ended triggering the Housing Boom\Bust and carried Oil prices to $147/bbl. Since then Interest rates have remained extremely low while World Debt has soared (expected to top $250T in 2019). ..."
"... Probably the biggest concern for me is the risking risks for another World war: The US has been targeting all of the major Oil exporters. The two remaining independent targets are Venezuela & Iran. I suspect Venzuela will be the next US take over since it will be a push over compared to Iran. ..."
"If that was to happen and no energy source can cover the decline rate, wouldn't the world be pretty fucked economically
thereafter? Hence one can assume or take a wild ass guess that the decline after peak would resemble something like Venezuela.
So not a smooth short % decline rate."
Energy is the economy, The economy cannot function without energy. Thus its logical that a decline in energy supply will reduce
the economy. The only way for this not to apply is if there are efficiency gains that offset the decline. But at this point the
majority of cost effective efficiency gains are already in place. At this point gains become increasing expensive with much smaller
gains (law of diminishing returns). Major infrastructure changes like modernizing rail lines take many decades to implement and
also require lots of capital. Real capital needed will be difficult to obtain do to population demographics (ie boomers dependent
on massive unfunded entitlement & pensions).
Realistically the global economy is already in a tight spot. It started back in 2000 when Oil prices started climbing from
about $10/bbl in 1998 to about $30/bbl in 2000. Then the World Major Central banks dropped interest which ended triggering the
Housing Boom\Bust and carried Oil prices to $147/bbl. Since then Interest rates have remained extremely low while World Debt has
soared (expected to top $250T in 2019).
My guess is that global economy will wipe saw in the future as demographics, resource depletion (including Oil) and Debt all
merge into another crisis. Gov't will act with more cheap and easy credit (since there is no alterative TINA) as well as QE\Asset
buying to avoid a global depression. This creating a wipesaw effect that has already been happening since 2000 with Boom Bust
cycles. This current cycle has lasted longer because the Major central banks kept interest rates low, When The Fed started QT
and raising rate it ended up triggering a major stock market correction In Dec 2018. I believe at this point the Fed will no longer
seek any further credit tightening that will trip the economy back into recession. However its likely they the global economy
will fall into another recession as consumers & business even without further credit tighting by CB (Central Banks) Because they've
been loading up on cheap debt, which will eventually run into issues servicing their debt. For instance there are about 7M auto
loans in delinquency in March of 2019. Stock valuations are largely driven by stock buybacks, which is funded by debt. I presume
companies are close to debt limit which is likely going to prevent them from purchase more stock back.
Probably the biggest concern for me is the risking risks for another World war: The US has been targeting all of the major
Oil exporters. The two remaining independent targets are Venezuela & Iran. I suspect Venzuela will be the next US take over since
it will be a push over compared to Iran. I think once all of remaining independent Oil Exports are seized that is when the
major powers start fighting each other. However is possible that some of the proxy nations (Pakastan\India),(Israel\Iran), etc
trigger direct war between the US, China, and Russia at any time.
Notice that the US is now withdrawing from all its major arms treaties, and the US\China\Russia are now locked into a Arms
race. Nuclear powers are now rebuilding their nuclear capacity (more Nukes) and modernizing their deployment systems (Hypersonic,
Very large MIRV ICBMS, Undersea drones, Subs, Bombers, etc.
My guess is that nations like the US & China will duke it out before collapsing into the next Venezuela. If my assessment is
correct, The current state of Venezuela will look like the garden of Eden compared to the aftermath of a full scale nuclear war.
Currently the Doomsday clock (2019) is tied with 1953 at 2 minutes:
1953 was the height of the cold war. I presume soon the Doomsday clock will be reduced to less than 2 Minutes later this
year, due to recent events in the past few weeks.
"the world's nuclear nations proceeded with programs of "nuclear modernization" that are all but indistinguishable from
a worldwide arms race, and the military doctrines of Russia and the United States have increasingly eroded the long-held taboo
against the use of nuclear weapons."
" The current international security situation -- what we call the "new abnormal" -- has extended over two years now.
It's a state as worrisome as the most dangerous times of the Cold War, a state that features an unpredictable and shifting
landscape of simmering disputes that multiply the chances for major military conflict to erupt."
1. When something is increasing 0.8% a year based on data with, say, 2% or higher margin of error this is not a growth.
This is a number racket.
2. We need to use proper coefficients to correctly estimate energy output of different types of oil We do not know real
EROEI of shale oil, but some sources claim that it is in the 1.5-4.5 range. Let's assume that it is 3. In comparison, Saudi oil
has 80-100 range. In this sense shale oil is not a part of the solution; it is a part of the problem (stream of just bonds produced
in parallel is the testament of that). In other words, all shale oil is "subprime oil," and an increase of shale oil production
is correctly called the oil retirement party. The same is true for the tar sands oil.
So the proper formula for total world production in "normalized by ERORI units" might be approximated by the equation:
where coefficients (I do not claim that they are accurate; they are provided just for demonstration) reflect EROEI of particular
types of oil.
If we assume that 58% of the US oil production is shale oil and condensate then the amount of "normalized" oil extracted in
the USA can be approximated by the formula
total * 0.83
In other words 17% of the volume is a fiction. Simplifying it was spent on extraction of shale oil and condensate (for concentrate
lower energy content might justify lower coefficient; but for simplicity we assume that it is equal to shale oil).
Among other things that means that 1970 peak of production probably was never exceeded.
3. EROEI of most types of oil continues to decline (from 35 in 1999 to 18 in 2006 according to
http://www.euanmearns.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/eroeihalletal.png).
Which means that in reality physical volume became a very deceptive metric as you need to sink more and more money/energy into
producing every single barrel and that fact is not reflected in the volume. In other words, the barrel of shale oil is already
50% empty when it was lifted to the ground (aka "subprime oil"). In this sense, shale wells with their three years of the high
producing period are simply money dumping grounds for money in comparison with Saudi oil wells.
4. The higher price does not solve the problem of the decline of EROEI. It just allows the allocation of a larger portion
of national wealth to the oil extraction putting the rest of the economy into permanent stagnation.
5. If we assume average EROEI equal 3 (or even 5) for shale oil then rising shale oil production along with almost constant
world oil production is clearly a Pyrrhic victory. Again, putting a single curve for all types of oil is the number racket,
or voodoo dances around the fire.
NOTES:
1. IMHO Ron made a correct observation about Saudi behavior: the declines of production can well be masked under pretention
of meeting the quota to save face. That might be true about OPEC and Russia as a whole too. Exceptions like Iraq only confirm
the rule.
"... Yang promises a universal entitlement, not dependent on income, that he calls a "freedom dividend." To be funded through a value added tax , Yang claims that it would reduce the strain on "health care, incarceration, homeless services, and the like" and actually save billions of dollars. Yang also notes that "current welfare and social program beneficiaries would be given a choice between their current benefits or $1,000 cash unconditionally." ..."
"... Yang is justifying the need for such a program because of automation . Again, VDARE.com has been exploring how automation may necessitate such a program for many years . Yang also discussed this problem on Tucker Carlson's show , which alone shows he is more open to real discussion than many progressive activists. ..."
"... Indeed, journalists, hall monitors that they are, have recognized that President Trump's online supporters are flocking to Yang, bringing him a powerful weapon in the meme wars. ..."
"... it is ominous for Trump that many of the more creative and dedicated people who formed his vanguard are giving up on him. ..."
Yang is a businessman who has worked in several fields, but was best known for founding
Venture for America , which helps college graduates become entrepreneurs.
However, he is now gaining recognition for his signature campaign promise -- $1,000 a month for every American.
Yang promises a
universal entitlement, not dependent on income, that he calls a "freedom dividend." To be funded through a
value added tax , Yang claims that it would
reduce the strain on "health care, incarceration, homeless services, and the like" and actually save billions of dollars. Yang also
notes
that "current welfare and social program beneficiaries would be given a choice between their current benefits or $1,000 cash unconditionally."
As Yang himself notes, this is not a new idea, nor one particularly tied to the Left. Indeed, it's been proposed by several prominent
libertarians because it would replace the far more inefficient welfare system.
Charles Murray called for
this policy in 2016. [ A
guaranteed income for every American, AEI, June 3, 2016]
Milton
Friedman suggested a similar policy in a 1968 interview with William F. Buckley, though
Friedman called it a
"negative income tax."
It's also been proposed by many nationalists, including, well, me. At the January 2013 VDARE.com Webinar, I
called for a "straight-up minimum income for citizens only" among other policies that would build a new nationalist majority
and deconstruct Leftist power. I've
retained that belief ever since and argued for it here for years.
However, I've also made the argument that it only works if it is for
citizens
only and is combined with a restrictive immigration policy. As I previously
argued in a piece attacking Jacobin'sdisingenuous
complaints about the "reserve army of the unemployed," you simply can't support high wages, workers' rights, and a universal
basic income while still demanding mass immigration.
Yang is also directly addressing the crises that the Trump Administration has seemly forgotten. Unlike Donald Trump himself, with
his endless boasting about "low black and Hispanic unemployment," Yang
has directly spoken about the demographic
collapse of white people because of "low birth rates and white men dying from
substance
abuse and suicide ."
Significantly, President Trump himself has never once specifically recognized the plight of white Americans.
...He wants to make
Puerto Rico a state . He
supports a path to citizenship for illegal
aliens, albeit with an 18-year waiting period and combined with
pledges to secure the border
and deport illegals who don't enroll in the citizenship program. He
wants to create a massive bureaucratic system to track
gun owners, restrict
gun ownership , and require various "training" programs for licenses. He wants to
subsidize local journalists with taxpayer
dollars...
... ... ...
Indeed, journalists, hall monitors that they are, have recognized that President Trump's online supporters are flocking to
Yang, bringing him a powerful weapon in the meme wars. (Sample meme at right.) And because many of these online activists are
"far right" by Main Stream Media standards, or at least Politically Incorrect, there is much hand-waving and wrist-flapping about
the need for Yang to decry "white nationalists." So of course, the candidate has dutifully done so, claiming "racism and white nationalism
[are] a threat to the core ideals of what it means to be an American". [
Presidential candidate
Andrew Yang has a meme problem, by Russell Brandom, The Verge, March 9, 2019]
But what does it mean to be an American? As more and more of American history is described as racist, and even national
symbols and the national anthem are targets for protest, "America" certainly doesn't seem like a real country with a real identity.
Increasingly, "America" resembles a continent-sized shopping mall, with nothing holding together the warring tribes that occupy it
except money.
President Trump, of course, was elected because many people thought he could reverse this process, especially by limiting mass
immigration and taking strong action in the culture wars, for example by promoting official English. Yet in recent weeks, he has
repeatedly endorsed more legal immigration. Rather than fighting, the president is content to brag about the economy and whine about
unfair press coverage and investigations. He already seems like a lame duck.
The worst part of all of this is that President Trump was elected as a response not just to the Left, but to the failed Conservative
Establishment. During the 2016 campaign, President Trump specifically
pledged to protect
entitlements , decried foreign wars, and argued for a massive infrastructure plan. However, once in office, his main legislative
accomplishment is a tax cut any other Republican president would have pushed. Similarly, his latest budget contains the kinds of
entitlement cuts that are guaranteed to provoke Democrat attack ads. [
Trump said he wouldn't cut Medicaid, Social Security, and Medicare . His 2020 budget cuts all 3, by Tara
Golshan, Vox, March 12, 2019] And the president has already backed down on withdrawing all troops from Syria, never mind Afghanistan.
Conservatism Inc., having learned nothing from candidate Donald Trump's scorched-earth path to the Republican nomination, now
embraces Trump as a man but ignores his campaign message. Instead, the conservative movement is still promoting the same tired slogans
about "free markets" even as they have appear to have lost an
entire
generation to socialism. The most iconic moment was Charlie Kirk, head of the free market activist group Turning Point USA, desperately
trying to tell his followers not to cheer for Tucker Carlson because
Carlson had suggested a nation should be treated like a
family, not simply a marketplace .
Thus, especially because of his cowardice on immigration, many of President Trump's most fervent online supporters have turned
on him in recent weeks. And the embrace of Yang seems to come out of a great place of despair, a sense that the country really is
beyond saving.
Yang has Leftist policies on many issues, but many disillusioned Trump supporters feel like those policies are coming anyway.
If America is just an economy, and if everyone in the world is a simply an American-in-waiting, white Americans might as well get
something out of this System before the bones are picked clean.
National Review ' s Theodore Kupfer just claimed the main importance of Yang's candidacy is that it will prove meme-makers
ability to affect the vote count "has been overstated" [
Rise of the pink hats,
March 12, 2019].
Time will tell, but it is ominous for Trump that many of the more creative and dedicated people who formed his vanguard
are giving up on him.
Weirdly, Trump abruptly attacked Ann Coulter , one of his earliest
and
most eloquent backers , on Twitter Saturday night, perhaps signaling he is repudiating the
immigration patriotism he won on -- or perhaps that he knows Ann is right:
In reality of course, "major sections of the wall" have not been built. And the
administration suffered yet another defeat in the courts last week over its attempts to enforce
immigration law. [ In another blow to Trump, judge rules in favor of ACLU in family separations case ,
by Maria Sacchetti, The Washington Post , March 8, 2019] Trump is fighting, to his
credit, but he simply is not winning on the border.
Congressional Republicans also seem uninterested in immigration patriotism.
Many Republicans want to block President Trump's national emergency declaration on the
border -- the one good thing Trump has recently done on immigration–because it goes
against their " principles ."
Thirteen House Republicans voted to block the executive order last month. "The president
doesn't get to just declare an emergency for something that Congress has deliberated many times
over the past several years," Michigan Rep. Justin Amash, a libertarian, said of why he
sponsored legislation to stifle the national emergency. [ Rep. Justin
Amash: 'The President Doesn't Get To Just Declare an Emergency' , by Joe Seyton,
Reason, February 26, 2019]. Amash was joined by a group primarily made up of squishy
Republicans. [ Meet the 13
Republicans who rebuked Trump over his national emergency , by Bridget Bowman, Roll
Call , February 26, 2019]
Trump's executive order is receiving even more pushback from Senate Republicans. Senators
such as Shelly Moore-Capito (R-West Virginia) and Susan Collins think the national
emergency is "concerning" and believe Trump already has enough wall money without the
declaration. [ GOP
wants Trump to back off on emergency , by Alexander Bolton, The Hill , March 6,
2019]
Four Republican Senators have announced their intention to vote for legislation to block the
national emergency: Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Thom Tillis, and usual Trump ally Rand Paul. More
are likely to announce their support for this measure as the vote approaches this week. Pat
Toomey and Todd Young, both who are close with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, want to
propose resolutions to give
cucky Republicans a way to voice their disapproval without voting with the Democrats.
The resolutions would convey the message that Republicans want border security, but don't
want to take the necessary actions to fund said border security. Sen. Mike Lee of Utah wants to
pass a resolution that would restrict the president's emergency powers and place a 30-day or
60-day time limit on how long they can be in effect without congressional approval.
McConnell announced Monday that he could not prevent passage of legislation blocking Trump's
national emergency declaration. The New York Times declared this announcement as proof
that Trump has lost influence within his own party. [ Trump's Grip
Shows Signs of Slipping as Senate Prepares to Block Wall Emergency , By Sheryl Gay
Stolberg and Emily Cochrane, The New York Times , March 4, 2019]
The good news is that Trump will most likely veto this legislation and Congress doesn't have
enough votes to override the veto. The President is also threatening senators who vote for the
block with stiff consequences. [ Senate Republicans divided ahead of vote on disapproval of national emergency , by
Ted Barrett, CNN , March 7, 2019] There is little chance the President will sign a bill
that overrides his own action, even if his close advisers tell him to do so. Trump's instincts
would never allow such behavior.
The bad news: it's a sign congressional Republicans have no will to support immigration
patriotism at the moment. This is very bad considering the immigration bills that may come
before them in the near future, including the possible White House measure on guest worker
visas. House Democrats are set to introduce a new DREAM Act that will legalize at least 1.8
million illegals and extend Temporary Protected Status for hundreds of thousands of foreign
nationals.
Congressional Republicans need to get their act together to kill these pieces of
legislation. But
they may be at the forefront in support of them. Last fall, multiple Republican senators,
including the appalling
Thom Tillis, proposed a bill that would double the number of H-2b visas and screw over
low-skilled American workers. And last month, several Republicans -- alas, including supposed
immigration patriot
Tom Cotton -- championed the easement of some regulations on H-1b visas.
The better hope for killing a guest worker expansion lies with the Democrats. Anyone with a
brain realizes this would be bad for American workers and benefits greedy corporations.
Democrats have never been too fond of this plan, as evidenced by their skepticism about its
expansion in the Gang of Eight Amnesty. [ Gang
of 8 defends guest worker plan , by Seung Min Kim, Politico , May 13, 2013].
What better way to portray Trump as a phony populist in 2020 than to skewer him for this gift
to the cheap labor lobby?
The House Democrats' proposed DREAM Act will probably go nowhere–unless Trump includes
that idea in his immigration package. There are some positive signs that the White House won't
do this; and that Republicans would block its passage. Kushner floated the idea of giving green
cards for Dreamers in exchange for wall funding during shutdown negotiations earlier this year.
That plan was firmly opposed by conservative senators who thought it was insanity [ A "go big" idea to end the shutdown , by Jonathan Swan, Axios , January 23,
2019]
Though Congress and the White House seem set on terrible immigration ideas, it's worth
remembering there are alternative patriotic immigration proposals they could push. All of these
ideas would not likely pass the current Congress, but they would shape the immigration debate
in a positive direction ahead of the 2020 election.
El Chapo Act:
This bill proposed by Sen. Ted Cruz would confiscate the money of drug lords like Joaquin
"El Chapo" Guzman and allocate it to building the wall. Cruz reintroduced the proposal in
February and believes the government could obtain $14 billion out of El Chapo's drug profits
through this law [ Sen. Ted Cruz's solution to border wall impasse: Make El Chapo pay for it , by
Deanna Paul, The Washington Post , February 13, 2019]. This would be more money than
Trump currently has for wall construction and would send a strong message to the cartels. The
president himself has said Sen. Cruz's idea is "interesting." There is no reason Republicans
shouldn't hold a vote on this bill and make Democrats stand up for drug cartels.
Kate's Law:
This bill, named after Kate Steinle who was murdered by an illegal alien, would institute
harsher penalties for illegals caught re-entering the country. This measure passed the House in
2017, but it died in the (n.b. GOP-controlled)Senate [ Senate Has Not Voted On Kate's Law Five Months After It Passed The House With Bipartisan
Support , by Will Racke, The Daily Caller , December 1, 2017].
Trump should resurrect the bill. Yes, it's passage is less likely with a Democrat-controlled
House. That doesn't matter. The president needs to convey he still wants to crack down on
illegal immigration and that his opponents favor criminal aliens over American citizens.
Along with the El Chapo Act, probably has the best chance at passage among the ideas the
Trump admin could push as multiple Democrats voted for it back in 2017. There is still a chance
enough Democrats would vote for it again to achieve passage.
No Sanctuary for Criminals Act:
This act would cut Sanctuary Cities off from federal law enforcement funds and it was also
passed by the House in 2017, albeit by a smaller margin than Kate's Law. It also went nowhere
in the (GOP-controlled) Senate. If Republicans want to highlight the chaos created by Democrat
policies, they should revive this bill and remind Americans that Trump stands up for law and
order. This act, however, does have less chance of passage as it was more strongly opposed by
Democrats [ Dems
block Senate vote on sanctuary cities , by Alexander Bolton, The Hill , February
13, 2018]
Mandatory e-Verify:
Requiring all American companies to use e-verify seems almost too good of an idea for
Republicans. The bill explicitly protects American workers and puts the onus on employers to
make sure they only hire those who are here legally. This should receive bipartisan support as
both parties want to portray themselves as the true protectors of American workers.
House Republicans included the measure in their DACA deal last year, so they are aware of
this proposal [ Goodlatte offers E-Verify mandate, farm worker fix for immigration bill , by John
Bresnahan, Politico , June 26, 2018]. We just need one patriot Republican to stand up
and offer mandatory e-Verify. This proposal also has a decent chance of passage.
Override the Flores Settlement:
This 1997 court decision has handcuffed the Trump administration's ability to enforce
immigration law and is directly responsible for the current border collapse. It has allowed
liberal judges to deem it unlawful for the government to detain illegal alien minors for more
than 20 days. It also has allowed for these minors to have better access to asylum as they
remain in America undetained. Some Republican lawmakers, including Ted Cruz, suggested
legislative action in the last congressional session to correct this loophole [ The History of the Flores
Settlement , by Matt Sussis, Center for Immigration Studies , February 11,
2019].
A bill to end this policy would not likely pass as many Republicans shrank from the Trump's
family detention policies last summer [ Here
Are the Republicans Opposing Migrant Family Separation , by Jeff Cirillo, Roll
Call , June 19, 2018]. That doesn't change the fact that the Trump administration needs
this legislation to avoid further court losses and to shift public discussion on family
detention to focus on Democratic preference for illegal immigrants.
Eliminating birthright citizenship:
There is no way that this idea would pass Congress, but it does have the backing of the
President and one prominent Republican senator. Trump said he may eliminate birthright
citizenship by executive order and
Sen. Lindsey Graham proposed a bill to do so right before the 2018 election. [ Lindsey
Graham Seconds Trump Proposal to End Birthright Citizenship , by Niels Lesniewski,
Roll Call , October 30, 2018]
Those plans, however, seem to have disappeared since then. But Trump still seems interested
in the issue -- he mentioned it in his speech to CPAC -- and events may prompt the president to
revisit the topic. A bill would cause an uproar within Congress and among the Republican
caucus, let alone an executive order. And that's good. If Trump wants to have a serious
discussion on citizenship and reduce the negative effects of mass immigration, then he must
force this issue into the public square.
Javanka would likely oppose any such effort, so perhaps their White House influence would
have to be minimalized from what it is today for this to happen.
The RAISE Act:
The RAISE
Act would halve America's yearly immigration intake and structure our system to be more
"merit-based." It would also cap annual refugee numbers at 50,000 and eliminate the diversity
visa lottery. The bill was introduced by Sens. Tom Cotton and David Perdue with Trump's backing
in August 2017. But (again, despite GOP control of Congress) nothing happened.
If Trump wants to show he still puts America first ahead of 2020, he could resurrect the
RAISE Act. There is no chance it would pass, but it would force Republicans to run on the plan
and win the seats necessary to pass it in Trump's second term.
These are some positive things Trump and Republicans can do. Whether they choose to do them
is up to them.
It's not looking good.
Washington Watcher [ email him ] is an anonymous source
Inside The Beltway.
Jimmy Dore show is pretty educational... Why hasn't Schultz been charged for election fraud yet (she rigged the 2016 primary
and then rigged her own race in Florida against Tim Canova.)? Just when you thought crooked Hillary and corrupt Debbie
Wasserman-Schultz were finally silent and out of the picture, they keep coming back again and again and again...like a case of
herpes.
Nothing that Bernie will do can satisfy the Democrats. Said the other day he was
wishy-washy over Venezuela but it was still not enough. Seems that Debbie Wasserman Schultz
has threatened to have him kicked out of the party unless he calls out Madura as a dictator.
Well then, Sanders better be carrying a polished shield at all times never know when
Debbie the medusa will lurch forward throwing that gazy DNC stink-eye in his direction !
Right now the title should "Can Trump happen again?" ;-)
But this is from 2016 and Professor Stiglitz missed the foreign policy and neoliberal globalization aspects of "Hillary vs
Trump" battle. A vote for Hillary was a vote for continuation of wars of expansion of neoliberal empire.
It is unclear where is political force that can reverse neoliberal deregulation and neoliberal tax cuts. for example full set of
taxes on all kind of income might help (so that dividends owners should pay Social security tax too) but currently is politically unfeasible,
as control of Washington is in the hands of financial oligarchy which will not relinquish its power without a fight.
Notable quotes:
"... reforms that political leaders promised would ensure prosperity for all – such as trade and financial liberalization – have not delivered. Far from it. And those whose standard of living has stagnated or declined have reached a simple conclusion: America's political leaders either didn't know what they were talking about or were lying (or both). ..."
"... Thus, many Americans feel buffeted by forces outside their control, leading to outcomes that are distinctly unfair. Long-standing assumptions – that America is a land of opportunity and that each generation will be better off than the last – have been called into question. The global financial crisis may have represented a turning point for many voters: their government saved the rich bankers who had brought the US to the brink of ruin, while seemingly doing almost nothing for the millions of ordinary Americans who lost their jobs and homes. The system not only produced unfair results, but seemed rigged to do so. ..."
"... Support for Trump is based, at least partly, on the widespread anger stemming from that loss of trust in government. ..."
"... The simplistic neo-liberal market-fundamentalist theories that have shaped so much economic policy during the last four decades are badly misleading, with GDP growth coming at the price of soaring inequality. Trickle-down economics hasn't and won't work. Markets don't exist in a vacuum. The Thatcher-Reagan "revolution," which rewrote the rules and restructured markets for the benefit of those at the top, succeeded all too well in increasing inequality, but utterly failed in its mission to increase growth. ..."
"... The interests that have secured control of the US government -- again, the legislative and executive at the federal and state levels, in particular -- will not easily or readily let go of the power they have amassed, vis-à-vis their control over the writing and execution of laws and regulations lesser mortals must live under but from which the elites are exempt (cf, banking crisis). ..."
"... Either we find a TR and FDR -- and the modern-day equivalent of their allies in Congress -- or our society will continue to erode. ..."
"... the balance of global power likely will continue to shift to the more pragmatic and less constrained Hobbesian forms of societal organization -- most likely some variant of strongman rule, with China at the vanguard, if Xi Jinping (or a competitor) is able to successfully consolidate power. ..."
"... we still lack the details and a roadmap towards a new economy. ..."
"... The vehicle for shifting the fruits of that growth has more to do with our free trade agreements than tax cuts. Corporations were just as greedy before we had free trade agreements but tariffs prevented the enrichment free trade opens up. That GDP increase would have happened without free trade as workers enjoyed higher wages. Which makes Trump correct after all. ..."
"... From shortly after the end of the War of 1812 until the Kennedy Round of tariff reductions in 1967 the United States was the most tariff protected nation on earth. ..."
"... How is it possible that two powerful families (Bush and Clinton) are nearly have a monopoly on becoming US presidents. ..."
"... Just twenty five years ago Mr. Robert McNamara came to Matsue, a Japanese city near where I live, to attend a US-Japanese conference. I was appalled to hear, as he said and I was in the audience, that the income of the American middle-class had not risen at all for the past twenty or so years. His words were less an explanation of what had been going on in the American economy and more a warning of what was going to happen in the Japanese economy. The rules need to be rewritten. ..."
"... The Americans shall be voting Trump for the same reasons they voted Bush Jr. The democratic [neoliberal] establishment failed miserably ..."
But several underlying factors also appear to have contributed to the closeness of the race. For starters, many Americans are
economically worse off than they were a quarter-century ago. The median income of full-time male employees is lower than it was 42
years ago, and it is increasingly difficult for those with limited education to get a full-time job that pays decent wages.
Indeed, real (inflation-adjusted) wages at the bottom of the income distribution are roughly where they were 60 years ago. So
it is no surprise that Trump finds a large, receptive audience when he says the state of the economy is rotten. But Trump is wrong
both about the diagnosis and the prescription. The US economy as a whole has done well for the last six decades: GDP has increased
nearly six-fold. But the fruits of that growth have gone to a relatively few at the top – people like Trump, owing partly to massive
tax cuts that he would extend and deepen.
At the same time, reforms that political leaders promised would ensure prosperity for all – such as trade and financial liberalization
– have not delivered. Far from it. And those whose standard of living has stagnated or declined have reached a simple conclusion:
America's political leaders either didn't know what they were talking about or were lying (or both).
Trump wants to blame all of America's problems on trade and immigration. He's wrong. The US would have faced deindustrialization
even without freer trade: global employment in manufacturing has been declining, with productivity gains exceeding demand growth.
Where the trade agreements failed, it was not because the US was outsmarted by its trading partners; it was because the US trade
agenda was shaped by corporate interests. America's companies have done well, and it is the Republicans who have blocked efforts
to ensure that Americans made worse off by trade agreements would share the benefits.
Thus, many Americans feel buffeted by forces outside their control, leading to outcomes that are distinctly unfair. Long-standing
assumptions – that America is a land of opportunity and that each generation will be better off than the last – have been called
into question. The global financial crisis may have represented a turning point for many voters: their government saved the rich
bankers who had brought the US to the brink of ruin, while seemingly doing almost nothing for the millions of ordinary Americans
who lost their jobs and homes. The system not only produced unfair results, but seemed rigged to do so.
Support for Trump is based, at least partly, on the widespread anger stemming from that loss of trust in government.
But Trump's proposed policies would make a bad situation much worse. Surely, another dose of trickle-down economics of the kind he
promises, with tax cuts aimed almost entirely at rich Americans and corporations, would produce results no better than the last time
they were tried.
In fact, launching a trade war with China, Mexico, and other US trading partners, as Trump promises, would make all Americans
poorer and create new impediments to the global cooperation needed to address critical global problems like the Islamic State, global
terrorism, and climate change. Using money that could be invested in technology, education, or infrastructure to build a wall between
the US and Mexico is a twofer in terms of wasting resources.
There are two messages US political elites should be hearing. The simplistic neo-liberal market-fundamentalist theories that
have shaped so much economic policy during the last four decades are badly misleading, with GDP growth coming at the price of soaring
inequality. Trickle-down economics hasn't and won't work. Markets don't exist in a vacuum. The Thatcher-Reagan "revolution," which
rewrote the rules and restructured markets for the benefit of those at the top, succeeded all too well in increasing inequality,
but utterly failed in its mission to increase growth.
This leads to the second message: we need to rewrite the rules of the economy once again, this time to ensure that ordinary citizens
benefit. Politicians in the US and elsewhere who ignore this lesson will be held accountable. Change entails risk. But the Trump
phenomenon – and more than a few similar political developments in Europe – has revealed the far greater risks entailed by failing
to heed this message: societies divided, democracies undermined, and economies weakened.
markets aurelius OCT 15, 2016
I've yet to see such a succinct or well-presented analysis on the rise of Trump and the far-left and -right in Europe. Thank
you.
Where I disagree with Prof. Stiglitz, however, is in the second point of his conclusion; to wit, "... we need to rewrite the
rules of the economy once again, this time to ensure that ordinary citizens benefit. Politicians in the US and elsewhere who ignore
this lesson will be held accountable. Change entails risk. But the Trump phenomenon – and more than a few similar political developments
in Europe – has revealed the far greater risks entailed by failing to heed this message: societies divided, democracies undermined,
and economies weakened." A political solution is impossible at this point in the USA since the legislative and executive branches
of the have been completely captured by cartels, just as Hayek warned back in the '40s.
It took centuries of war -- civil and foreign -- to evolve the English common law and representative government from which
America derived is greatest strengths. Included in that are the quaint cultural memes of civility and "fair play," which permeated
all levels of society, not just sports; these norms were violated at great personal expense, in that it was difficult to gain
the trust of one's fellow citizens if one violated them. However, it is not an immutable fact of nature such a system will persist
throughout history. Truth be told, it is an outlier in the history of the world. Typically, and to this day outside the Anglosphere,
most societies are spoils systems, in which the strong impose their will on the weak, and take the larger share of everything
their societies produce. Some operate artfully (e.g., Mediterranean Europe), while others are just ham-handed (e.g., Russia, the
Middle East). The ordering described by Hobbes more appropriately captures the state of affairs to a greater or lesser degree
in these states.
It took a revolution, a civil war, and a century-long struggle post-civil war to evolve the US society to its modern, yet-to-be-fully-formed
state. The interests that have secured control of the US government -- again, the legislative and executive at the federal
and state levels, in particular -- will not easily or readily let go of the power they have amassed, vis-à-vis their control over
the writing and execution of laws and regulations lesser mortals must live under but from which the elites are exempt (cf, banking
crisis).
Either we find a TR and FDR -- and the modern-day equivalent of their allies in Congress -- or our society will continue
to erode. Either we fade into history as much of Europe did during the Dark Ages or we have another revolution.
While that's going on, the balance of global power likely will continue to shift to the more pragmatic and less constrained
Hobbesian forms of societal organization -- most likely some variant of strongman rule, with China at the vanguard, if Xi Jinping
(or a competitor) is able to successfully consolidate power.
Daniel Esmond OCT 15, 2016
I agree with nearly everything in Prof Stiglitz' analysis. However, I would like some details about the new 'rules of the economy'.
There is a realisation in many circles that something has to change and the solutions advanced by the new populists are unworkable.
But we still lack the details and a roadmap towards a new economy. While analysis like this one about how we got here
are useful and enlightening, we need (desperately!) to move on and do something. I really would like to see a follow up of this
article with Prof Stigliz outlining his plans for a new economic order.
James Murphy OCT 15, 2016
"But Trump is wrong both about the diagnosis and the prescription. The US economy as a whole has done well for the last
six decades: GDP has increased nearly six-fold. But the fruits of that growth have gone to a relatively few at the top.."
The vehicle for shifting the fruits of that growth has more to do with our free trade agreements than tax cuts. Corporations
were just as greedy before we had free trade agreements but tariffs prevented the enrichment free trade opens up. That GDP increase
would have happened without free trade as workers enjoyed higher wages. Which makes Trump correct after all.
We are a trade deficient nation. As such the only way we lose a trade war is not to fight one. Aside from the short transition
harm the American people would be better off with tariff protection as they were in the past.
From shortly after the end of the War of 1812 until the Kennedy Round of tariff reductions in 1967 the United States was
the most tariff protected nation on earth. During that time absolutely none of the bad things you postulate actually happened.
Free trade is an Ivory Tower theory that has never worked in the real world experience of the United States. We have more free
trade today than we have ever had. Where are the blessings of those free trade deals? We abandoned free trade in 1967 and the
real wages of blue collar workers peaked 5 years later never to come back.
Simon Barnard OCT 14, 2016
Rules of the economy do need to be rewritten and also do the rules of economic measurement.
Growth of GDP is not a valid measurement of whether or not an economy is healthy (or indeed growing). Should vast inequalities
be created, that in turn cause social unrest, that in turn lead to a disintegration of society, this society may find it necessary
to build a lot of prisons. The capital expenditure on these prisons will contribute to the GDP. Is it really healthier? Is this
what is happening in the US? - it could be going that way.
So is it any wonder that people are looking for an alternative to the status quo, of which Hilary Clinton is certainly part
of? NO.
Is Trump an alternative? DEFINITELY NO.
As Joseph Stiglitz put very well, he would make things still worse.
So I feel sorry for the USA having such a poor choice and I hope that soon we can change from the neo-liberal hegemony and
develop a new one that will allow a progressive new choice to make itself available.
Vicky Lavendel OCT 14, 2016
The true questions is: How is it possible that two powerful families (Bush and Clinton) are nearly have a monopoly on becoming
US presidents. And furthermore all presidential candidates who want to have a chance must be ultra rich (like Trump) or must
have very wealthy donors (like Obama). Is this still a democracy or already an oligarchy? That Stieglitz doesnt ask this question
might be a hint that he is part of this wealthy establishment as well.
Yoshimichi Moriyama OCT 14, 2016
The word liberalization is so dazzling that we are captured and made by it to be unable to see the reality; we are often duped
by it. When we hear or see the word, we need to be very careful of what the speaker or writer actually means by it. Corporate
and financial interests have made an extensive use of it to camouflage and promote their selfishness.
Just twenty five years ago Mr. Robert McNamara came to Matsue, a Japanese city near where I live, to attend a US-Japanese
conference. I was appalled to hear, as he said and I was in the audience, that the income of the American middle-class had not
risen at all for the past twenty or so years. His words were less an explanation of what had been going on in the American economy
and more a warning of what was going to happen in the Japanese economy.
The rules need to be rewritten.
M M OCT 14, 2016
The Americans shall be voting Trump for the same reasons they voted Bush Jr. The democratic [neoliberal] establishment failed
miserably. They had eight years to put things right and what did they do, not only maintaining the status quo which made
inequality worse but created mayhem everywhere and the Clintons were part of it throughout the Obama tenure. So Mr. "Yes We Can"
not only managed to increase inequality, re-introduce slavery (albeit in many new forms), help spread terrorism all over the place
and this to state just a few examples.
First of all, what is called "School of management" typically is a voodoo cult that should
have nothing to do with university education ;-)
"He [Bush] signaled the shift [in strategy] in a speech here [in Pittsburgh] last week
when he charged that Reagan had made 'a list of phony promises' on defense, energy and
economic policy. And he labeled Reagan's tax cut proposal 'voodoo economic policy' and
'economic madness.'"
It's not the temporary ban on immigration that upsets people so much as singling out
people from specific countries, whether Obama's Republican Congress in did it or Trump did
it.
The ban should be on all religious extremists including apartheid Zionists and Christian
extremists. Religious extremists from all of the major religions have committed heinous
atrocities.
...And the Demo establishment lines up to attack Drumpf's ban; hoping to get some easy
votes for corporatist neo-con hypocrites?
...The main purpose of all the noise against president Trump is to weaken him and
then force him to take the positions the deep state wants him to take. Among the many
problems he has he is only an apprentice.
"... As Sen. Elizabeth Warren has famously said with respect to cabinet and other political appointments, "Personnel Is Policy." You can see the outline of the Trump administration's real policies being shaped before our eyes via his proposed cabinet appointees, covered by Politico and other sites. ..."
"... Sanders, Warren and others should hold Trump's feet to the fire on the truly populist things he said and offer to work with him on that stuff. Like preserving Social Security and Medicare and getting out of wars. ..."
Not surprised at all. The election is over, the voters are now moot. As Sen. Elizabeth Warren
has famously said with respect to cabinet and other political appointments, "Personnel Is Policy."
You can see the outline of the Trump administration's real policies being shaped before our eyes
via his proposed cabinet appointees, covered by Politico and other sites.
Also no mention of NAFTA or renegotiating trade deals in the new transition agenda. Instead
there's just a bunch of vague Chamber of Commercesque language about making America attractive
to investors. I think our hopes for a disruptive Trump presidency are quickly being dashed.
Sanders, Warren and others should hold Trump's feet to the fire on the truly populist things
he said and offer to work with him on that stuff. Like preserving Social Security and Medicare
and getting out of wars.
As to the last point, appointing Bolton or Corker Secretary of State would be a clear indication
he was just talking. A clear violation of campaign promises that would make Obama look like a
choirboy. Trump may be W on steroids.
I can't imagine how he's neglected to update his transition plan regarding nafta. After all,
he's already been president-elect for, what, 36 hours now? And he only talked about it umpteen
times during the campaign. I'm sure he'll renege.
Hell, it took Clinton 8 hours to give her concession speech.
On the bright side, he managed to kill TPP just by getting elected. Was that quick enough for
you?
"... Trump's "opposition" in the Democratic Party is no less hostile to democratic rights. They have focused their anti-Trump campaign on bogus allegations that he is a Russian agent, while portraying the emergence of social divisions within the United States as the consequence of Russian "meddling," not the crisis of capitalism, and pushing for across-the-board internet censorship. ..."
"The finance aristocracy, in its mode of acquisition as well as in its pleasures, is nothing
but the rebirth of the lumpenproletariat on the heights of bourgeois society ." -- Karl
Marx, The Class Struggles in France
What Marx described, in his analysis of the corruption of the bourgeoisie in France
leading up to the 1848 revolution, applies with even greater force to the United States of
2019, where the bourgeoisie faces its own rendezvous with social upheaval and explosive class
battles.
That is how a Marxist understands the spectacle of Wednesday's hearing before the House
Oversight Committee, in which Michael Cohen, the former attorney and "fixer" for Donald Trump
for more than a decade, testified for six hours about how he and his boss worked to defraud
business partners and tax collectors, intimidate critics and suppress opposition to Trump's
acitvities in real estate, casino gambling, reality television and, eventually, electoral
politics.
What Cohen described was a seedier version of an operation that most Americans would
recognize from viewing films like The Godfather: Trump as the capo di tutti capi, the
unquestioned authority who must be consulted on every decision ; the children, Donald Jr.,
Ivanka and Eric, each now playing significant roles in the ongoing family criminal enterprise;
Allen Weisselberg, CFO of the Trump Organization, the consigliere in charge of finance,
mentioned by Cohen more than 20 times in the course of six hours of testimony as the man who
facilitated Trump's schemes to evade taxes, deceive banks or stiff business partners.
Cohen himself was an enforcer. By his own account, he threatened people on Trump's behalf at
least 500 times in a ten-year period, including business associates, politicians, journalists
and anyone seeking to file complaints or gain reimbursement after being defrauded by one or
another Trump venture. The now-disbarred lawyer admitted to tape recording clients -- including
Trump among many others -- more than 100 times during this period.
The incidents recounted by Cohen range from the farcical (Trump browbeating colleges and
even his military prep school not to release his grades or test scores), to the shabby (Trump
having his own "charitable" foundation buy a portrait of himself for $60,000), to the brazenly
criminal (deliberately inflating the value of properties when applying for bank loans while
deflating the value of the same properties as much as twenty-fold in order to evade
taxation).
One of the most remarkable revelations was Cohen's flat assertion that Trump himself did
not enter the presidential race with the expectation that he could win either the Republican
nomination or the presidency. Instead, the billionaire reality television "star" regularly told
his closest aides, the campaign would be the "greatest infomercial in political history," good
for promoting his brand and opening up business opportunities in previously closed
markets.
These unflattering details filled the pages of the daily newspapers Thursday and occupied
many hours on the cable television news. But in all that vast volume of reporting and
commentary, one would look in vain for any serious assessment of what it means, in terms of the
historical development and future trajectory of American society, that a family like the Trumps
now occupies the highest rung in the US political system.
The World Socialist Web Site rejects efforts by the Democrats and the corporate media
to dismiss Trump as an aberration, an accidental figure whose unexpected elevation to the
presidency in 2016 will be "corrected" through impeachment, forced resignation or electoral
defeat in 2020. We insist that the Trump administration is a manifestation of a protracted
crisis and breakdown of American democracy, whose course can be traced back at least two
decades to the failed impeachment of Bill Clinton in 1998-99, followed by the stolen
presidential election of 2000.
The US political system, always dominated by the interests of the capitalist ruling class
that controls both of the major parties, the Democrats as much as the Republicans, is breaking
down under the burden of mounting social tensions, driven above all by skyrocketing economic
inequality. It is impossible to sustain the pretense that elections at two-year and four-year
intervals provide genuine popular influence over the functioning of a government so completely
subordinated to the financial aristocracy.
The figures are familiar but require restating: over the past three decades, virtually all
the increase in wealth in American society has gone to a tiny layer at the top. Three
mega-billionaires -- Jeff Bezos, Warren Buffett and Bill Gates -- now control more wealth than
half the American population. This process of social polarization is global: according to the
most recent Oxfam report, 26 billionaires control more wealth than the poorer half of the human
race.
These billionaires did not accumulate their riches by devising new technologies or making
new scientific discoveries that increased the wealth and happiness of humanity as a whole. On
the contrary, their enrichment has come at the expense of society. Bezos has become the world's
richest man through the emergence of Amazon as the greatest sweatshop enterprise in history,
where every possible second of labor power is extracted from a brutally exploited
workforce.
The class of billionaires as a whole, having precipitated the global financial collapse of
2008 through reckless speculation and swindling in the sale of derivatives and other obscure
financial "products," was bailed out, first by the Republican Bush, then by the Democrat Obama,
to the tune of trillions of dollars. Meanwhile, the jobs, living standards and social
conditions for the great mass of working people sharply declined.
As for Donald Trump, the real estate swindler, casino con man and reality television mogul
is a living demonstration of the truth of Balzac's aphorism: "Behind every great fortune is a
great crime."
Trump toyed with running for president on the ultra-right Reform Party ticket in 2000 after
a long stint as a registered Democrat and donor to both capitalist parties. When he decided to
run for president as a Republican in 2016, however, he had shifted drastically to the right.
His candidacy marked the emergence of a distinctly fascistic movement, as he spewed
anti-immigrant prejudice and racism more generally, while making a right-wing populist appeal
to working people, particularly in de-industrialized areas in the Midwest and Appalachia, on
the basis of economic nationalism.
As World Socialist Web Site editorial board Chairman David North explained even
before the 2016 elections:
The Republican nominee for the presidency of the United States did not emerge from an
American version of a Munich beer hall. Donald Trump is a billionaire, who made his money in
Manhattan real estate swindles, the semi-criminal operations of casino gambling, and the
bizarre world of "reality television," which entertains and stupefies its audience by
manufacturing absurd, disgusting and essentially fictional "real life" situations. The
candidacy of Donald Trump could be described as the transfer of the techniques of reality
television to politics.
The main development in the two years since Trump entered the White House is the emergence
of the American working class into major struggles, beginning with the wave of teachers'
strikes in 2018, initiated by the rank and file in defiance of the bureaucratic unions. The
reaction in the American ruling elite is a panic-stricken turn to authoritarian methods of
rule.
The billionaire in the White House is now engaged in a systematic assault on the foundations
of American democracy. He has declared a national emergency in order to bypass Congress, which
holds the constitutional "power of the purse," and divert funds from the military and other
federal departments to build a wall along the US-Mexico border.
Whether or not he is immediately successful in this effort, it is clear that Trump is
moving towards the establishment of an authoritarian regime, with or without the sanction of
the ballot box. As Cohen observed in his closing statement -- in remarks generally downplayed
by the media and ignored by the Democrats -- he is worried that if Trump loses the 2020
election, "there will never be a peaceful transition of power."
Trump's "opposition" in the Democratic Party is no less hostile to democratic rights. They
have focused their anti-Trump campaign on bogus allegations that he is a Russian agent, while
portraying the emergence of social divisions within the United States as the consequence of
Russian "meddling," not the crisis of capitalism, and pushing for across-the-board internet
censorship.
The defense of democratic rights and genuine resistance to Trump's drive toward
authoritarian rule must come through the development of an independent political movement of
the working class, directed against both big business parties, the Democrats as much as the
Republicans, and against the profit system which they both defend.
"... The Puppet show display by Pence & Pompeo to rap Europeans over the knuckles for everything from not exiting the Iran Nuclear deal to not stopping the Nordstream pupeline & trying to contain Hiawei is blowing up in the Trump Administration's faces as these so called Allies or Vassals of the American Empire are refusing to tow the line? ..."
"... A failure for US oligarchy foreign policy is a win for the US and the rest of the world. ..."
The "Exceptional Nation" has now become the "Detestable Nation"!
The Puppet show display
by Pence & Pompeo to rap Europeans over the knuckles for everything from not exiting the
Iran Nuclear deal to not stopping the Nordstream pupeline & trying to contain Hiawei is
blowing up in the Trump Administration's faces as these so called Allies or Vassals of the
American Empire are refusing to tow the line?
Trump has alienated & disgusted it's
Allies, so much that they can now see how deranged, unworkable & destructive is the
Americans Foreign Policy & its bankrupt disfunctional , delusional Policies?
It's
ridiculous, irrational & pathological hatred for Iran has shown that the US is the main
Terrorist Nation on Earth not Iran who has never invaded anyone unlike the hypocritical US
Empire!
Meanwhile in Sochi, the real Diplomacy for peace is taking place with Russia, Iran,
Turkey & Syria having won the War against the US Empire & its cowardly, crony white
helmeted, ragtag bunch of proxy Army misfits made up of Israel, ISIS, SDF & the Kurds now
scurrying out of the Country like rats leaving a sinking ship!
And what was really laughable
about VP Pences speech in Warsaw was the defeating silence to the pauses in that speech
expecting people to clap on demand which never happened?
How embarrassing & really showed
the lack of respect & utter contempt that everyone has for America these days!
Sam F, February 20, 2019 at 12:32 pm
A failure for US oligarchy foreign policy is a win for the US and the rest of the world.
Let's hope we see the end of NATO as an excuse for US bully tyrants to "defend" us with greedy aggression.
Perhaps that will lead to strengthening the UN and isolating it from the economic power of US tyrants.
The UN would be far stronger if it taxed its members instead of begging for support, on pain of embargo by all members, and
monitored for corrupt influence.
Tump can go back and keep his job pleasing the Zionist elite that installed him.
So far as I'm concerned Hillary was the dream candidate for the apartheid Jewish state.
That the Zionists have made a terrific rebound in capturing Trump seems to me to be another
story entirely. At a guess, I'd say the job was done with a combination of flattery, bribery,
and naked force.
I've tuned out the Mueller thing, but suspect it was part of the leverage used to get
control of Trump. Again a guess, but I'd say Trump was totally in bed with the Russians - and
everybody else with whom he thought he might run a scam. But this was "business", as in
making promises and squeezing money out of them. Things like Trump University. With proper
handling the cost of the failures would fall mostly on the "investors". And in the worst
case, there was always the fifth or sixth bankruptcy.
Trump didn't expect to be president - that was a humongous publicity campaign financed by
the Corporate Media. I don't think Pence was expecting anything besides getting some national
exposure which might lead him becoming Senator from Indiana in 2018.
I'm very glad Hillary isn't perched in the White House, but the price of avoiding that has
been higher than I expected. Speaking of the devil, I read some ugly stuff at the 2:00 news
part of Naked Capitalism.
Clinton (2): "EX-CLINTON POLLSTER: Hillary will run if Biden doesn't -- or field is 'too
far left'" [The American Mirror]. "After defending Clinton's credentials as 'one of the
most experienced politicians around,' [Mark] Penn went on to say of the reported recent
confabs between Hillary and declared candidates, "Those meetings are going to be somewhat
awkward because she hasn't declared that she's not definitely running, and she, in fact, at
the same time is looking over the field and I think will make a decision later in the year
whether or not to run herself. Penn said the chances of Hillary running depends on how the
field shapes up. 'If the party looks too far to the left and there's no front runner,
she'll get in,' he said. 'I think if Joe Biden gets in, that probably means she won't run
if he gets in. If he doesn't get in, I think the field will be open for her,' Penn said."
• She's tanned, rested, and ready!
That fits right in with my belief that the corporate Dems would prefer Trump's second term
or Pence's first term to any decent Democrat being elected. I'll be saying this over and over
- while Sander's foreign policy credentials stink to high heaven, the prospect of him being
"decent" in domestic matters isn't too awfully bad.
Mueller [investigation]... suspect it was part of the leverage used to get control
of Trump.
Well, the "Russia meddled" scare-mongering has worked well as a means of reviving
anti-Russian McCarthyism. It even ensnared Wikileaks and Michael Flynn (both of whom were
CIA/Deep State targets).
And, why would the Deep State allow an unvetted person to assume control of the
Presidency? They are too careful for that. In fact, all recent President's have some
connection to CIA: Bush Sr., Clinton, Bush Jr., Obama. Felix Slater, an FBI informant worked
for Trump for over a decade while informing on the Russian mob, and most of Trump dubious
Russian oligarch connections are actually more loyal to Israel than Russia.
Trump didn't expect to be president
That's funny, given the fact that he bragged that he would win and that he was the ONLY
populist running for the Republican nomination (out of 19 contenders!). And none of the other
candidates (many of whom are seasoned campaigners) sought to alter their strategy when the
saw Trump pulling ahead?!?!
Oh, and Hillary helped her friend Trump win when she alienated key constituencies
(Sanders progressives, Blacks) and energized Trump's base by calling them
"deploreables".
<> <> <> <> <> <> <> <>
Oh, sorry, these things are supposed to be memory-holed. Hope you and MoA readers don't
suffer from too much cognitive dissonance from such facts.
With Trump incoherence, impulsivity and appointment of Pompeo and Bolton it is really unclear who are the good guys and and who
are bad guys.
Color revolution against Trump failed and that's a good sign, the sign of healthy political system. But it might well
be that "The moor has done his duty, the moor can go"
Trump already undermined the credibility of neoliberal MSM and we should be glad to him for that. He also withdrawing troops from
Syria (which were in the country illegally) but only after bombing Assad air forces half-dozen times on false premises.
Looks like he reached some progress in talks with China and Chine will buy more agricultural production from the USA. But
the question to him is: if China already has the capacity to produce all those goods, how he think manufacturing will return to the
USA.
He still is warmongering about Iran. And he initiated the regime change in Venezuela.
On domestic front he positioned himself as a clear neoliberal and bully -- king of "national neoliberalism" instead of national
socialism of the past (what is funny is that many point of NSDAP program of 1920 are now far left to the Democratic Party platform,
to say nothing about Trump.
Notable quotes:
"... "All governments suffer a recurring problem: Power attracts pathological personalities. It is not that power corrupts but that it is magnetic to the corruptible." -Frank Herbert, Author of Dune ..."
The bad guys wear black hats. We're programmed to see things in black or white, right or wrong, good or evil. From what we are
shown in movies and books from an early age, there is a protagonist and an antagonist.
Clever writers make it a little more complex, with the Boo Radleys and Snapes who are thought to be villains but turn out to be
heroes. But generally, the characters fit largely into extremes: good guys or bad guys with little overlap: Harry Potter versus Voldemort.
But it's those characters on the edge who people can't get enough of. Like Walter White, the cancer patient who starts producing
meth to leave some money behind for his family in the TV show Breaking Bad .
And that's probably because its an often unspoken truth that life is mostly gray, and not so black and white.
But the binary two choice meme has a function. It makes things a hell of a lot easier. And it prevents us from being crippled
by indecision and inaction.
Of course, this is also easily exploited by bad guys
When I hear that the FBI considered attempting to oust Trump from the oval office, I am tempted to think, hey, Trump must not
be such a bad guy.
According to a new book by former deputy FBI director Andrew McCabe, top FBI brass discussed using the 25th amendment to remove
Trump, even though as the Wall Street Journal explains:
A President exercises his constitutional prerogative to fire the FBI director, and Mr. Comey's associates immediately talked
about deposing him in what would amount to a coup?
The 25th Amendment was passed after JFK's assassination to allow for a transfer of power when a President is "unable" to discharge
his duties. It is intended to be used only after demonstrated evidence of impairment that is witnessed by those closest to the
Commander in Chief. It doesn't exist to settle political differences, or to let scheming bureaucrats imagine they are saving the
country from someone they fear is a Manchurian candidate. The constitutional process for that is impeachment.
So if the
horribly corrupt FBI doesn't like Trump, he must have something to offer. But this is only true in the binary world or pure good
and evil. In the real world, evil often opposes evil, because they are different factions fighting for the same territory.
"All governments suffer a recurring problem: Power attracts pathological personalities. It is not that power corrupts but
that it is magnetic to the corruptible." -Frank Herbert, Author of Dune
We usually end up supporting who we see as the lesser of two evils.
That's sort of like Walter White. He starts off as a timid science geek and devoted father and husband. He is attracted to the
drug industry for apparently noble purposes. And he ends up poisoning a child, causing another child to be murdered, ordering an
innocent assistant killed, and causing the death of his brother-in-law. Ultimately, Walter White admits he didn't become a massive
meth producer for his family. He did it for the thrill, the glory, the power that came with it . We live in a world of Walter Whites,
not Voldemorts.
J.K. Rowling made Voldemort pure evil. But to her credit, she demonstrated how easy it was for him to seize the reigns of power
at the Ministry of Magic, and how all the bureaucrats and ministers simply started serving a new master. Some even rejoiced in their
new authority, relishing the newfound power.
When it comes to Trump versus the FBI, the Wall Street Journal editorial laments, "This is all corrosive to public trust in American
democracy."
So what do we do about it?
Rejoice!
The less trust we put in the political system, the better. All we can do is separate ourselves to the best of our abilities from
far off bureaucrats and politicians.
The problem here is the progressive votes is split between Bernie, Warren, and Tulsi. That means that all three of them
now can be eliminated be invertionaist Dems.
Notable quotes:
"... Tulsi Gabbard is scary to Republicans because a lot of us center-right folks would be tempted to support her ..."
"... Would love to see a Tulsi - Trump debate. She'd be a formidable opponent. ..."
1. Bolton is evil, 2. Pompeo is a liar, 3. Pence is a moralizing buffoon.
I detest them all but who do I hate the least? I'm going to go with Bolton.
Since I believe that Pence is an honest man, it twists my mind how someone can stand on a
stage and seriously believe that other countries have a moral obligation to obey the U.S. in
who they do and don't do business with. How dare you undermine U.S. sanctions he thunders,
and the look on his face, priceless.
At least Bolton embraces the fact that he is simply
exerting power over others without the insufferable moralizing of a Mike Pence.
I watched Trump's Rose Garden session in which he announced that he would sign the
appropriation bill and also declare a national emergency under the National Emergencies Act.
IMO he will win whatever court challenges are made because his authority to do this is clear in
"black letter" law and the opposition will have to base their plaints on a judgment as to
whether or not there is an emergency. IMO there is nothing in the constitution or law that
makes the judgment or the courts competent to overrule his judgment in this case. If they don't
like the National Emergencies Law, let the Congress repeal it.
On the other hand, Trump also told the world that because of a personal appeal by a woman
from Idlib Province in Syria who came to see him in the Oval Office, he called Putin and argued
him into calling off the preparations for a massive Russo/Syrian/Iranian offensive that would
IMO have recovered Idlib for the SAG.
I am recalling here roughly what he said.
The lady's argument was that she believed that the millions who lived in the province would
be killed or maimed in the process and all the towns destroyed. Her parents lived in the
province. And, after all, she said, there are only 45,000 jihadis in the province. I was not
in the room, but would be willing to bet that she was; well spoken, well dressed, and
reasonably attractive. Trump was persuaded and Idlib remains a cancer in the side of the Syrian
state, the Russians, having listened to Trump, attempted to create a de-militarized zone around
Idlib Province within which the jihadis have consolidated power.
Some years ago I was asked to speak at a two or three day discussion of the Middle East at
Mississippi State University. This is a big school. Attendance was in the thousands. On the
program with me (or I with him) was, then TV personality, (later governor of Ohio) John Kasich.
At a pre-conference dinner, Kasich sought to dominate the table talk and me (his principal
competition) at this conference. There were numerous senior faculty present at table. Kasich
sought to belittle whatever knowledge I might have of the MENA region and of the peoples and
cultures there. In particular he said that I did not understand Islam at all because I said
that the jihadis were among the various forms of Islam, a religion which I foolishly claimed
had no central authority structure and in which the "true Islam" was not to be known except in
the consensus (ijma') of various groups of Muslims.
Having heard him out, I explained to him my background and experience. He grew more and more
sober, clearly unused to opposition. I asked him what the basis was for his opinion that the
various jihadis were not real Muslims at all.
He told us that a number of beauteous Muslim ladies had been brought to see him. He said
they were well spoken, well dressed (some in French couture clothing) and that they smelled
good. This last was said after I asked him about it having run into this phenomenon
before.
These ladies were all at pains to explain to him that the jihadis were outside Islam
because they did not accept the ijma' of the scholars of whatever "school" (mathab) of Sunni
Sharia these ladies adhered to.
The lesson - Beware of well dressed ladies who smell of Chanel #5. pl
Are you suggesting that President Trump could be influenced by an attractive, well spoken
woman with an exotic accent? Maybe the Iranian Mullahs need to change their UN representative
to get off Trump's s#*! list.
Great anecdote Colonel, interesting that Kasich's first instinct was to see you as
"competition" in such a setting. I don't suppose you told him that, despite your evident
ignorance, you were known by the name of a famous warrior poet in several ME countries - or
inquired as to his own sobriquet as in these places? My guess is the women folk of Idlib
province are not in the habit of frequenting the Oval Office, it would be interesting to know
who arranged her visit.
Machiavelli does not seem to have commented on the specific matter of wariness of
beauteous messengers. However, I'd expect his advice on such matters would echo your own, in
the importance of evaluating a message independently of its perfume.
That is very good. Antar thanks you. An Iraqi general once asked me how I came to be called
that. He said, "you are not Black." I said that was true but that I lived with a woman whose
sobriquet was Abla and after so much war my heart was black enough. He said that was true of
them as well.
Actually Abla and I were named by a Palestinian Arabic teacher who wanted his class to have
working names that began with 'ain. He was from Bethlehem and owned a night club in San
Francisco where he was occupied while not teaching Arabic at DLI in Monterey. The name stuck.
He was killed in Kuwait by the Kuwaiti resistance who said he was a collaborator with the
Iraqis. He was a marvelous 'oud player.
On the other side of the coin, I recall reading how HRC, when she was SecState, was convinced
by well-spoken, well-dressed Westernized and Western-educated men from Libya and Syria that
if only the U.S. would overthrow the "brutal tyrants" then ruling those nations, that then
democracy and freedom would reign in those lands.
In particular, she was lobbied by one such Westernized Libyan just before she persuaded BHO
to intervene in Libya, leading to the subsequent chaos.
BTW, for a reminder of who else pushed BHO to intervene in Libya,
see
"Fight of the Valkyries" by Maureen Dowd, 2011-03-23.
Is calling such women stupid about things that matter sexist?
Thinking about how popular the values of Westernized people from the Islamic world are back
in their native lands, there is the illustrative example of
Benazir Bhutto .
While not having the time nor energy at the moment to read much (even more post much), this
statement from DJT just stunned me. And i am not easily stunned.
Some ppl including me thought of this possibility, to be precise that Ivanka and Jared fed
him: You got to save those inocent people there! And he took the bait.
But then again i didnt truely want to believe that this is how the goverment of the
biggest world power works. With all those gazillions of analysts, SIGINT HUMINT etc. at hand,
briefings and what not..
Even more comically and tragic is, that he might just told the truth, and this is truly
what happend.
IMHO this is how the neocons influence him: By presenting selective "information", and
just like the MSM he falls for it. Be it his family or patriachic instincts or what ever the
psychologic motivation:
He admitted that he was influenced by the same MSM methods he claims to fight, and in turn
protecting the biggest gathering of international Jihahist in this century against their sure
defeat.
MAGA = Make AlQaida Great Again! ;)
AFAIK this is how DJT stopped the funding of the FSA, when he was shown the video of the
child the Zenki Jihadists beheaded. So it is not a single decision, but the M.O. of his style
of decision making.
Under all that narcissistic, egomanic and sociopathic behaviour seems to be a human being,
a quite emotional too. Too bad it seems to care more for single female Jihadists
propagandists than for his campaign promise of fighting Jihadists..
Maybe Assads wife should make a undercover visit to DJT? ;)
What is with the "EDIT:Typos" thingy? We are all plain folk here. Basma Asad? A beautiful,
well spoken creature. There is a certain strain of blond Syrian upper class woman who will
just knock your socks off. This what Italians call "the thunderbolt." I went to visit one in
the Maryland suburbs of DC. A relative asked me to go. She was that type. After she decided I
wasn't going to do whatever it was she thought I would want to do she took me out to the
garage where there were several big cats; tiger, leopard, puma, etc. in cages. I asked her
why. She just shrugged and went back in the house.
Dr Rim Al-Bezem is the president of the eastern chapter of the Syrian-American Medical
Society (SAMS), an organization that provides training, medical equipment and medicine for
a country decimated by the war.
From memory, SAMS only ever
worked in the rebel-held areas .
And again from memory, she has been economical with the truth, by ignoring the doctors in
west Aleppo and inflating the number of people in Aleppo. Yet again from memory, I think it
never reached much above 2 million, 1.5 million in the west and 0.5 million in the
east.
"Many of the doctors have left the country because they, too, have families. In Aleppo
alone, there are 35 doctors left to treat the population of 5 million people," she said.
"... It is clear that on immigration, Eastern Europe differs from the rest of the continent -- attitudes represented politically only through the populist right in the west are thoroughly mainstream in the east. ..."
For starters, he talks about demography. Like many countries in Europe, Hungary's birthrates
have plummeted. Orbán has commenced a campaign to raise them, with measures including
generous maternity and paternity leave stipends, subsidies of up to 50 euros a month per child,
tax write-offs, and housing assistance for couples that have three or more children. The
government has also sent out questionnaires asking Hungarians whether they think the solution
to Hungary's demographic crisis is stronger support for families or higher immigration. Katalin
Novak, Orbán's minister of family and youth, explained unabashedly that the purpose of
this was "to send a clear message to Brussels: the renovation of Europe is impossible without
support for families and Hungary wants neither immigration nor a modification of its
population." This sort of frankness from leaders in the wealthier West is inconceivable. At a
press gathering I recently attended, a Macron minister holding a comparable post focused most
of the conversation on the expansion of gay rights.
Of course, the other half of the demography subject is immigration. In an address during the
fall of 2016 that still resonates, Orbán proclaimed that Europe is "in mortal
danger":
The danger is "not attacking us the way wars and natural disasters do mass migration is
a slow stream of water persistently eroding the shores. It is masquerading as a humanitarian
cause, but its true nature is the occupation of territory. And what is gaining territory for
them is losing territory for us. Flocks of obsessed human rights defenders feel the
overwhelming urge to reprimand us . [A]llegedly we are hostile xenophobes but the truth is
that the history of our nation is also one of inclusion, of the intertwining of cultures.
Those who have sought to come here as new family members, as allies, or as displaced persons
fearing for their lives have been let in to make a new home for themselves. But those who
have come here with the intention of changing our country, of shaping our nation in their own
image, have been met with resistance."
Faced with the Merkel Million Man Migration, Orbán ordered Hungary's army to build a
fence.
Slovakia similarly refused to take in a quota of migrants dictated by Brussels and Berlin.
The former president of the Czech Republic, Vaclav Klaus, wrote a short but excellent book,
Europe All Inclusive , about the migration crisis in which he charged that Europe's
western elites were supporting mass immigration explicitly to smash the remaining power of
nation states so full European unification could be achieved. Poland has likewise refused EU
demands to resettle refugees from the Mideast and North Africa.
It is clear that on immigration, Eastern Europe differs from the rest of the continent
-- attitudes represented politically only through the populist right in the west are thoroughly
mainstream in the east. This difference in political culture is so vast, it can be traced
to many sources. A similar divergence surfaced before, during the Cold War, when Eastern
Europeans stubbornly refused to allow Western European intellectuals to forget or ignore that
communism was a malign and murderous system. Today, Eastern Europeans note that they have been
already been the subjects of utopian projects to remake society according to a progressive
vision -- and they have no desire for a repeat.
Encountering Eastern European resistance to progressive dogma for the first time is a
bracing experience. I first had it during the mid-'70s, in a grad school lecture class at
Columbia. A charming and generally well-liked democratic socialist professor would take
admiring students through various sophisticated Marxist readings, leading inexorably to the
conclusion that the collapse of "late capitalism" was inevitable and to be welcomed. This
semester, there happened to be two Poles taking the class, one of whom was a woman who had been
an imprisoned dissident. They seemed to know their Marx as well as the prof did: they were
smart, they were vocal, and they were having absolutely none of it. It made for an exciting
several months, and for me a memorable demonstration that Eastern Europeans were more or less
immune to the guilt and self-hatred permeating much of the West.
Perhaps we are in for a reprise, when the people of the west learn once again from the east
what is true and essential about their own societies. Of course, there are parallels between
the communists' aspirations and the open borders diversity project. Both are genuinely
revolutionary in their desire to destroy and remake Western societies according to models that
have little viable precedent in human experience. Under this logic, the '60s and '70s can be
seen as a kind of transitional phase, during which Western socialists looked longingly towards
various Third World models -- China, Cuba, Vietnam, Nicaragua -- after they gave up on the
Soviet Union and their own proletariats as viable revolutionary agents. Now progressives hope
that social justice will bloom from the political chaos generated by demographic shifts.
Without the voices of Eastern Europe, the West might not have successfully resisted the
first progressive onslaught. Once again, it needs the voices of the east to illuminate its path
to survival.
Scott McConnell is a founding editor ofand the author of Ex-Neocon:
Dispatches From the Post-9/11 Ideological Wars.
"... Last night, President Trump reserved a few minutes of his State of the Union address to praise his tax reform law, which turned a year old last month. To promote its passage, Mr. Trump and his congressional allies promised Americans that drastically lowered corporate tax rates would bring home large sums of capital that had been stashed overseas and finance a surge of domestic investment. ..."
"... Why would any multinational corporation pay America's 21 percent tax rate when it could pay the new "global minimum" rate of 10.5 percent on profits shifted to tax havens, particularly when there are few restrictions on how money can be moved around a company and its foreign subsidiaries? ..."
"... For starters, the law's repatriation deal did prompt a brief surge in offshore profits returning to the United States. But the total sum returned so far is well below the trillions many proponents predicted, and a large chunk of the returned funds have been used for record-breaking stock buybacks, which don't help workers and generate little real economic activity. ..."
"... Bottom line: the Trump tax cut is a giveaway to corporations that doesn't promote investment here ..."
The Global Con Hidden in Trump's Tax Reform Law, Revealed
Why would any multinational corporation pay the new 21 percent rate when it could use the new
"global minimum" loophole to pay half of that?
By Brad Setser
Last night, President Trump reserved a few minutes of his State of the Union address
to praise his tax reform law, which turned a year old last month. To promote its passage, Mr.
Trump and his congressional allies promised Americans that drastically lowered corporate tax
rates would bring home large sums of capital that had been stashed overseas and finance a
surge of domestic investment.
"For too long, our tax code has incentivized companies to leave our country in search of
lower tax rates," he said, pitching voters in the fall of 2017. "My administration rejects
the offshoring model, and we have embraced a brand-new model. It's called the American
model."
The White House argued they wanted a system that "encourages companies to stay in America,
grow in America, spend in America, and hire in America." Yet the bill he signed into law
includes a sweetheart deal that allows companies that shift their profits abroad to pay tax
at a rate well below the already-reduced corporate income tax -- an incentive shift that
completely contradicts his stated goal.
Why would any multinational corporation pay America's 21 percent tax rate when it
could pay the new "global minimum" rate of 10.5 percent on profits shifted to tax havens,
particularly when there are few restrictions on how money can be moved around a company and
its foreign subsidiaries?
These wonky concerns were largely brushed aside amid the political brawl. But now that a
full year has passed since the tax bill became law, we have hard numbers we can evaluate.
For starters, the law's repatriation deal did prompt a brief surge in offshore profits
returning to the United States. But the total sum returned so far is well below the trillions
many proponents predicted, and a large chunk of the returned funds have been used for
record-breaking stock buybacks, which don't help workers and generate little real economic
activity.
And despite Mr. Trump's proud rhetoric regarding tax reform during his State of the Union
address, there is no wide pattern of companies bringing back jobs or profits from abroad. The
global distribution of corporations' offshore profits -- our best measure of their tax
avoidance gymnastics -- hasn't budged from the prevailing trend.
Well over half the profits that American companies report earning abroad are still booked
in only a few low-tax nations -- places that, of course, are not actually home to the
customers, workers and taxpayers facilitating most of their business. A multinational
corporation can route its global sales through Ireland, pay royalties to its Dutch subsidiary
and then funnel income to its Bermudian subsidiary -- taking advantage of Bermuda's corporate
tax rate of zero.
Where American Profits Hide
[Graph]
No major technology company has jettisoned the finely tuned tax structures that allow a
large share of its global profits to be booked offshore. Nor have major pharmaceutical
companies stopped producing many of their most profitable drugs in Ireland. And Pepsi, to
name just one major manufacturer, still makes the concentrate for its soda in Singapore, also
a haven.
Eliminating the complex series of loopholes that encourage offshoring was a major talking
point in the run-up to the 2017 tax bill, but most of them are still in place. The craftiest
and largest corporations can still legally whittle down their effective tax rate into the
single digits. (In fact, the new law encourages firms to move "tangible assets" -- like
factories -- offshore).
Overall, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act amounted to a technocratic sleight of hand -- a scheme
set to shift an even greater share of the federal tax burden onto the shoulders of American
families. According to the Treasury Department's tally for fiscal year 2018, corporate income
tax receipts fell by 31 percent, an unprecedented year-over-year drop in a time of economic
growth (presumably a time when profits and government revenue should rise in tandem).
These damning results, to be sure, don't make for a good defense of what came before the
new law. In theory under the old system, American-based firms still owed the government a cut
of their global profits. In practice, large firms could indefinitely defer paying this tax
until the funds could be repatriated -- usually when granted a tax holiday by a friendly
administration.
Over a generation, this political dance was paired with rules that made it relatively easy
for firms to transfer their most prized intellectual property -- say, the rights to popular
software or the particular mix of ingredients for a hot new drug -- to their offshore
subsidiaries. Taken together, they created a tax nirvana of sorts for multinational
corporations, particularly in intellectual-property-intensive industries like tech and
pharmaceuticals. But it wasn't enough.
For their next trick, the companies worked with their political allies to favorably frame
the 2017 tax debate. When he was the House speaker, Paul Ryan was fond of talking about $3
trillion in "trapped" profits abroad. But those profits weren't actually, physically, sitting
in a few tax havens.
Dwarf Economies, Giant American Profits
[Graph]
They were largely invested in United States bank accounts, securities and bonds issued by
the Treasury or other companies headquartered in the States. As Adam Looney -- a Brookings
Institution fellow and former Treasury Department official -- has explained, companies that
needed to finance a new domestic investment could simply issue a bond effectively backed by
its offshore cash. (For instance, Apple could bring its "trapped" funds onshore by selling a
bond to Pfizer's offshore account, or vice versa.)
Put plainly, they got the best of both worlds: Uncle Sam could tax only a small slice of
their books while they traded with one another based on the size of the entire pie.
The scale of the tax shifting has become so immense that some economists believe curbing
it could raise reported G.D.P. by well over a percentage point -- something Mr. Trump, who's
been absorbed by opportunities to brag about the economy, should notionally welcome.
President Trump's economic advisers and the key architects of the bill on Capitol Hill
must have known their reform wasn't going to end business incentives that hurt American
workers. Honest reform would have meant closing corporate loopholes -- a move they originally
promised to make.
Should the opportunity present itself, perhaps to the next president, there are a couple
of viable options for a fundamental tax overhaul that wouldn't require reinstating the 35
percent corporate tax rate.
One of several possibilities is to return to a system of global taxation without the
deferrals that enabled empty repatriations. That would mean profits sneakily booked tax-free
in Bermuda would be taxed every year at 21 percent. Profits booked in Ireland -- or other
low-tax nations -- would be taxed at the difference between Ireland's rate and America's
rate.
It's an approach that would protect small and midsize American companies while cracking
down on bad corporate actors with enough fancy accountants and lawyers to rig the game to
their advantage. And it would be far better than the fake tax reform passed a year ago.
This is very good from the essential Brad Setser, our leading expert on international
trade and money flows. Bottom line: the Trump tax cut is a giveaway to corporations that
doesn't promote investment here 1/
The Global Con Hidden in Trump's Tax Reform Law, Revealed
Why would any multinational corporation pay the new 21 percent rate when it could use the
new "global minimum" loophole to pay half of that?
2:14 PM - 6 Feb 2019
@Brad_Setser also gets at something I've been trying to explain: corporate cash "overseas"
isn't really a stash of money that can be brought home, it's an accounting fiction that lets
them avoid taxes, with no real consequences for investment 2/
And this chart, showing the predominance of tax avoidance in overseas "investment", is a
classic 3/
"... The imperialists want to grab the rich oil fields for the US big oil cartel ..."
"... Venezuela must not become an example for other countries in the region on social-programs policy ..."
"... Venezuela must not turn to cooperation with rival powers like China and Russia. Such a prospect may give the country the ability to minimize the effects of the economic war ..."
"... So, when Trump declared the unelected Juan Guaido as the 'legitimate president' of Venezuela, all the main neoliberal powers of the West rushed to follow the decision. ..."
"... Donald Trump is the personification of an authoritarian system that increasingly unveils its true nature. The US empire makes the Venezuelan economy 'scream hard', as it did in Chile in 1973. The country then turned into the first laboratory of neoliberalism with the help of the Chicago Boys and a brutal dictatorship. So, as the big fraud is clear now, neoliberalism is losing ground and ideological influence over countries and societies, after decades of complete dominance. ..."
Even before the 2016 US presidential election, this blog supported that Donald Trump is
apure sample of neoliberal barbarism . Many almost laughed at this perception because Trump was being already promoted,
more or less, as the 'terminator' of the neoliberal establishment. And many people, especially in the US, tired from the economic
disasters, the growing inequality and the endless wars, were anxious to believe that this was indeed his special mission.
Right after the elections, we supported that the
US establishment
gave a brilliant performance by putting its reserve, Donald Trump, in power, against the only candidate that the same
establishment identified as a real threat: Bernie Sanders.
In 2017 , Trump bombed Syria for the first time, resembling the lies that led us to the Iraq war disaster. Despite the fact that
the US Tomahawk missile attack had zero value in operational level (the United States allegedly warned Russia and Syria, while the
targeted airport was operating normally just hours after the attack), Trump sent a clear message to the US deep state that he is
prepared to meet all its demands - and especially the escalation of the confrontation with Russia.
Indeed, a year later, Trump built a pro-war team that includes the most bloodthirsty, hawkish neocons. And then, he ordered a
second airstrike against Syria, together with his neocolonial friends.
In the middle of all this 'orgy' of pro-establishment moves, Trump offered a controversial withdrawal of US forces from Syria
and Afghanistan to save whatever was possible from his 'anti-interventionist' profile. And it was indeed a highly controversial action
with very little value, considering all these US military bases that are still fully operational in the broader Middle East and beyond.
Not to mention the various ways through which the US intervenes in the area (training proxies, equip them with heavy weapons, supporting
the Saudis and contribute to war crimes in Yemen, etc.)
And then , after this very short break, Trump returned to 'business as usual' to satisfy the neoliberal establishment with a 'glorious'
record. He achieved a 35-day government shutdown, which is the
"longest shutdown in US history"
.
Trump conducted the longest experiment on neoliberals' ultimate goal: abolishing the annoying presence of the state. And this
was just a taste of what Trump is willing to do in order to satisfy all neoliberals' wet dreams.
And now, we have the Venezuela issue. Since Hugo Chavez nationalized PDVSA, the central oil and natural gas company, the US empire
launched a fierce economic war against the country. Yet, while all previous US administrations were trying to replace legitimate
governments with their puppets as much silently as possible through slow-motion coup operations, Trump has no problem to do it in
plain sight.
And perhaps the best proof for that is a statement by one of the most warmongering figures of the neocon/neoliberal cabal, hired
by Trump . As John Bolton cynically and openly
admitted recently,
" It will make a big difference to the United States economically if we could have American oil companies really invest in and
produce the oil capabilities in Venezuela. "
Therefore, one should be very naive of course to believe that the Western imperialist gang seriously cares about the Venezuelan
people and especially the poor. Here are three basic reasons behind the open US intervention in Venezuela:
The imperialists want to grab the rich oil fields for the US big oil cartel, as well as the
great untapped
natural resources , particularly gold (mostly for the Canadian companies).
Venezuela must not become an example for other countries in the region on social-programs policy, which is mainly funded by
the oil production. The imperialists know that they must interrupt the path of Venezuela to real Socialism by force if necessary.
Neoliberalism must prevail by all means for the benefit of the big banks and corporations.
Venezuela must not turn to cooperation with rival powers like China and Russia. Such a prospect may give the country the ability
to minimize the effects of the economic war. The country may find an alternative to escape the Western sanctions in order to fund
its social programs for the benefit of the people. And, of course, the West will never accept the exploitation of the Venezuelan
resources by the Sino-Russian bloc.
So, when Trump declared the unelected Juan Guaido as the 'legitimate president' of Venezuela, all the main neoliberal powers of
the West rushed to follow the decision.
This is something we have never seen before. The 'liberal democracies' of the West - only by name - immediately, uncritically
and without hesitation jumped on the same boat with Trump towards this outrageously undemocratic action. They recognized Washington's
puppet as the legitimate president of a third country. A man that was never elected by the Venezuelan people and has very low popularity
in the country. Even worse, the EU parliament
approved this action
, killing any last remnants of democracy in the Union.
Yet, it seems that the US is finding increasingly difficult to force many countries to align with its agenda. Even some European
countries took some distance from the attempted constitutional coup, with Italy even
trying to
veto EU's decision to recognize Guaido.
Donald Trump is the personification of an authoritarian system that increasingly unveils its true nature. The US empire makes
the Venezuelan economy 'scream hard', as it did in Chile in 1973. The country then turned into the first laboratory of neoliberalism
with the help of the Chicago Boys and a brutal dictatorship. So, as the big fraud is clear now, neoliberalism is losing ground and
ideological influence over countries and societies, after decades of complete dominance.
This unprecedented action by the Western neoliberal powers to recognize Guaido is a serious sign that neoliberalism returns to
its roots and slips towards fascism. It appears now that this is the only way to maintain some level of power.
If Trump runs of the defense of neoliberalism platform he will lose. But Trump proved to be a bad, superficial politician,
Republican Obama so to speak, so he may take this advice from his entourage. Trump proved to be a puppet of MIC and
Israel, his tax cuts had shown that he is a regular "trickle down" neoliberal. So he attraction to voters is down
substantially. Now
Polling is unambiguous here. If you define the "center" as a position
somewhere between those of the two parties, when it comes to economic issues the public is overwhelmingly left of center; if anything,
it's to the left of the Democrats. Tax cuts for the rich are the G.O.P.'s defining policy, but two-thirds of voters believe that taxes
on the rich are actually too low, while only 7 percent believe that they're too high. Voters support Elizabeth Warren's proposed tax
on large fortunes by a three-to-one majority. Only a small minority want to see cuts in Medicaid, even though such cuts have been central
to every G.O.P. health care proposal in recent years.
Notable quotes:
"... Insiders have suggested that Trump plans to explicitly run against socialism in 2020. In fact, in playing up the dangers of socialism, he may be positioning himself to run against Bernie Sanders in 2020. ..."
"... Sanders's rebuttal to Trump's address gave us a preview of how he plans to respond to the mounting attacks on socialism from the Right. President Trump said tonight, quote, "We are born free, and we will stay free," end of quote. Well I say to President Trump, people are not truly free when they can't afford to go to the doctor when they are sick. People are not truly free when they cannot afford to buy the prescription drugs they desperately need. People are not truly free when they are unable to retire with dignity. People are not truly free when they are exhausted because they are working longer and longer hours for lower wages. People are not truly free when they cannot afford a decent place in which to live. People certainly are not free when they cannot afford to feed their families. ..."
"... As Dr Martin Luther King Jr said in 1968, and I quote, "This country has socialism for the rich, and rugged individualism for the poor." What Dr. King said then was true, and it is true today, and it remains absolutely unacceptable. ..."
"... In essence what we're seeing here is Bernie Sanders challenging the popular equation of capitalism with democracy and freedom. This is the same point Bernie has been making for decades. "People have been brainwashed into thinking socialism automatically means slave-labor camps, dictatorship and lack of freedom of speech," he said in 1976. This Cold War dogma swept the pervasive reality of capitalist unfreedom - from the bondage of poverty to the perversions of formal democracy under the pressure of a dominant economic class - under the rug. In a 1986 interview, Bernie elaborated: ..."
"... All that socialism means to me, to be very frank with you, is democracy with a small "d." I believe in democracy, and by democracy I mean that, to as great an extent as possible, human beings have the right to control their own lives. And that means that you cannot separate the political structure from the economic structure. One has to be an idiot to believe that the average working person who's making $10,000 or $12,000 a year is equal in political power to somebody who is the head of a large bank or corporation. So, if you believe in political democracy, if you believe in equality, you have to believe in economic democracy as well. ..."
"... The rise of neoliberalism and the fall of the Soviet Union relieved the capitalist state's elite of the need to keep shoring up the equation between capitalism and freedom. Capitalists and their ideology had triumphed, hegemony was theirs, and socialism was no real threat, a foggy memory of a distant era. But forty years of stagnating wages, rising living costs, and intermittent chaos caused by capitalist economic crisis remade the world - slowly, and then all at once. When Bernie Sanders finally took socialist class politics to the national stage three years ago, people were willing to listen. ..."
Trump Is Right to Be Afraid of Socialism
BY MEAGAN DAY
... I think he's scared," said Ocasio-Cortez of Trump's socialism remarks. "He sees that everything is closing in on him. And
he knows he's losing the battle of public opinion when it comes to the actual substantive proposals that we're advancing to the
public." Given the remarkable popularity of proposals like Bernie's Medicare for All and tuition-free college and Ocasio-Cortez's
70 percent top marginal tax rate, she's probably onto something.
Insiders have suggested that Trump plans to explicitly
run against socialism in 2020. In fact, in playing up the dangers of socialism, he may be positioning himself to run against Bernie
Sanders in 2020. That would be a smart move, since Bernie is the most popular politician in America and could very well be
Trump's direct contender in the general election, if he can successfully dodge attacks from the establishment wing of the Democratic
Party in the primary.
Sanders's rebuttal to Trump's address gave us a preview of how he plans to respond to the mounting attacks on socialism
from the Right. President Trump said tonight, quote, "We are born free, and we will stay free," end of quote. Well I say to President
Trump, people are not truly free when they can't afford to go to the doctor when they are sick. People are not truly free when
they cannot afford to buy the prescription drugs they desperately need. People are not truly free when they are unable to retire
with dignity. People are not truly free when they are exhausted because they are working longer and longer hours for lower wages.
People are not truly free when they cannot afford a decent place in which to live. People certainly are not free when they cannot
afford to feed their families.
As Dr Martin Luther King Jr said in 1968, and I quote, "This country has socialism for the rich, and rugged individualism
for the poor." What Dr. King said then was true, and it is true today, and it remains absolutely unacceptable.
In essence what we're seeing here is Bernie Sanders challenging the popular equation of capitalism with democracy and freedom.
This is the same point Bernie has been making for decades. "People have been brainwashed into thinking socialism automatically
means slave-labor camps, dictatorship and lack of freedom of speech," he said in 1976. This Cold War dogma swept the pervasive
reality of capitalist unfreedom - from the bondage of poverty to the perversions of formal democracy under the pressure of a dominant
economic class - under the rug. In a 1986 interview, Bernie elaborated:
All that socialism means to me, to be very frank with you, is democracy with a small "d." I believe in democracy, and by
democracy I mean that, to as great an extent as possible, human beings have the right to control their own lives. And that means
that you cannot separate the political structure from the economic structure. One has to be an idiot to believe that the average
working person who's making $10,000 or $12,000 a year is equal in political power to somebody who is the head of a large bank
or corporation. So, if you believe in political democracy, if you believe in equality, you have to believe in economic democracy
as well.
For more than four decades, Bernie made these points to relatively small audiences. In 2016, everything changed, and he now
makes them to an audience of millions.
The rise of neoliberalism and the fall of the Soviet Union relieved the capitalist state's elite of the need to keep shoring
up the equation between capitalism and freedom. Capitalists and their ideology had triumphed, hegemony was theirs, and socialism
was no real threat, a foggy memory of a distant era. But forty years of stagnating wages, rising living costs, and intermittent
chaos caused by capitalist economic crisis remade the world - slowly, and then all at once. When Bernie Sanders finally took socialist
class politics to the national stage three years ago, people were willing to listen.
Bernie has been so successful at changing the conversation that the President now feels obligated to regurgitate Cold War nostrums
about socialism and unfreedom to a new generation.
Good, let him. Each apocalyptic admonition is an opportunity for Bernie, and the rest of us socialists, to articulate a different
perspective, one in which freedom and democracy are elusive at present but achievable through a society-wide commitment to economic
and social equality. We will only escape "coercion, domination, and control" when we structure society to prioritize the well-being
of the many over the desires of the greedy few.
Mr. Bill said in reply to anne... February 06, 2019 at 03:29 PM
A lot of the opinion part of what Paul Krugman says, in this article, maybe, doesn't ring quite true, although I don't dispute
the facts.
Poll after poll show that 75% of us agree on 80% of the issues, regardless of which political tribe we identify with.
I tend to think that the real problem is that neither the GOP, which represents the top 1% of the economically comfortable, nor the
Democrats who represent the top 10%, are representative of the majority of Americans.
Frantically trying to slice and dice the electorate into questionably accurate tranches, ignores the elephant in the room, Paul.
Wages are rising at the fastest pace in decades, and growing for blue collar workers, who I
promised to fight for, faster than anyone else. Nearly 5 million Americans have been lifted off
food stamps. The United States economy is growing almost twice as fast today as when I took
office, and we are considered far and away the hottest economy anywhere in the world.
Unemployment has reached the lowest rate in half a century. African-American, Hispanic-American
and Asian-American unemployment have all reached their lowest levels ever recorded.
Unemployment for Americans with disabilities has also reached an all-time low. More people are
working now than at any time in our history -- 157 million.
We passed a massive tax cut for working families and doubled the child tax credit.
We virtually ended the estate, or death, tax on small businesses, ranches, and family
farms.
We eliminated the very unpopular Obamacare individual mandate penalty -- and to give
critically ill patients access to life-saving cures, we passed right to try.
My Administration has cut more regulations in a short time than any other administration
during its entire tenure. Companies are coming back to our country in large numbers thanks to
historic reductions in taxes and regulations.
We have unleashed a revolution in American energy -- the United States is now the number one
producer of oil and natural gas in the world. And now, for the first time in 65 years, we are a
net exporter of energy.
After 24 months of rapid progress, our economy is the envy of the world, our military is the
most powerful on earth, and America is winning each and every day. Members of Congress: the
State of our Union is strong. Our country is vibrant and our economy is thriving like never
before.
On Friday, it was announced that we added another 304,000 jobs last month alone -- almost
double what was expected. An economic miracle is taking place in the United States -- and the
only thing that can stop it are foolish wars, politics, or ridiculous partisan
investigations.
If there is going to be peace and legislation, there cannot be war and investigation. It
just doesn't work that way!
... ... ...
Both parties should be able to unite for a great rebuilding of America's crumbling
infrastructure.
I know that the Congress is eager to pass an infrastructure bill -- and I am eager to work
with you on legislation to deliver new and important infrastructure investment, including
investments in the cutting edge industries of the future. This is not an option. This is a
necessity.
The next major priority for me, and for all of us, should be to lower the cost of healthcare
and prescription drugs -- and to protect patients with pre-existing conditions.
Already, as a result of my Administration's efforts, in 2018 drug prices experienced their
single largest decline in 46 years.
But we must do more. It is unacceptable that Americans pay vastly more than people in other
countries for the exact same drugs, often made in the exact same place. This is wrong, unfair,
and together we can stop it.
... ... ...
he final part of my agenda is to protect America's National Security.
Over the last 2 years, we have begun to fully rebuild the United States Military -- with
$700 billion last year and $716 billion this year. We are also getting other nations to pay
their fair share. For years, the United States was being treated very unfairly by NATO -- but
now we have secured a $100 billion increase in defense spending from NATO allies.
As part of our military build-up, the United States is developing a state-of-the-art Missile
Defense System.
Under my Administration, we will never apologize for advancing America's interests.
For example, decades ago the United States entered into a treaty with Russia in which we
agreed to limit and reduce our missile capabilities. While we followed the agreement to the
letter, Russia repeatedly violated its terms. That is why I announced that the United States is
officially withdrawing from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, or INF Treaty.
Perhaps we can negotiate a different agreement, adding China and others, or perhaps we can't
-- in which case, we will outspend and out-innovate all others by far.
As part of a bold new diplomacy, we continue our historic push for peace on the Korean
Peninsula. Our hostages have come home, nuclear testing has stopped, and there has not been a
missile launch in 15 months. If I had not been elected President of the United States, we would
right now, in my opinion, be in a major war with North Korea with potentially millions of
people killed. Much work remains to be done, but my relationship with Kim Jong Un is a good
one. And Chairman Kim and I will meet again on February 27 and 28 in Vietnam.
Two weeks ago, the United States officially recognized the legitimate government of
Venezuela, and its new interim President, Juan Guaido.
... ... ...
Our approach is based on principled realism -- not discredited theories that have failed for
decades to yield progress. For this reason, my Administration recognized the true capital of
Israel -- and proudly opened the American Embassy in Jerusalem.
Our brave troops have now been fighting in the Middle East for almost 19 years. In
Afghanistan and Iraq, nearly 7,000 American heroes have given their lives. More than 52,000
Americans have been badly wounded. We have spent more than $7 trillion in the Middle East.
As a candidate for President, I pledged a new approach. Great nations do not fight endless
wars.
When I took office, ISIS controlled more than 20,000 square miles in Iraq and Syria. Today,
we have liberated virtually all of that territory from the grip of these bloodthirsty
killers.
Now, as we work with our allies to destroy the remnants of ISIS, it is time to give our
brave warriors in Syria a warm welcome home.
I have also accelerated our negotiations to reach a political settlement in Afghanistan. Our
troops have fought with unmatched valor -- and thanks to their bravery, we are now able to
pursue a political solution to this long and bloody conflict.
In Afghanistan, my Administration is holding constructive talks with a number of Afghan
groups, including the Taliban. As we make progress in these negotiations, we will be able to
reduce our troop presence and focus on counter-terrorism. We do not know whether we will
achieve an agreement -- but we do know that after two decades of war, the hour has come to at
least try for peace.
... ... ...
My Administration has acted decisively to confront the world's leading state sponsor of
terror: the radical regime in Iran.
To ensure this corrupt dictatorship never acquires nuclear weapons, I withdrew the United
States from the disastrous Iran nuclear deal. And last fall, we put in place the toughest
sanctions ever imposed on a country.
Concerning
the partial shutdown and and the border barriers 1 - The banks, credit unions and any
other financial institutions that can lend money are missing a chance to build a lot of good
will in this situation. Good will is an item that any good business plan must take into account
even of it is impossible to quantify on paper. Good will leads to more customers. Businesses
want to acquire more customers. The 800k federal employees now on furlough have legislated
assurance that their back pay will be quickly forthcoming when the pause ends. Sooo! Make them
no interest loans in the amount of their postponed pay. You will not be sorry if you do that. I
don't know if that could be extended to contract employees since the contract that includes
their services may not insure back pay.
2 - The wall, barrier system or whatever you want to call it presently exists on a number of
sections of the border. Pelosi, Schumer and the other Democrats who prattle about the
"immorality" and uselessness of physical border defenses should be asked each and every day if
they want the present border barriers demolished so that anyone can cross the border whenever
they want and anywhere they want. California is the destination of choice of these economic
migrants. If the border barriers are taken down, there will be IMO a mass migration into what
is now the United States and especially into California from Latin American and then inevitably
from all over the world. Ask the Democrats, every day if they want the existing border barriers
taken down, Ask them! pl
The current fight over "the wall" and funding for that wall is pure politics on both sides.
We are under a partial government shutdown for the sake of a symbol. Some kind of border
barrier has been in existence since the 90s and the "Secure Border Act" of 2006 called for
close to 700 miles of double fence barriers. Both Republican and Democratic legislatures and
presidencies have maintained and added to this fencing as well as doubling the size of the
CBP. According to a December 2016 GAO report on securing the SW border, the CBP spent $2.4
billion between 2007 and 2015 to deploy tactical infrastructure (TI) - fencing, gates, roads,
bridges, lighting and drainage infrastructure distributed along the entire SW border area.
That includes 654 miles of fencing and 5,000 miles of roads.
A total of $1.7 billion was appropriated in FY17 and FY18 for new and replacement barriers
and fences. Most of those funds have been obligated to the Corp of Engineers and much of that
has been awarded to contractors. Only a small percentage (6%) has been paid out for completed
contracts. The following projects account for close to half of those funds:
- In New Mexico to replace 20 miles of fencing with bollard wall for $73 million. Contract
was awarded in February 2018. Construction started in April 2018 and was completed in
September 2018.
- In the Rio Grande Valley to build 8 miles of 18 foot bollard wall and replace existing
levee wall for $167 million to begin in February 2019.
- In Arizona to build/replace 32 miles of "primary pedestrian wall" for $324 million to
begin in April 2019.
- Near San Diego to replace 14 miles of 8-10 foot metal wall/fence with 18-30 foot tall
bollard wall system for $287 million to begin in July 2019.
Trump's current demand for $5.7 billion covers an additional 243 miles of fencing mostly
in the Rio Grande Valley. It'll probably be 2020 before a single bollard is set from that
$5.7 billion and several years after that to issue the contracts and complete the
construction. Given the shortcoming in the present border fences, that $5.7 billion would be
better spent on replacing the present barriers in the most needed areas rather constructing
new fence in less vulnerable areas. Just to maintain and replace what we have should require
close to a billion dollars a year. I say again, this current battle over $5.7 billion for
"the wall" is political posturing by both sides.
The more important demand made by Trump was the $800 million to address the humanitarian
crisis on the border. These funds would provide for improved care/processing of
refugees/asylum seekers, 2,750 more border agents and 75 more immigration judges. In my
opinion, that would be a wise expense. I think there ought to be ten times that number of new
border agents/officers to better address the refugee problem (humanitarian crisis) which will
probably remain for many years. Climate change is making drought, hurricanes, floods and
mudslides the new normal in Central America. The farming economy in this region, which
includes southern Mexico is collapsing. Local governments are dysfunctional and impotent.
These people are going to migrate or die in place.
If you want to declare a national emergency, we could use eminent domain to condemn and
buy a lot of farmland at cost from corporate agribusinesses and start a "40 acres and a mule"
program for refugee farm families and any native American family who desire a new start.
Have to agree. Trump only asked for $1.6 billion for his wall in his 2019 budget...and got
it. He then decided to have a fight, one that he was loath to have when the Republicans held
the majority in the House.
IMO Pelosi and co have also decided this is a good place to have a Waterloo. This isn't a
struggle for a wall it's a struggle for dominance. They await a tide of public opinion to
decide it.
They should shut down the whole regime. The first things to be shut down should be the myriad
of bases occupying foreign soil, particularly the bases that support the destabilization of
middle eastern countries.
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I am on the left and I don't have a problem with the wall. That said, if you really want to
reduce illegal immigration exit controls would be more effective (and much more cost
effective). I went through a whole lot of trouble to get a work visa to work legally in
Poland in the late 90s - and I wouldn't have bothered if Poland didn't have exit controls.
Almost every country in the world has exit controls ... except for Canada and the US.
Oh cut it out. The wall is bullshit. If Trump was actually serious about illegal immigration
he'd be pushing E-Verify for all US businesses to determine the eligibility of employees. But
the GOP business lobby would never allow that so we get dog and pony shows like this so that
Trump can act like he really means business.
Well, at last you have made a logical point. E-verify should be made mandatory. You would
probably loose a lot of friends if it were. BTW, your many insulting comments today have
caused me after many years to ban you.
With regard to #1 I'm not holding my breath. Fundamental to the financial sector's business
model is opportunistic predation. As Michael Hudson relentlessly documents in his recently
published and forgive them their debts: Lending, Foreclosure and Redemption from Bronze
Age Finance to the Jubilee Year , it has been this way since money was invented in the
ancient Near East over five thousand years ago. In today's world few banksters can be
expected to forego invoking the fine print terms regarding the late fees and interest rate
hikes, especially considering the fact the careers of the CEOs and CFOs of publicly traded
companies live or die by the next quarterly earnings report.
https://amzn.to/2TfN2ht
Sadly Hudson's important book is getting little traction. He could only get this published on
a print-to-order basis in spite of the fact he has about a dozen prior books to his credit.
As a PtO book it will not be stocked by chain book stores.
They would never admit it, but of courser the Democrats want all the barriers gone and an
open border.
There are approx. 22 mil. illegal aliens in this country and the Democrats want more and
more.
Then they can push for amnesty (which the swamp Republicans, in their gross stupidity, will
go along with) and PRESTO: 22 mil. plus entitled Democrat voters.
Who needs those redneck goober
They would never admit it, but of courser the Democrats want all the barriers gone and an
open border.
There are approx. 22 mil. illegal aliens in this country and the Democrats want more and
more.
Then they can push for amnesty (which the swamp Republicans, in their gross stupidity, will
go along with) and PRESTO: 22 mil. plus entitled Democrat voters.
Who needs those redneck goober (white male)Trump voters, anyway?
As Philip Giraldi points out in a post a The Unz Review today, the Democratic establishment
isn't opposed to walls per se. It depends on who's building it and for what purpose.
Pelosi, Schumer and the other Democrats who prattle about the immorality and uselessness of
physical border defenses should be asked each and every day if they want the present border
barriers demolished so that anyone can cross the border whenever they want and anywhere
they want The wall, barrier system or whatever you want to call it presently exists on a
number of sections of the border.
In honor of Sen. Chuck 'Shomer', I vote that we call our border barrier a fence ,
just as Israel does:
Sir: While not directly on point, I knuckled under and signed up with Disqus simply to say
how much I have appreciated this committee of correspondence over the years. Seeing your post
recently about conversing with Glubb Pasha was the proverbial straw that broke the camel's
back.
IMO, we should sell coastal California to Mexico for $100 billion. Then use that money to
build a wall from Oregon to Brownsville, TX. Solves two problems in one fell swoop.
It sure does seem like the lenders are missing an excellent opportunity for a nearly risk
free public relations campaign as well as sales opportunities. Get these furloughed workers
in the door and give them a furlough loan and then get them interested in home loans, auto
loans...whatever they're qualified for. Should be a no-brainer.
Trump is our chief executive charged with the day to day running of the government and the
proverbial "making the trains run on time" for government functions. All these functions work
for him, not the legislative branch. His partial shutdown of the government reminds me of the
classic film Blazing Saddles where the black sheriff, played by Cleavon Little, takes himself
hostage by holding a gun to his own head to hold off a mob angry at having a black appointed
sheriff for their town. It worked in the film. Let's hope it does not work in Washington.
Fred, just finished the book you recommended "A Disease in the Public Mind - Why We Fought
the Civil War" by Thomas Flemming. The most balanced and fair nonfiction historical book I
have read on this subject.
Also depressing because History is repeating itself. Not rhyming but repeating itself. The
modern day abolitionist is convinced of their morale superiority over the deplorables. Just
look at the Fake News regarding the Catholic School boys. One abolitionist said on Twitter
that he wish they were dead along with their parents.
I hate the agenda of the Paul Ryan wing of the Republican Party but I hate these modern
day abolitionist more since they desire to kill people just because they don't agree with
their transgender, open borders anarchy, and taxes on the little guy for a Climate Change
problem that doesn't exist. The Yellow Vest movement is a push back against this madness.
Instead of talking Medicare for All, jobs for everyone, prosperity, taking care of your
countryman the political narrative is on bizarre subjects due to the Elite knowing
Globalization is destroying huge sections of Western Civilization. The Yellow Vest have
destroyed 60% of the Speed Cameras deployed to catch the little guy going 5 m.p.h. over the
speed limit or running a red light that is timed to get you. It has nothing to do with safety
and everything to do with raising money off the individuals who are already struggling to
survive.
For the top 26 billionaires in the world to have as much wealth as the bottom 3.8 billion
people in the world is barbaric. Globalization has led to drastic income inequality and the
fuse is burning.
Glad you read the book. I agree when you say " The modern day abolitionist is convinced of
their morale superiority over the deplorables." I wrote an early piece about that existential
angst of this newest generation. (Hard to believe it has already been two years.)
https://turcopolier.typepad...
I think this generation is waking up to having 'been played' by the politicians. What is
being missed in this latest effort to control the narrative is 1) Anti-Semitism in the
Women's march which led many groups, inluding the DNC, to withdraw support. 2) A turnout
that's roughly 90% lower than two years ago and a far, far cry from what was promoted. Others
in random order: Unempolyment is way down. The stock market is up almost 10% since the
shutdown began. Turmp is directing that the armed forces leave Syria (Afghanistan is probably
next) and North Korea is making further move gestures towards actual denuclearization.
What will be interesting to see, in the long run, is if the Democrats can keep the Hispanic
vote. Being godless sodomites, the new age abolitionists are making war on Catholics and, it
just so happens, that Hispanics, by and large, are serious about their Catholicism.
I don't see it. California proves otherwise. Texas and Georgia have become competitive
because of illegal immigrants having American born kids. The abolitionist say demography is
destiny and I tend to agree. Shows how racist they are. And how much they hate white people.
I see the Republican Party becoming noncompetitive to extinct over the next 20 years. And
the Democrat Party separating into 2 parties. The Progressive Wing versus the Moderate Wing.
Of course it could just all burned down before then and I wouldn't be surprised. I plan to
read your book next and have no doubt I will enjoy it. I've read the free excerpts you
provided and enjoyed them.
In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if future white generations in America do not emigrate to
Russia. I hate to be pessimistic but the monkey brain of man is incurable and hate runs
rampant. The modern day white abolitionist will be sideline to the trailer park but they are
too stupid to see it.
We need a new party in America that is for all colors of citizens and an economic populist
platform along with a social justice system that is vibrant.
The Democrat Party is the most vile/racist/bigoted party in the world right now. This
modern abolitionist attitude that killed many innocent Iraqi's due to no fault of their own
and believes they can dictate to countries such as Afghanistan, Syria, and Russia on how to
live because they are gender neutral is going to come back and destroy them. Either through a
home grown movement such as the Yellow Vest or worse to all of our detriment.
Sir, It may already be happening. An NPR/PBS/Marist January poll (that's not Fox/Breitbart)
shows approval of the performance of Trump among Hispanics rising from 31% to 50% since the
same poll was performed just prior to the shutdown. I can't figure out if Trump is a 10th
level Jedi master or if it's a case of the one eyed man being king in the land of the blind.
Trump says give me X number of $$s for my border wall (thought balloon over his head says "so
I can get re-elected") or I shut down the gov't. What's to keep him from doing it again if
the Dems cave this time?
On a side note: it's pretty appalling that you and your mostly Cuckoo bird commenters
think this is the way the republic should be run. So sad what happened to this blog.
We have Democrats like Sandy Ocasio-Cortez demanding the abolition of ICE. Is that one of
so-called improvements to border security the Democrats are seeking with popular backing?
If left to their devices, the Democrats would happily do away with the border altogether.
Don't take my word for it. Take the words of the two-time failed Democratic presidential
candidate Hillary Clinton. She gave a paid, private speech in Brazil where she claimed, "My
dream is a hemispheric common market, with open trade and open borders, some time in the
future with energy that is as green and sustainable as we can get it, powering growth and
opportunity for every person in the hemisphere." That's all fine and dandy, I'm sure, but
oddly she didn't make that proclamation publicly on the campaign trail.
You are so full of shit. Dems want borders and they want border security based on real
experience, not a mnemonic device dreamed up by Roger Stone to focus candidate Trump on
immigration issues.
I think you are putting words in Pelosi's and the democrats mouths. I have heard of none of
them espousing getting rid of the border barriers. I believe they view a wall as a dumb idea
but are for other improvements for border security. This, I believe, is what the majority of
the populace want.
Pelosi and any number of other leading Dems have said that border barriers are immoral. The
logical conclusion from those statements is that ALL border barriers are immoral. If that is
their position then they should advocate removal of existing barriers. If they do not, then
they are politically self serving liars.
Tell that to the angry ranchers along the southern Texas borders who think trump's wall is a
political stunt that will ruin them economically.
There is no illegal alien southern border crisis in 2019 -- and the migrant caravan that
had so many republicans freaked out ultimately wound up in Tijuana, across the wall from San
Diego. Because that's where migrant families wind up, at official points of entry so they can
apply for asylum.
Sir;
The problem with the idea of banks building 'good will' is that the financial sector, by and
large, has moved on from old fashioned business models to an 'enrich the insiders at everyone
else's expense' model.
My local bank that I use has signs in the lobby directing workers discommoded by the shutdown
to apply at the small loan desk. I do not know what incentives are on offer, but my
unpleasant experience with the bank once before does not give me much hope of the bank acting
altruistically.
William K Black, who headed part of the Federal response to the 'Savings and Loan' crisis in
the 1980's has called this trend the building of a "criminogenic environment."
As for the wall fiasco, I would ask Chuck and Nancy; "Who do you consider as being
Americans?" Then tell them to serve that group, no one else. The last time I looked, no one
had abolished the Nation State.
Thank you for your indulgence.
But that is exactly the problem; global corporations and their lobbyists are doing their
utmost to abolish the Nation State. Nation states are a PITA, from the Globalist POV. They
make regulations, have borders impeding the rampant denuding of talent pools and worst of all
occasionally erect trade barriers to favor their domestic industries. All of this is harmful
to the corporate profits of a global business. What we are witnessing in the US and elsewhere
is the push back against this drive to maximize profits at the cost of huge sections of
national populations.
Trump may be a billionaire businessman with worldwide interests, but real estate is
different. It employs largely local labor and is not vulnerable to 'protectionist' government
policies in the same way. This is key to understanding how a billionaire like Trump can think
and act so differently to the Davos club and billionaires like Bezos.
Totally agree with you. What I can't understand about these politicians from the democratic
party or for that matter the main stream media is if we are so internationalized then why all
the this drum beating about Russia Russia since we a re all a part of the nice international
group of people. Don't they have as much stake who governs in this international brotherhood?
Then that is what they should say, rather than the prattle they are currently issuing.
Apparently, unlike me, you completed the mind reading class in high school.
My mind reading comment was actually addressed to Stuart Wood for his remark about Pelosi and
company that despite their words to the contrary, "I believe they view a wall as a dumb
idea but are for other improvements for border security."
"... A Trump wall or barrier will cost far more than believed and be likely unfinished, with large gaps like the Maginot Line. Some better way of blocking the border must be found. If not, we may end up having to wall and garrison the Canadian border as well. ..."
`Good fences make good neighbors,' wrote American poet Robert Frost. But not according to
President Donald Trump whose proposed Great Wall is supposed to protect the nation from hordes
of rabid, murderous, drug crazed rapists and unwhites from south of the border.
I'm a life-long student of military architecture, with a particular passion for modern
fortification, chief among which is France's own Great Wall, the magnificent and unfairly
reviled Maginot Line.
Given the heated debate in America over Trump's proposed barrier along the Mexican border,
it's worth looking back to the Maginot Line. It was supposed to have been France's savior after
the bloodbath of World War I.
Proposed by Deputy André Maginot in the 1920's, the Line was supposed to cover key
parts of France's frontiers with German and Italy. Due to the terrible losses of the Great War,
France did not have enough soldiers to properly defend its long frontiers. So it made sense to
erect fortifications to compensate for manpower weakness and to block surprise attacks from
next door enemy forces.
The first large Maginot fort was built in the 1920's north of Nice to protect the Cote
d'Azur from possible Italian attacks. Mussolini was demanding France return the Riviera coast
to its former Italian rulers. Work on the principal Line along the German and Luxembourg
borders began soon after. Phase one covered 260 miles from near the Rhine to Longuyon, a rail
junction south of the Belgian border.
The Line consisted of hundreds of steel and concrete machine gun and anti-tank casemates
with interlocking flanking fire. They were surrounded by upright rails designed to halt tanks
and dense belts of interwoven barbed wire covered by machine guns. Artillery casemates with
75mm, 81mm and 135mm guns covered the fort's fronts and sides.
Within and behind the Maginot Line were based an army of specialized fortress troops and
hundreds of field artillery guns. The era's most advanced electronic communications systems
meshed the defenses together. The big forts were mostly buried 90 feet underground, proof from
any projectiles of the era.
But the problem was that a wall or barrier is only effective so long as there are adequate
troops to man it.
In the spring of 1940, France had deployed nearly a third of its field army behind the
Maginot Line. But then the Germans staged a brilliant breakthrough north of the Line across the
supposedly impenetrable Ardennes forest region. In 1938, a French parliamentarian named Perrier
(from the French water family) had toured the Ardennes area and warned the military that it was
very vulnerable to a German breakthrough. The generals scoffed at 'this civilian' and ignored
Perrier's warning.
Sure enough, the German armored and infantry assault came right through this Ardennes weak
point near Sedan, forcing a rapid retreat by French and British forces in the region that ended
up at Dunkerque.
ORDER IT NOW
As outflanked Allied forces pulled back from the frontier, they exposed the northern flank
of the Maginot Line. The French high command, fearing their armies around the Line would be
encircled, ordered the interval forces to retreat towards the highlands of central France. The
Line was thus denuded of its troops and artillery. These units, who were armed and trained for
static defense, had to make their way cross country on foot. Most were captured en route by
advancing German forces.
In spring 1940 the Line was unfinished with large gaps and open flanks due to budgetary
constraints caused by the 1930's depression. The Germans drove through them, wisely avoiding
most of big forts, and attacked the Line from the rear. Ironically, in 1944/45, German troops
ended up defending the Maginot Forts from the advancing US Army.
The Line worked as planned, protecting vulnerable areas. But it was never extended to the
Channel due to Belgium's high water table and reluctance to fortify behind the French ally. The
Belgians believed their powerful forts near Liege would delay the Germans until the French Army
could intervene. They were wrong.
The French public ascribed almost magical powers to the Line. It would keep them
invulnerable they believed. Building the fortifications became a national works project during
the Depression, rather like the US WPA labor program. But Adolf Hitler vowed he would go around
the Line and chop it up. He did.
A Trump wall or barrier will cost far more than believed and be likely unfinished, with
large gaps like the Maginot Line. Some better way of blocking the border must be found. If not,
we may end up having to wall and garrison the Canadian border as well.
Sir, you make an interesting point, but the comparison is not valid.
In the Maginot line case, France was being attacked by other COUNTRIES, i.e. govt. of
other countries, with tanks and soldiers.
But, the US is being attacked by individuals, these criminal alien invaders. The Mexican
govt. is not trying to invade us with troops and tanks; only the individuals with nothing but
a big mouth.
This is a horrible analogy and the author knows it. He is correct, Trump's border wall would
not withstand an attack by thousands of German troops with tanks. There is no mention of
walls in Israel that no illegal immigrant can cross, nor the South Korean DMZ. Border
security makes sense and is a tiny fraction of the huge budget our Department of Defense
spends to protect the borders of our allies. Opponents are just naive or covert open borders
globalists.
We don't needs a wall (or high barriers) along 90% of the border because those areas are
too far from road access on Mexican side, nor do we need them along 99% of the Canadian
border. One can visit the border or just look at youtube and see that we really need a first
class barrier along 10% of the Mexican border. This will deter chaos in the easily accessible
areas by replacing an assortment of old fences wobbly that even moms with kids can hop
over.
I challenge Mr Margolis to cite just one incident where an illegal immigrant penetrated the
Maginot Line. Otherwise, he should apologize for wasting our time with this horrible article.
If he wants to discuss alternatives, like requiring e-verify, let's hear them.
How about self-funding border security. We all pay a TSA fee for every flight for
security. Why not charge $10 to cross the border by foot, or $20 per vehicle. Many American
bridges have hefty fees to cross, why not the border?
No wall is strong enough to protect against desperate people who flee from extreme violence
and poverty; yet these people are NOT an invading army but broken families; single mothers
with small kids who only seek peace and security for their children.
The problem of mass migration is not new; but the US leadership had always dealt with it
with foresight which is lacking in the Trump Administration. America wouldn't have the
problem of mass migration had the US fulfilled its own role as the world Superpower –
so, dealing with the Latin America as the neighbours who need help to restore themselves to
functioning states as opposed to walling them in their desperation.
Back in 1994, the Peso Crisis would have paralyzed Mexico as a functioning state but Bill
Clinton administration had recognized that the US must help Mexican government from total
collapse which would have resulted to flood of poor migrants to the southern borders of the
USA – as such, under the leadership of president Bill Clinton, the US, Canada and IMF
had structured a bailout loan-package to help the Mexican government to keep its economy
afloat, that has not only prevented the mass migration of poor Mexicans workers to the
southern borders of the USA but also helped the US exports to Mexico, so, helped the American
economy as well.
We need similar approach to the rest of the Latin America, we need to help these countries
to sustain and restore themselves to functioning states with relative security for families;
because no wall is strong enough to protect against total desperation.
The wall will not be effective because illegal immigration from Mexico and Central America
constitutes 5% or less of all immigration, see Ron Unz's recent article on the subject. The
real problem is legal immigration: anchor babies, diversity lottery visa, H1-B visa, chain
immigration, etc. The real problem is US immigration law, not lack of a physical barrier to
illegal immigration. If a wall worked 100% of the time (it won't) you still would have 20
times the numbers in *legal immigration* that would continue to fail to be addressed. The
Wall is a sop tossed to the masses by pandering politicians who don't have the will to
address the overarching problem of legal immigration. General George Patton summed up the
Maginot line pretty well, and it applies to the Wall: "Fixed fortifications are a monument to
the stupidity of man."
@Giuseppe The wall will be effective: at proving that America is actually capable of
stopping immigration flow. Can't do something as simple and straightforward as building the
wall, can't enforce immigration law.
The key point is that the Germans went around the Maginot Line: The wall itself worked.
My chateau is near Sedan; lovely wooded hilly place, and one would be forgiven for
thinking an armoured assault through the Ardennes would surely fail, so why waste resources
there? I hear the same sort of blather about parts of the US southern border.
This is a horrible analogy and the author knows it.
Yep.
There is no mention of walls in Israel that no illegal immigrant can cross, nor the
South Korean DMZ.
Yep. Especially the former.
All Trump has to do, re the wall is implement Israeli solution . Gander, goose.
As for the illegal immigration, also simple: JAIL the business owners who employ them;
including one member of a household where an illegal is employed.
As for legal immigration, well one step at the time.
All this bullshit about this topic is truly funny. Funny how retards get hooked on it. Not
people with agendas, oh they know what they are doing. But an average Joe getting so excited
about the topic.
No wonder we are where we are.
I guess that's one of the usual "gullibility" games TPTBs play with the "deplorables". And
win, obviously.
So Mexicans are going to go by boat caravans to Canada, which is going to let that happen,
and then the caravans will cross the U.S.-Canadian border?
As far as Nazis in tanks coming in from Mexico, that's O.K. with me. The more Nazi
soldiers, the better. Just keeping out the hordes of unskilled poor is enough.
I challenge Mr Margolis to cite just one incident where an illegal immigrant penetrated
the Maginot Line
Right.
Even keeping the problematic, apples-to-oranges migration-to-military analogy, consider
this letter-to-editor in a Maryland local newspaper published
Jan. 14, 2019:
The Maginot Line worked; it forced the Germans to attack elsewhere. Defeat could have
been prevented, but the French failed to fully understand what a successful deterrent their
wall was. France built the Maginot Line on the border between France and Germany from
Switzerland to Belgium.
For political reasons (they didn't want to "offend" King Leopold) they stopped at
Belgium instead of extending it to the North Sea. The French relied on the Dyle River and
the Ardennes in Belgium to stop the Germans. Not extending the wall to the North Sea was
the Maginot Line's Achilles Heel and caused the French defeat.
At the outbreak of war France's border was protected by the impregnable Maginot Line.
Belgium, demonstrating "The Triumph of Hope over experience," had declared itself neutral
and forbade the extension of the Line along its border. This meant that an attack on France
would come via Belgium.
The Allied plan, Plan D, was to advance into Belgium and there, because of overall
superiority, defeat the Germans. [Isaac Leslie Hore-Belisha, Jewish British Secretary of
State for War], far from happy with this Plan, wanted the original defence system
strengthened. This was to be done by building 240 pillboxes (small forts).
The Army told him it would take 3 weeks to construct a pillbox. Belisha ascertained that
it would take 3 days. Accordingly he brought to France a team of Civil Engineers to do
this. Unfortunately the Army resented them and gave minimal co-operation.
Belisha now visited France, and attended a meeting of senior officers, which included
the commander of the British force, Lord Gort.
A shocked Belisha found that the 1st item on the agenda was "Over which shoulder should
a soldier carry his steel helmet when it was not on his head?" He also found that only 2
pillboxes had been constructed.
On his return he reported the situation to the Army Council, and informed the Prime
Minister who said that if he wanted to sack Lord Gort he would support him. Belisha refused
to do this. Instead he sent General Packenham Walsh to convey to Lord Gort the Army
Council's disquiet at the state of his defences.
In doing this Belisha had committed a breach of etiquette. An officer can only be
reprimanded by a senior. Packenham Walsh was junior to Lord Gort.
This faux pas increased the already deep hostility to Belisha to a blinding rage. Lord
Gort referred to him as Belli; His Chief of Staff General Sir Henry Pownell now referred to
him as a "Shallow brained, charlatan, political Jew boy". Michael Foot, later to become
leader of the Labour party thought of him as "a shit". Chips Chanon a prominent socialite
referred to him as "An Oily Jew".
An army song went:
"Onward Christian Soldiers,
You have nothing to fear
Israel Hore-Belisha will lead you from the rear,
Clothed by Monty Burton
Fed on Lyons Pies
Die for Jewish freedom
As a Briton always dies.
Other officers were referring to him as Horeb Elisha.
Aware of this viscous attitude the Chief of the Imperial General Staff visited France.
On his return he supported the Armies attitude, and reported to the King who called in the
Prime minister. On January 4th 1940 Belisha was sacked.
On May 10th the Germans attacked through Belgium, and the British Army following plan D
advanced to combat the enemy. They were then completely out flanked
But the problem was that a wall or barrier is only effective so long as there are adequate
troops to man it.
True, but this has absolutely nothing to do with the failure of the Allies to stop the
German invasion. By the way something, which part of the US's southern border is playing
Belgium in this rather dubious comparison?
@Rational The Kaiser didn't use 1,000 volts, he used 2,000 volts for his electric fence:
The Hun used a stand alone 2,000 volt power generation plant for their fence. Widespread
electric power in the USA means we could use 1:2 step down power transformers for an
electrified fence.
Did the Kaiser's fence work as planned?
"As Germany invaded neutral Belgium, Belgians began to cross the border to the Netherlands
en masse. In 1914 one million Belgian refugees were already in the Netherlands, but
throughout the war, refugees kept coming and tried to cross the border. Many wanted to escape
German occupation, others wanted to join their relatives who had already fled, and some
wanted to take part in the war and chose this detour to join the forces on the allied
front.
"Construction began in the spring of 1915 and consisted of over 200 km (125 mi) of
2,000-volt wire with a height ranging from 1.5 to about 3 m (5 to about 10 ft) spanning the
length of the Dutch-Belgian border from Aix-la-Chapelle to the River Scheldt. Within
100–500 m (110–550 yd) of the wire, anyone who was not able to officially explain
their presence was summarily executed.
"The number of victims is estimated to range between 2,000 and 3,000 people. Local
newspapers in the Southern Netherlands carried almost daily reports about people who were
'lightninged to death'.
"The wire also separated families and friends as the Dutch–Belgian border where
Dutch and Flemings (Dutch-speaking Belgians), despite living in different states, often
intermarried or otherwise socialized with each other. Funeral processions used to walk to the
fence and halt there, to give relatives and friends on the other side the opportunity to pray
and say farewell.[3]
@Gordo' Actually I agree a wall is not needed, it is willpower that is needed.
Without that a wall is useless, with it a wall is superfluous '
The wall has become a symbol -- as walls tend to be.
It's now secondary whether it actually stops anyone. If we build it, we have decided to
retake control of our borders. If we don't, we have abdicated that control.
The demand of President Donald Trump
that congress should appropriate money to build a wall securing the nation's southern border has resulted in
the longest federal government shutdown in history with no end in sight. There is considerable opposition to
the wall based on two quite different perceptions of border security. The generally "progressive" view is
that there is no border threat at all, that the thousands of migrants heading for the U.S. can be
assimilated and indeed should be allowed entry because of U.S. government policies in Central America that
have created the ruined states that the would-be immigrants have been fleeing.
There is certainly some truth to that
argument, though it suggests that the United States should essentially abandon sovereignty over its own
territory, which most Americans would reject. The alternative viewpoint, which has a much broader bipartisan
constituency, consists of those who do feel that border security is a national priority but are nevertheless
critical of building a wall, which will be expensive, possibly ineffective and environmentally damaging.
They prefer other options, to include increased spending on the border guards, more aggressive enforcement
against existing illegals and severe punishment of businesses in the U.S. that hire anyone not possessing
legal documentation. Some also have argued in favor of a national ID issued only to citizens or legal
permanent residents that would have to be produced by anyone seeking employment or government services.
Whether the wall will ever be built is
questionable, but one thing that is certain is that there is more than enough hypocrisy regarding it to go
around. Democratic Presidents including Bill Clinton and Barack Obama when campaigning have called for
better border security, as have Democratic Congressional leaders who are now smelling blood and attacking
Trump for seeking to do what they have long at least theoretically sought.
Apart from that, many of the Democrats
who are currently criticizing the southern border wall on moral grounds have failed to apply the same
standard to another infamous wall, that which is being built by Israel. Israel's "separation wall" is
arguably being constructed at least in part using "aid" and charitable money provided by Washington while
also being enabled politically by the U.S. government's acquiescence to the Israeli violations of
international law. And if the moral argument for not having a wall to aid suffering refugees has any
meaning, it would be many times more so applied to the Israeli wall, which is an instrument in the
maintenance of apartheid in areas under Israeli control while also making permanent the stateless status of
the more than one million Palestinian refugees, far more in number than the would-be immigrants marching
through Mexico.
The Israeli wall is at many points larger
and more intimidating than that planned by Trump, and it is also designed to physically and economically
devastate the Palestinian population adjacent to it. Israel's wall is undeniably far more damaging than
anything being considered for placement along the U.S.-Mexican border as it operates as both a security
measure and a tool for confiscating more Arab land by including inside the barrier illegal West Bank
settlements.
There are both physical similarities and
differences relating to the two walls. Judging from prototypes, Trump currently appears to favor
prefabricated mostly metal sections with barbed wire coils on top that would be high and intimidating enough
to deter climbing over. The sections would be set in foundations sufficiently deep to deter most tunneling
and there would be sensors at intervals to alert guards to other attempts to penetrate the barrier. Israel's
wall varies in terms of structural material, including large concrete blocks 28 feet high in some areas
while other less populated stretches that are considered low security make do with multiple lines of barbed
wire and sensors. It is interesting to note that some Israeli companies have apparently expressed interest
in building the Mexico wall and, as one of the many perks Israel receives from congress includes the right
to bid on U.S. government contracts, they might well wind up as a contractors or subcontractors if the
barrier is ever actually built.
As noted above, the principal difference
between the U.S. wall and that of Israel is that the American version is all on U.S. land and is engineered
to more or less run in a straight line along the border. The Israeli version is nearly 90% built on
Palestinian land and, as it is designed to create facts on the West Bank, it does not run in a straight
line, instead closing off some areas to the Palestinians by surrounding Arab villages. It therefore keeps
people in while also keeping people out, so it is not strictly speaking a security barrier. Indeed, some
Israeli security experts have stated their belief that the wall has been only
a minor asset
in preventing violence directed by Palestinians against Israelis.
If the Israeli wall had followed the
Green Line that separated Israel proper from Palestinian land it would be only half the estimated 440 miles
long that it will now be upon completion. The extra miles are accounted for
by the deep cuts
of as much as 11 miles into the West Bank, isolating about 9% of it and completely
enclosing 25,000 Palestinian Arabs from areas nominally controlled by the Palestinian Authority. One
often cited victim
of the barrier is the Palestinian town of Qalqilyah, with a population of 45,000,
which is enclosed on all sides by a wall that in some sections measures more than 25 feet high. Qalqilyah is
only accessible through an Israeli controlled military checkpoint on the main road from the east and a
tunnel on the south side that links the town to the adjacent village of Habla.
The wall is therefore only in part a
security measure while also being a major element in the Israeli plan to gradually acquire as much of the
West Bank as possible – perhaps all of it – for Israeli settlers. It is a form of collective punishment
based on religion to make life difficult for local people and eventually drive them from their homes.
it is difficult to overstate the
humanitarian impact of the Barrier. The route inside the West Bank severs communities, people's access to
services, livelihoods and religious and cultural amenities. In addition, plans for the Barrier's exact
route and crossing points through it are often not fully revealed until days before construction
commences. This has led to considerable anxiety amongst Palestinians about how their future lives will be
impacted The land between the Barrier and the Green Line constitutes some of the most fertile in the
West Bank. It is currently the home for 49,400 West Bank Palestinians living in 38 villages and towns."
"The fence/wall, in its present
configuration, violates Israel's obligations under international humanitarian law Since the summer of
2002 the Israeli army has been destroying large areas of Palestinian agricultural land, as well as other
properties, to make way for a fence/wall which it is building in the West Bank. In addition to the large
areas of particularly fertile Palestinian farmland that have been destroyed, other larger areas have been
cut off from the rest of the West Bank by the fence/wall. The fence/wall is not being built between
Israel and the Occupied Territories but mostly (close to 90%) inside the West Bank, turning Palestinian
towns and villages into isolated enclaves, cutting off communities and families from each other,
separating farmers from their land and Palestinians from their places of work, education and health care
facilities and other essential services. This in order to facilitate passage between Israel and more than
50 illegal Israeli settlements located in the West Bank.
"
Of course, the situation has become far
worse for Palestinians since the two reports dating from 2004 and 2005. Israel has accelerated its
settlement construction and the wall has expanded and shifted to accommodate those changes, making life
impossible for the indigenous population.
Any pushback from the United States has
been rare to nonexistent, with successive administrations only occasionally mentioning that the settlements
themselves are "troubling" or a "complication" vis-à-vis a peace settlement. The first direct criticism of
the wall itself took place in 2003, when the Bush administration briefly considered reducing loan guarantees
to discourage its construction. Then Secretary of State Colin Powell
remarked
"A nation is within its rights to put up a fence if it sees the need for one. However, in the
case of the Israeli fence, we are concerned when the fence crosses over onto the land of others."
On May 25, 2005, Bush
repeated his concerns
, noting that "I think the wall is a problem. And I discussed this with Ariel
Sharon. It is very difficult to develop confidence between the Palestinians and Israel with a wall snaking
through the West Bank." In a letter to Sharon he stated that it "should be a security rather than political
barrier, should be temporary rather than permanent and therefore not prejudice any final status issues
including final borders, and its route should take into account, consistent with security needs, its impact
on Palestinians not engaged in terrorist activities."
Congress is, of course, Israeli occupied
territory so its response was directed against Powell and Bush in support of anything Israel chose to do.
Then Senator Joe Lieberman
complained
"The administration's threat to cut aid to Israel unless it stops construction of a security
fence is a heavy-handed tactic. The Israeli people have the right to defend themselves from terrorism, and a
security fence may be necessary to achieve this."
In 2005, Senator Hillary Clinton
declared her support
for the wall by claiming that the Palestinian Authority had failed to fight
terrorism. "This is not against the Palestinian people. This is against the terrorists. The Palestinian
people have to help to prevent terrorism. They have to change the attitudes about terrorism." Senator
Charles Schumer, also from New York,
added
"As long as the Palestinians send terrorists onto school buses and to nightclubs to blow up
people, Israel has no choice but to build the Security Wall."
So, for many in Washington a legal and
relatively apolitical wall by the United States to protect its border is a horrible prospect while the
Israeli version built on someone else's land with the intention to damage the local Arab population as much
as possible is perfectly fine. The reality is that America's Establishment, which is dominated by veneration
of Israel for a number of reasons, is completely hypocritical, more prepared to criticize actions taken by
the United States even when those actions are justified than they are to condemn Israeli actions that amount
to crimes against humanity. That is the reality and it is playing out in front of us right now.
Philip M. Giraldi, Ph.D., is
Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, a 501(c)3 tax deductible educational foundation
that seeks a more interests-based U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. Website is
www.councilforthenationalinterest.org,
address is P.O. Box 2157, Purcellville VA 20134 and its
email is
[email protected]
.
> Most have been breached in one manner or another, sabotaged, or gone around.
That's an extremely naïve position. The function of the wall is not to block the
access, but to slow it down and raise the cost of crossing for illegal immigrants.
As such it has some value. Also those neoliberal Dems are eager to finance foreign
wars and programs like F35 without any hesitation.
What a bunch of fools. As Tucker Carlson aptly said
Most terrifying of all, the crew has become incompetent. They have no idea how to
sail. They're spinning the ship's wheel like they're playing roulette and cackling like
mental patients.
The boat is listing, taking on water, about to sink. They're totally unaware that
any of this is happening. As waves wash over the deck, they're awarding themselves
majestic new titles and raising their own salaries. You look on in horror, helpless and
desperate. You have nowhere to go. You're trapped on a ship of fools.
Plato imagined this scene in The Republic. He never mentions what happened to the
ship. It would be nice to know. What was written as an allegory is starting to feel
like a documentary, as generations of misrule threaten to send our country beneath the
waves.
The people who did it don't seem aware of what they've done. They don't want to
know, and they don't want you to tell them. Facts threaten their fantasies. And so they
continue as if what they're doing is working, making mistakes and reaping consequences
that were predictable even to Greek philosophers thousands of years before the
Internet.
They're fools. The rest of us are their passengers.
I've grown very sceptical over the years about the whole issue of asylum. To me, the idea
that an individual can cross a border illegally without a visa, or without even a passport,
and then suddenly become quasi legal be declaring that they wish to seek asylum is a bit of a
farce. The situation becomes even more farcical when failed asylum seekers still aren't
deported. As for humanitarian and ethical obligations, I don't really buy into that either
because the demographics of the world are such that the West is at risk of losing its very
identity if it feels "obliged" to accept everyone seeking asylum and/or work from the world's
more troubled regions. I see the admission of refugees as a generous gesture, not as an
obligation.
While Tucker uses logic and facts to make his arguments, Cenk uses feelings to
support his. If anyone is still a follower of Cenk after this video, then Tucker is right, the
level of delusion in society is staggering.
Chunk really is a disingenuous slime ball. He brings up food as evidence of our
"multiculturalism", it's such a moronic example. The fundamentals of culture that Tucker was
speaking of include our beliefs enshrined in the constitution, freedom of speech, our
egalitarianism, capitalism, the English language, ingenuity, entrepreneurial spirit, all of the
god-given rights we believe in, self defense, etc. It's very uniquely American and to have
millions upon millions of Hondurans or Mexicans or whatever flood in, not assimilate, and
change the language and the freedoms/god-given rights we believe in, that will displace OUR
culture with theirs.... and clearly our culture is superior, if it wasn't then they'd be the
one's with a rich country that we'd want to move to. Who gives a fuck if we like to eat tacos
or pasta you greasy slime ball. Basically if Glob of Grease was right then there would be no
such thing as assimilation.
At the risk of sounding misogynistic I have to say listening to a liberal is like listening to
a woman. No matter how wrong they are in their mind they're right. No matter how much logic
& common sense you throw their way it's never enough for them to understand. That's what it
be like watching these "debates". This is why a lot of the left when it comes to men are
considered BETA. They have the skewed mind like that of a female, men appeal more to logic than
emotional rhetoric like what Cenk was speaking from. This is why civilizations of the past have
all gone the way of the dodo bird. Because they'll allow themselves to become so diverse to the
point of collapse. It's funny too because all of the countries they beg us to allow in are some
of the most segregated countries on the planet, such as Asia.
One of the most sought-after visa programs in the U.S., the H-1B, could see some significant
changes in 2019, according
to President Trump , including a potential path to citizenship for recipients of the
non-immigrant visa.
The H-1B visa program allows U.S. employers to hire graduate-level workers in specialty occupations, like IT,
finance, accounting, architecture, engineering, science and medicine. Any job that requires
workers to have at least a bachelor's degree falls under the H-1B for specialty
occupations.
Each year, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) allots about 85,000 of the
H-1B visas -- 65,000 for applicants with a bachelor's degree or equivalent, and 20,000 for
those with a master's degree or higher.
As of April 2017, when Trump signed an executive order -- "Buy American and Hire American"
-- it's become more difficult for U.S. companies to hire people via H-1B. It directs the
Department of Homeland Security to only grant the visas to the "most-skilled or highest-paid
beneficiaries."
Here's a look at the American companies (and industries) that benefited the most from the
program in 2017.
Cognizant: The IT services business had a whopping 3,194 H-1B initial petitions approved in
2017, the most of any U.S. company by almost 600.
Amazon: In 2017, the e-commerce behemoth hired 2,515 employees via
the H-1B visa program, according to data compiled by the
National Foundation for American Policy . That was about a 78 percent increase from 2016,
or 1,099 more employees.
Microsoft: Microsoft hired 1,479 workers through H-1B in 2017, the second most of U.S.
companies -- an increase in 334 employees from the year prior, or close to 29 percent.
IBM: In 2017, IBM employed about 1,231 workers through the H-1B visa program.
Intel: The California-based company employed 1,230 workers through H-1B in 2017, 200 more
workers -- or a 19 percent increase -- compared to 2016.
Google: The search engine giant had 1,213 H-1B initial petitions approved for fiscal year
2017, a 31 percent increase of about 289 from 2016.
"US agents have fired tear gas over the border into Mexico at migrants trying to enter the
country illegally.
Around 150 Central Americans tried to make the crossing near the town of Tijuana to the
south of California on New Year's Day.
One US official described the migrants as a "violent mob".
It comes as the US federal government remains shut down as President Donald Trump and
Congress argue over funding for his proposed border wall." BBC
------------
The BBC does not seem to know that the US voluntarily admits over one million legal
IMMIGRANTS per year. These people are automatically on a track to full citizenship after five
years residence if they behave themselves, pay their taxes, do not commit criminal acts, etc.
They can accelerate that process if they join the US armed forces and serve honorably.
The people now seeking to force their way across the border seem to think that they are
justified in crashing across the US border with Mexico without regard to US law. To willingly
cross the US border illegally is a misdemeanor crime. The US government has a duty under the
constitution to defend the borders of the US against foreign invasion. How are foreign people
trying to crash through the border not an invasion? Tear gas? Yes, it makes you cry and choke.
The alternative is force escalating to deadly force.
The US listens to petitions for asylum from conditions that threaten life. The US does not
recognize petitions for asylum based on poor conditions of local economy or crime in countries
of origin. If the US did accept such petitions, most of the population of the planet would be
eligible for asylum in the US.
The argument is raised that the US should make Central America an earthly paradise, a
veritable Nebraska in which Hondurans, Guatemalans and Salvadorans would be content to abide.
Well, pilgrims, as I have explained here several times, the US has been trying to do that in
Latin America ever since the Kennedy Administration with minimal success. Do these little
countries wish to surrender their sovereignty to the US so that we might perform our magic of
enrichment and creation of actual democracy upon them? I think they do not. They approach our
borders waving the various flags of their wretched countries even while asking for ASYLUM from
those countries, countries that cannot run their own affairs well enough to make people want to
stay home and live the good life Latino style.
Make no mistake. If these migrants, who think nothing of using little children as human
shields, force surrender of control of immigration, there will be a tidal wave coming behind
them. pl
"... an old-school Christian democracy, rooted in European traditions ..."
"... Beggar-thy-neighbor migration policies, such as building border fences, will not only further fragment the union; they also seriously damage European economies and subvert global human rights standards. ..."
"... at least 300,000 refugees each year ..."
"... surge funding, ..."
"... raising a substantial amount of debt backed by the EU's relatively small budget. ..."
"... To finance it, new European taxes will have to be levied sooner or later, ..."
It is no secret that neoliberalism relentlessly pursues a globalized, borderless world where labor, products, and services obey
the hidden hand of the free market. What is less often mentioned, however, is that this system is far more concerned with
promoting the well-being of corporations and cowboy capitalists than assisting the average person on the street. Indeed, many of
the world's most powerful companies today have
mutated
into
"
stateless superpowers
," while consumers are forced to endure crippling austerity
measures amid
plummeting
standards
of living. The year 2018 could be seen as the tipping point when the grass-roots movement against these dire conditions took off.
Since 2015, when German Chancellor Angela Merkel allowed hundreds of thousands of undocumented migrants into Germany and the EU,
a groundswell of animosity has been steadily building against the European Union, perhaps best exemplified by the Brexit
movement. Quite simply, many people are growing weary of the globalist
argument
that
Europe needs migrants and austerity measures to keep the wheels of the economy spinning. At the very least, luring migrants with
cash
incentives
to move to Germany and
elsewhere
in
the EU appears incredibly shortsighted.
Indeed, if the globalist George Soros wants to lend his
Midas
touch
to ameliorating the migrant's plight, why does he think that relocating them to European countries is the solution? As
is becoming increasingly apparent in places like
Sweden
and
France, efforts to assimilate people from vastly different cultures, religions and backgrounds is an extremely tricky venture,
the success of which is far from guaranteed.
One worrying consequence of Europe's season of open borders has been the rise of far-right political movements. In fact, some of
the harshest criticism of the 'Merkel plan' originated in
Hungary
,
where its gutsy president, Viktor Orban, hopes to build "
an old-school Christian democracy,
rooted in European traditions
." Orban is simply responding to the democratic will of his people, who are fiercely
conservative, yet the EU parliament voted to
punish
him
regardless. The move shows that Brussels, aside from being adverse to democratic principles, has very few tools for addressing
the rise of far-right sentiment that its own misguided policies created.
Here it is necessary to mention once again that bugbear of the political right, Mr. Soros, who has received no political mandate
from European voters, yet who campaigns relentlessly on behalf of globalist initiatives through his Open Society Foundations (OSF)
(That campaign just got some serious clout after Soros
injected
$18bn
dollars of his own money into OSF, making it one of the most influential NGOs in the world).
With no small amount of impudence, Soros has condemned EU countries – namely his native Hungary – for attempting to protect their
territories by constructing border barriers and fences, which he believes violate the human rights of migrants (rarely if ever
does the philanthropist speak about the "human rights" of the native population). In the
words
of
the maestro of mayhem himself: "
Beggar-thy-neighbor migration policies, such as building
border fences, will not only further fragment the union; they also seriously damage European economies and subvert global human
rights standards.
"
Through a leaked
network
of
compromised EU parliamentarians who do his bidding, Soros says the EU should spend $30 billion euros ($33bln) to accommodate "
at
least 300,000 refugees each year
." How will the EU pay for the resettling of migrants from the Middle East? Soros has an
answer for that as well. He calls it "
surge funding,
" which entails "
raising
a substantial amount of debt backed by the EU's relatively small budget.
"
Any guesses who will be forced to pay down the debt on this high-risk venture? If you guessed George Soros, guess again. The
already heavily taxed people of Europe will be forced to shoulder that heavy burden. "
To
finance it, new European taxes will have to be levied sooner or later,
" Soros admits. That comment is very interesting in
light of the recent French protests, which were
triggered
by
Emmanuel Macron's plan to impose a new fuel tax. Was the French leader, a former investment banker, attempting to get back some
of the funds being used to support the influx of new arrivals into his country? The question seems like a valid one, and goes far
at explaining the ongoing unrest.
At this point, it is worth remembering what triggered the exodus of migrants into Europe in the first place. A large part of the
answer comes down to unlawful NATO operations on the ground of sovereign states. Since 2003, the 29-member military bloc, under
the direct command of Washington, has
conducted
illicit
military operations in various places around the globe, including in Iraq, Libya and Syria. These actions, which could be best
described as globalism on steroids, have opened a Pandora's Box of global scourges, including famine, terrorism and grinding
poverty. Is this what the Western states mean by 'humanitarian activism'? If the major EU countries really want to flout their
humanitarian credentials, they could have started by demanding the cessation of regime-change operations throughout the Middle
East and North Africa, which created such inhumane conditions for millions of innocent people.
This failure on the part of Western capitals to speak out against belligerent US foreign policy helps to explain why a number of
other European governments are experiencing major shakeups. Sebastian Kurz, 32,
won
over
the hearts of Austrian voters by promising to tackle unchecked immigration. In super-tolerant Sweden, which has
accepted
more
migrants per capita than any other EU state, the anti-immigrant Sweden Democrats party
garnered
17.6
percent of the vote in September elections – up from 12.9 percent in the previous election. And even Angela Merkel, who is seen
by many people as the de facto leader of the European Union, is watching her political star crash and burn mostly due to her
bungling of the migrant crisis. In October, after her Christian Democratic Union (CDU) suffered a stinging setback in Bavaria
elections, which saw CDU voters abandon ship for the anti-immigrant AfD and the Greens, Merkel
announced
she
would resign in 2021 after her current term expires.
Meanwhile, back in the US, the government of President Donald Trump has been shut down as the Democrats refuse to grant the
American leader the funds to build a wall on the Mexican border – despite the fact that he essentially made it to the White House
on precisely that promise. Personally, I find it very hard to believe that any political party that does not support a strong and
viable border can continue to be taken seriously at the polls for very long. Yet that is the very strategy that the Democrats
have chosen. But I digress.
I am all alone (poor me) in the White House waiting for the Democrats to come back and make a deal on
desperately needed Border Security. At some point the Democrats not wanting to make a deal will cost our
Country more money than the Border Wall we are all talking about. Crazy!
The lesson that Western governments should have learned over the last year from these developments is that there exists a
definite red line that the globalists cross at risk not only to the social order, but to their own political fortunes. Eventually
the people will demand solutions to their problems – many of which were caused by reckless neoliberal programs and austerity
measures. This collective sense of desperation may open the door to any number of right-wing politicians only too happy to meet
the demand.
Better to provide fair working conditions for the people while maintaining strong borders than have to face the wrath of the
street or some political charlatan later. Whether or not Western leaders will change their neoliberal ways as a populist storm
front approaches remains to be seen, but I for one am not betting on it.
My right wing friends can't understand the biggest issue of our times is class war. This
article mentions the "Panama papers" where great many corporations and wealthy individuals
(even politicians) in my country were exposed. They run their profits through offshore tax
havens while using public infrastructure (paid for by taxpayers) to make their money. It's
estimated that wealth amounting to 1,5 times our GDP is stored in these accounts!
There is absolutely no way to get it through my right wing friends thick skull that
off-shore accounts are tax frauds. Resulting in they paying higher taxes off their wages
because the big corporations and the rich don't pay anything. Nope. They simply hate taxes
(even if they get plenty back in services) and therefore all taxes are bad. Ergo tax evasions
by the 1% are fine – socialism or immigrants must be the root of our problems.
MIGA!
Come to think of it – few of them would survive the "law of the jungle" they so much
desire. And none of them would survive the "law of the jungle" if the rules are stacked
against them. Still, all their political energy is aimed against the ideas and people that
struggle against such reality.
I give up – I will never understand the right. No more than the pure bread
communist. Hopeless ideas!
@niceland
Your friends are not "right wing". The left/right paradigm is long dead. Your friends are
globalists, whether they realize it or not. Globalism is about moving capital to the benefit
of the haves. Migrants/immigrants are a form of capital. Investing in migration/immigration
lowers the long term costs and increases long term profit. The profit (money capital) is then
moved to a place where it best serves its owner.
I agree Jilles, and with many other of the commenters.
Read enough to see that the article has many errors of fact and perception. It is bad
enough to suspect *propaganda* , but Brett is clearly not at that level.
An important point that you hint at is that the Brits were violently and manipulatively
forced to accept mass immigration for many years.
Yet strangely, to say anything about it only became acceptable when some numbers of the
immigrants were fellow Europeans from within the EU, and most having some compatibility with
existing ethnicity and previous culture.
Even people living far away notice such forced false consciousness.
As for Corbyn, he is nothing like the old left of old Labour. He tries to convey that
image, it is a lie.
He may not be Blairite-Zio New Labour, and received some influence from the more heavily
Marxist old Labour figures, but he is very much a creature of the post-worst-of-1968 and
dirty hippy new left, Frankfurt School and all that crap, doubt that he has actually read
much of it, but he has internalised it through his formal and political education.
By the way, the best translation of the name of North Korea's ruling party is 'Labour
Party'. While it is a true fact, I intend nothing from it but a small laugh.
The world according to Trump -- notice a trend here?
Reporter: "Who should be held accountable?" [for Jamal Khashoggi's murder]
Trump: "Maybe the world should be held accountable because the world is a vicious place. The world is a very, very vicious
place. " -- November 22, 2018.
2007:
" The world is a vicious and brutal place. We think we're civilized. In truth, it's a cruel world and people are ruthless.
They act nice to your face, but underneath they're out to kill you." Think Big and Kick Ass in Business and in Life , Donald
Trump & Bill Zanker, 2007, p. 71.
"Life is not easy. The world is a vicious, brutal place. It's a place where people are looking to kill you, if not
physically, then mentally. In the world that we live in every day it is usually the mental kill. People are looking to put you
down, especially if you are on top. When I watched Westerns as a kid, I noticed the cowboys were always trying to kill the fastest
gun. As a kid, I never understood it. Why would anyone want to go after the fastest gun?
"This is the way it is in real life. Everyone wants to kill the fastest gun. In real estate, I am the fastest gun, and everyone
wants to kill me. You have to know how to defend yourself. People will be nasty and try to kill you just for sport. Even your
friends are out to get you!" Think Big and Kick Ass in Business and in Life , Donald Trump & Bill Zanker, 2007, p. 139.
2018:
"Well, not all people. But it's a vicious place. The world is a vicious place. You know, the lions and tigers, they
hunt for food, we hunt for sport. So, it can be a very vicious place. You turn on the television and you look at what's happening."
Interview with John Barton, Golf Digest , October 13, 2014.
" This is the most deceptive, vicious world. It is vicious, it's full of lies, deceit and deception. You make a deal
with somebody and it's like making a deal with– that table." Interview with Lesley Stahl, CBS 60 Minutes , October 15,
2018.
"This is a r– this is a vicious place. Washington DC is a vicious, vicious place. The attacks, the– the bad mouthing,
the speaking behind your back. –but – you know, and in my way, I feel very comfortable here." Interview with Lesley Stahl, CBS
60 Minutes , October 15, 2018.
Karl Kolchak , November 23, 2018 8:54 pm
The world is a vicious place -- that is utterly dependent on oil and other fossil fuels, and will be until civilization
finally collapses.
ilsm , November 24, 2018 7:19 am
Newly posted DNC democrat Bill Kristol thinks regime change in China a worthwhile endeavor.
The "world is a vicious place" designed, set up, held together, secured by the capitalist "post WW II world order" paid for
by the US taxpayer and bonds bought by arms dealers and their financiers.
The tail wagging the attack dog being a Jerusalem-Medina axis straddling Hormuz and Malacca .
An inept princely heir apparent assassin is far better than Rouhani in a "vicious place".
"I think Europe needs to get a handle on migration because that is what lit the flame,"
Clinton said, speaking as part of a series of interviews with senior centrist political
figures about the rise of populists, particularly on the right, in Europe and the
Americas.
"I admire the very generous and compassionate approaches that were taken particularly by
leaders like Angela Merkel, but I think it is fair to say Europe has done its part, and must
send a very clear message – 'we are not going to be able to continue provide refuge and
support ' – because if we don't deal with the migration issue it will continue to roil
the body politic."
Hillary still can't admit to herself that she lost the election because she was a horrible
candidate and people refused to vote for her.
Clinton urged forces opposed to rightwing populism in Europe and the US not to neglect the
concerns about race and i dentity issues that she says were behind her losing key votes in
2016. She accused Trump of exploiting the issue in the election contest – and in
office.
"The use of immigrants as a political device and as a symbol of government gone wrong, of
attacks on one's heritage, one's identity, one's national unity has been very much exploited
by the current administration here," she said.
"There are solutions to migration that do not require clamping down on the press, on your
political opponents and trying to suborn the judiciary, or seeking financial and political
help from Russia to support your political parties and movements."
Let's recap what Obama's coup in
Ukraine has led to shall we? Maybe installing and blatantly backing Neo Nazis in Ukraine
might have something to do with the rise of " populists on the right " that is
spreading through Europe and this country, Hillary.
America's criminal 'news' media never even reported the coup, nor that in 2011 the Obama
regime began planning
for a coup in Ukraine . And that by 1 March 2013 they started organizing it inside
the U.S. Embassy there . And that they hired members of Ukraine's two racist-fascist,
or nazi, political parties , Right Sector and Svoboda (which latter had been called the
Social Nationalist Party of Ukraine until the CIA advised them to change it to Freedom Party,
or "Svoboda" instead). And that in February 2014 they did it (and here's the 4 February 2014 phone call
instructing the U.S. Ambassador whom to place in charge of the new regime when the coup will
be completed), under the cover of authentic anti-corruption demonstrations that the Embassy
organized on the Maidan Square in Kiev, demonstrations that the criminal U.S. 'news' media
misrepresented as 'democracy demonstrations ,' though Ukraine already had democracy (but
still lots of corruption, even more than today's U.S. does, and the pontificating Obama said
he was trying to end Ukraine's corruption -- which instead actually soared after his coup
there).
"... Her announcement on Monday that she will vacate the leadership of Germany's ruling center-right Christian Democrats marks the culmination of what has been a slow denouement of Merkelism. ..."
"... Long the emblematic figure of "Europe," hailed by the neoliberal Economist as the continent's moral voice, long the dominant decider of its collective foreign and economic policies, Merkel will leave office with border fences being erected and disdain for European political institutions at their highest pitch ever. In this sense, she failed as dramatically as her most famous predecessors, Konrad Adenauer, Willy Brandt, Helmut Schmidt, and Helmut Kohl, succeeded in their efforts to make Germany both important and normal in the postwar world. ..."
"... "We can do this!" she famously declared. Europe, she said, must "show flexibility" over refugees. Then, a few days later, she said there was "no limit" to the number of migrants Germany could accept. At first, the burgeoning flood of mostly young male asylum claimants produced an orgy of self-congratulatory good feeling, celebrity posturing of welcome, Merkel greeting migrants at the train station, Merkel taking selfies with migrants, Merkel touted in The Economist as "Merkel the Bold." ..."
"... The euphoria, of course, did not last. Several of the Merkel migrants carried out terror attacks in France that fall. (France's socialist prime minister Manuel Valls remarked pointedly after meeting with Merkel, "It was not us who said, 'Come!'") Reports of sexual assaults and murders by migrants proved impossible to suppress, though Merkel did ask Mark Zuckerberg to squelch European criticism of her migration policies on Facebook. Intelligent as she undoubtedly is (she was a research chemist before entering politics), she seemed to lack any intellectual foundation to comprehend why the integration of hundreds of thousands of people from the Muslim world might prove difficult. ..."
"... Merkel reportedly telephoned Benjamin Netanyahu to ask how Israel had been so successful in integrating so many immigrants during its brief history. There is no record of what Netanyahu thought of the wisdom of the woman posing this question. ..."
"... In any case, within a year, the Merkel initiative was acknowledged as a failure by most everyone except the chancellor herself. ..."
Drop of Light/Shutterstock Whatever her accomplishments
as pathbreaking female politician and respected leader of Europe's dominant economic power, Angela Merkel will go down in history
for her outburst of naivete over the issue of migration into Europe during the summer of 2015.
Her announcement on Monday that she will vacate the leadership of Germany's ruling center-right Christian Democrats marks
the culmination of what has been a slow denouement of Merkelism.
She had seen the vote share of her long dominant party shrink in one regional election after another. The rebuke given to her
last weekend in Hesse, containing the Frankfurt region with its booming economy, where she had campaigned extensively, was the final
straw. Her CDU's vote had declined 10 points since the previous election, their voters moving toward the further right (Alternative
fur Deutschland or AfD). Meanwhile, the further left Greens have made dramatic gains at the expense of Merkel's Social Democrat coalition
partners.
Long the emblematic figure of "Europe," hailed by the neoliberal Economist as the continent's moral voice, long the
dominant decider of its collective foreign and economic policies, Merkel will leave office with border fences being erected and disdain
for European political institutions at their highest pitch ever. In this sense, she failed as dramatically as her most famous predecessors,
Konrad Adenauer, Willy Brandt, Helmut Schmidt, and Helmut Kohl, succeeded in their efforts to make Germany both important and normal
in the postwar world.
One can acknowledge that while Merkel never admitted error for her multiculti summer fling (beyond wishing she had communicated
her goals better), she did manage to adjust her policies. By 2016, Germany under her watch was paying a healthy ransom to Turkey
to keep would-be migrants in camps and preventing them from sailing to Greece. Merkel's departure will make the battle to succeed
her one of the most watched political contests in Europe. She has turned migration into a central and quite divisive issue within
the CDU and Germany, and the party may decide that it has no choice but to accommodate, in one way or another, the voters who have
left them for the AfD.
Related to the issue of who should reside in Europe (objectively the current answer remains anyone who can get there) is the question
of how are such questions decided. In July 2015, five years after asserting in a speech that multiculturalism has
"utterly failed" in Germany (without addressing what policies should be pursued in an increasingly ethnically diverse society)
and several weeks after reducing a young Arab girl to tears at a televised forum by telling her that those whose asylum claims were
rejected would "have to go back" and that "politics is hard," Merkel changed course.
For those interested in psychological studies of leadership and decision making, it would be hard to imagine a richer subject.
Merkel's government first announced it would no longer enforce the rule (the Dublin agreement) that required asylum claimants to
be processed in the first country they passed through. Then she doubled down. The migrants fleeing the Syrian civil war, along with
those who pretended to be Syrian, and then basically just anyone, could come to Germany.
"We can do this!" she famously declared. Europe, she said, must "show flexibility" over refugees. Then, a few days later,
she said there was "no limit" to the number of migrants Germany could accept. At first, the burgeoning flood of mostly young male
asylum claimants produced an orgy of self-congratulatory good feeling, celebrity posturing of welcome, Merkel greeting migrants at
the train station, Merkel taking selfies with migrants, Merkel touted in The Economist as
"Merkel the Bold."
Her words traveled far beyond those fleeing Syria. Within 48 hours of the "no limit" remark, TheNew York Times
reported a sudden stirring of migrants from Nigeria. Naturally Merkel boasted in a quiet way about how her decision had revealed
that Germany had put its Nazi past behind it. "The world sees Germany as a land of hope and chances," she said. "That wasn't always
the case." In making this decision personally, Merkel was making it for all of Europe. It was one of the ironies of a European arrangement
whose institutions were developed in part to transcend nationalism and constrain future German power that 70 years after the end
of the war, the privately arrived-at decision of a German chancellor could instantly transform societies all over Europe.
The euphoria, of course, did not last. Several of the Merkel migrants carried out terror attacks in France that fall. (France's
socialist prime minister Manuel Valls remarked pointedly after meeting with Merkel, "It was not us who said, 'Come!'") Reports of
sexual assaults and murders by migrants proved impossible to suppress, though Merkel did ask Mark Zuckerberg to squelch European
criticism of her migration policies on Facebook. Intelligent as she undoubtedly is (she was a research chemist before entering politics),
she seemed to lack any intellectual foundation to comprehend why the integration of hundreds of thousands of people from the Muslim
world might prove difficult.
Merkel reportedly telephoned Benjamin Netanyahu to ask how Israel had been so successful in integrating so many immigrants
during its brief history. There is no record of what Netanyahu thought of the wisdom of the woman posing this question.
In any case, within a year, the Merkel initiative was acknowledged as a failure by most everyone except the chancellor herself.
Her public approval rating plunged from 75 percent in April 2015 to 47 percent the following summer. The first electoral rebuke came
in September 2016, when the brand new anti-immigration party, the Alternative fur Deutschland, beat Merkel's CDU in Pomerania.
In every election since, Merkel's party has lost further ground. Challenges to her authority from within her own party have become
more pointed and powerful. But the mass migration accelerated by her decision continues, albeit at a slightly lower pace.
Angela Merkel altered not only Germany but the entire European continent, in irreversible ways, for decades to come.
Scott McConnell is a founding editor ofand the author of Ex-Neocon: Dispatches From the Post-9/11 Ideological Wars
.
Trump represents himself and expects the little people (IE, everyone except him and his
children) to exist only for him, the spoiled daddy-created globalist so-called billionaire
who doesn't have a clue WTF he's doing as POTUS besides infotaining and enflaming his racist
base, plus giving into the GOP party line on all substantive issues with the result being
more of the same as Barry-O, only worse.
Personally, I enjoy him from an infotainment perspective. We are all only infotaining
ourselves to death anyway, so Trump's just added comedic grist to enliven our time in hospice
care.
Did you expect or hope for another in the globalist class, maybe as slick as Barry-O,
who appealed to the edumacated coastal elites in his incredibly pompous and phony
addresses?
I expected a globalist (either Trump or Hillary) but hoped for Bernie.
Trump is not antithesis. This is where you are most mistaken. If he were the truth (as you
state), there would be stronger social security, Medicare and Medicaid for his base, no tax
cuts favouring corporations, LLCs and the very rich.
There would be newly created infrastructure and improved healthcare.
The trade war would already be won and the wealth equality gap would be well on the road
to closure.
The Pittsburgh attack was conveniently timed to distract US media from another murderous
onslaught by Israel on Gaza. The IDF targets included a Gaza hospital.
Assuming this was not another psyops it seems amazing to me that people cant distinguish
between the Israeli government and their lobby which influences policy and elections in the
US and the average Jew attending a synagogue.
As with any event I always look at who benefits. Certainly the anti-gun lobby. Zionists
have always benefitted from such acts as they use them to get more protection against
criticism of their policies (eg legislation to define antisemitism as hate speech which would
include criticism of Israel). Remember the NY bombing threats a couple of years ago were
coming from an individual said to be working alone in Israel)
Be interesting to learn more about this Bowers. I am skeptical its a psyops at this point
because he was taken alive, but who knows.
Posted by: Pft | Oct 28, 2018 6:36:52 PM | 39 Assuming this was not another psyops it seems amazing to me that people cant distinguish
between the Israeli government and their lobby which influences policy and elections in the
US and the average Jew attending a synagogue.
If I understood correctly his attack was against the Jewish organisation that brings
immigrants. Because he sees that as the enemy action.
I left the United States
because I married a Danish woman. We tried living in
New York, but we struggled a lot. She was not used to
being without the normal help she gets from the Danish
system. We...
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I left the United States
because I married a Danish woman. We tried living in
New York, but we struggled a lot. She was not used to
being without the normal help she gets from the Danish
system. We made the move a few years ago, and right
away our lives started to improve dramatically.
Now I am working in IT,
making a great money, with private health insurance.
Yes I pay high taxes, but the benefits outweigh the
costs. The other things is that the Danish people
trust in the government and trust in each other. There
is no need for #metoo or blacklivesmatter, because the
people already treat each other with respect.
While I now enjoy an easier
life in Denmark, I sit back and watch the country I
fiercely love continue to fall to pieces because of
divisive rhetoric and the corporate greed buying out
our government.
Trump is just a symptom of
the problem. If people could live in the US as they
did 50 years ago, when a single person could take care
of their entire family, and an education didn't cost
so much, there would be no need for this revolution.
But wages have been stagnant since the 70's and the
wealth has shifted upwards from the middle class to
the top .001 percent. This has been decades in the
making. You can't blame Obama or Trump for this.
Meanwhile, I sit in Denmark
watching conservatives blame liberalism, immigrants,
poor people, and socialism, while Democrats blame
rednecks, crony capitalism, and republican greed.
Everything is now "fake news". Whether it be CNN or
FOX, no one knows who to trust anymore. Everything has
become a conspiracy. Our own president doesn't even
trust his own FBI or CIA. And he pushes conspiracy
theories to mobilize his base. I am glad to be away
from all that, and living in a much healthier
environment, where people aren't constantly attacking
one another.
Maybe if the US can get it's
healthcare and education systems together, I would
consider moving back one day. But it would also be
nice if people learned to trust one another, and trust
in the system again. Until then, I prefer to be around
emotionally intelligent people, who are objective, and
don't fall for every piece of propaganda. Not much of
that happening in America these days. The left has
gone off the deep end playing identity politics and
focusing way too much on implementing government
mandated Social Justice. Meanwhile the conservatives
are using any propaganda and lying necessary to push
their corporate backed agenda. This is all at the cost
of our environment, our free trade agreements, peace
treaties, and our European allies. Despite how much I
love my country, I breaks my heart to say, I don't see
myself returning any time soon I'm afraid.
"... Salam's case is that America's legal immigration system needs be reformed on lines roughly similar to what the Trump administration now and others before it have long advocated: changing the rules to place a greater emphasis on the economic skills of immigrants while deemphasizing the role played by family "reunification" would ensure both that new immigrants are an economic plus to the economy and, more importantly, that they are more likely to integrate into the American cultural mainstream. ..."
"... First of all, Salam reminds us, an alarming number of recent immigrants and their families are poor. This does not mean that almost all of them have not improved their economic status by migration: they have. ..."
"... Salam explains that under the current system, most visas are doled out according to family ties -- not skills or education. And the larger the number of immigrants is from a given country, the lower their average earnings and educational outcomes will be in the U.S. Conversely, the harder it is for a given group to enter the United States, the more likely it is that immigrants will be drawn from the top of their country's pecking order. ..."
Why Not a Merit-Based Immigration System?Reihan Salam's latest book makes the
case for an overhaul along Trumpian lines.
It's hard to imagine a more needed contribution to America's immigration debate than Reihan
Salam's civil, sober, and penetrating Melting Pot or Civil War? At a moment when the
major dueling discourses revolve around lurid depictions of immigrant crime by one side, and
appeals to the inscription on the Statue of Liberty and accusations of racism by the other,
Salam's data-driven argument about the future consequences of today's immigration choices could
not be more timely.
While Salam is the child of middle-class professionals from Bangladesh who settled in New
York at a time when there were virtually no Bengali speakers in the city (there are now tens of
thousands), apart from a few personal anecdotes, his book could have been written by an author
of any ethnicity. Yet in our increasingly racialized debate, an argument made by a "son of
immigrants" (as the book's subtitle announces) may be less likely to face summary dismissal
from the centrist liberals and moderates who are its most important audience.
Salam's case is that America's legal immigration system needs be reformed on lines roughly
similar to what the Trump administration now and others before it have long advocated: changing
the rules to place a greater emphasis on the economic skills of immigrants while deemphasizing
the role played by family "reunification" would ensure both that new immigrants are an economic
plus to the economy and, more importantly, that they are more likely to integrate into the
American cultural mainstream. This would put the U.S. more in line with the generally
politically popular systems in place in Canada and Australia. The proposal is tempered, or
balanced, by measures to shore up the condition of the American working poor and an amnesty
giving long-term resident illegal immigrants a path to citizenship, as well as ambitious
measures to enhance economic development in the Third World.
But the meat of Melting Pot or Civil War? is not in the proposal but in the getting
to it -- a route which passes through numerous nuggets gleaned from contemporary research and a
depressing if persuasive analysis of the consequences if America stays on its present
course.
First of all, Salam reminds us, an alarming number of recent immigrants and their families
are poor. This does not mean that almost all of them have not improved their economic status by
migration: they have. A low-skilled job in the United States pays several times better than
such work in many countries, so low-skilled migration is, without a doubt, a benefit to
low-skilled migrants. Recent immigrants grateful for the opportunity to live in America may
accept living in poverty, though Salam is right to remind us of the miserable conditions,
redolent of the teeming tenements of the early 20th century, in which their lives often unfold.
He makes the subtle point that part of the current appeal of America's major cities to upper
middle-class professionals is the presence of a politically docile service class of low-skilled
immigrants, many of them undocumented.
But the families such immigrants form tend to be poor as well: today's immigrants face
headwinds to upward mobility that the storied Ellis Island generations did not. There was much
more need in 1900 for unskilled labor than there is now, and no substantive gap then existed in
education level between the immigrants and the general American population. The data Salam
deploys is not overly dramatic but decisive nonetheless: children of immigrants now make up 30
percent of all low-income children (where they are 24 percent of the whole); roughly half of
immigrant families have incomes within 200 percent of the poverty line; nearly a third of
immigrant children grow up in families headed by someone without a high school diploma; the
average Mexican immigrant has 9.4 years of schooling, rising to 12 in the second generation but
flatlining after that.
As the gap between the earnings of American college graduates and others has grown in the
past two generations, this means that the social problem of the intergenerational transmission
of poverty is being intensified by the ever continuing flow of poor, unskilled immigrants, both
legal and illegal. And while such immigrants may well be politically quiescent, their children
are unlikely to be.
These somber facts are balanced, and in many ways veiled, by the immigrant success stories
which Americans rightly celebrate. But while it may be unkind to say so, immigrants don't
arrive as blank slates, mysteriously sorted out upon reaching these shores so that some become
doctors and software entrepreneurs.
As Salam makes clear, successful immigrants tend to come from relatively rich and urbanized
societies. The parents of Google founder Sergey Brin were accomplished scholars. An astounding
45 percent of immigrants from India -- who make up the latest version of a high-achieving
"model minority" -- are Brahmins, members of the tiny Indian hereditary upper caste. Indians
who come here tend to be "triple selected": most enter the country by way of high-skilled
worker visas, which means they are products of India's highly competitive education system,
which serves only a fraction of India's population. Similarly, Chinese immigrants tend to come
from that country's college-educated elite.
Salam explains that under the current system, most visas are doled out according to family
ties -- not skills or education. And the larger the number of immigrants is from a given
country, the lower their average earnings and educational outcomes will be in the U.S.
Conversely, the harder it is for a given group to enter the United States, the more likely it
is that immigrants will be drawn from the top of their country's pecking order.
One might conceive of this as a stable system -- after all, there are many jobs for
low-skilled immigrants. But of course immigrants have children, at rates far higher than the
native born, and the children of lower-skilled immigrants make up a continually growing share
of Americans at or near the poverty level. "The children of elite immigrants make their way
into America's elite, where they add a much needed dash of superficial diversity, enough to
make us forget their inconvenient working class counterparts." The result, of which there is
already ample evidence among the Millennial cohort of immigrant children, is a growing
population which has grown up in poverty, isn't doing especially well in income or education,
and perceives the American dream cynically, as a kind of whites-only sham. This divide will
influence our politics for the foreseeable future. The question is how much.
♦♦♦
While much of Salam's analysis is a deep dive into statistics of intergenerational poverty,
educational outcomes, and the growing achievement gap, he doesn't shy from the ominous
implications of the racialization of the immigration debate. There is ample evidence that
college-educated Americans of all ethnicities marry one another at reasonable and growing
rates, producing a fair number of mixed-race people who feel themselves part of the cultural
mainstream. As scholars have long reminded us, "white" is a broad and fungible category in
American history, and there is a fair prospect that the college-educated and middle classes
will intermarry enough to produce a 21st-century version of the storied melting pot.
But that isn't the case with poorer immigrants, even as their children learn English.
Current family unification statutes encourage poor, non-white immigrant communities to
continually replenish their new arrivals. Thus there are two competing processes going on --
amalgamation, in which more educated immigrant families are joining the middle-class
mainstream, intermarrying with whites and with one another, and racialization, in which a new
immigrant group finds itself ghettoized and cut out of the mainstream. This latter phenomenon
is most pronounced in some Mexican-American communities, which are demographically the largest
immigrant groups, but exists in many immigrant communities.
It is in this subset, for example, where ISIS has found recruits, and where -- on a less
dramatic level -- the Marxist Left is able to make inroads. As America's demography grows less
white, the political salience of radical immigrants of color is likely to grow. While Salam
exercises great restraint describing the phenomenon, his foreboding is unmistakable: "The
danger, as I see it, is that as the logic of the melting pot fails to take hold, and as more
newcomers are incorporated into disadvantaged groups, the level of interethnic tension will
skyrocket, and we'll look back wistfully on the halcyon politics of the Trump years." Or again,
"Imagine an America in which wealthy whites and Asians wall themselves off from the rest of
society and low wage immigrants and their offspring constitute a new underclass."
Of course it is not merely racial minority immigrants who are tempted by political
radicalism. The current extremist white backlash is widely noted by scholars and journalists.
But among the liberal establishment it is viewed not as problem to be alleviated but a social
development to be crushed. Salam observes immigration scholars who are scrupulous about
reporting the ways immigration is making America less united, threatening social cohesion,
"leading to greater divisions and tensions," while never considering reducing or reforming
immigration (with greater emphasis on skills) as a possible answer to the problems. They hope
-- against considerable social science evidence that political instability is endemic to
multicultural societies -- that greater diversity will somehow bury ethnic conflict. This Salam
calls the Backlash Paradox: while mass immigration contributes to bigotry and polarization, the
only acceptable option among elites is to double down and hope the storm passes, as slowing the
pace of immigration is considered a "callow surrender to bigotry."
I have focused on the social and political elements, but Salam's argument also relies a
great deal on economics, much of it focused on economic choices molded by a relatively
high-skilled or low-skilled labor force. His major point is that labor shortages spur
technological innovation, while loose labor markets discourage it. Labor scarcity, Salam
observes, has been the historical secret to American prosperity, spurring one labor-saving
innovation after another. A high-immigration economy, with a completely elastic number of
workers willing to work for a minimum wage or less, is an economy under a completely different
calculus. There is no question we should prefer the first.
♦♦♦
I have only minor caveats with this outstanding book. It might be a necessary concession to
the immigrationist lobby to maintain the raw number of immigrants as high as it is at present,
but it seems likely that lowering it to, say, half a million a year, roughly the number urged
by the Clinton administration's task force on immigration, would break the fever more quickly
and lead to far more rapid assimilation of recent immigrants.
I find Salam's earnest plea for the United States to dramatically raise its spending to
accelerate economic development in the Third World well intended, but likely futile. An answer
which comes to mind is one that diplomat George F. Kennan suggested a quarter of a century ago,
that the single greatest benefit the United States can deliver to the world's poor is to
maintain itself as a relatively high civilization able to inspire by example, and provide help
and insight to others seeking answers to their problems.
And though it is a subject in itself, I wish Salam had directly addressed the new leftist
ideology built around the fighting of "white privilege" -- which now includes under its rubric
everything from getting rid of standardized tests to delegitimizing police departments, railing
against the First Amendment to ripping down statues of long-admired white Americans. This
largely white-led phenomenon does far more to intensify nativist dread about being reduced to
minority status than any racist agitation leveled against immigrants of color, however
lamentable the latter might be.
Scott McConnell is a founding editor ofand the author of Ex-Neocon:
Dispatches From the Post-9/11 Ideological Wars .
Dr. Hart's book is invaluable because it highlights some of the basic truths about America
that modern-day histories simply conceal. For example, he writes: "America is much younger than
most European
nations . It did not exist at all prior to 1600 AD but was created
in the ' colonial era .'"
Dr. Hart provides a basic history of America's development, including highlighting specific
incidents that ultimately proved critical to the future of the polity. One of the more
interesting was the Zenger
trial, a
colonial case in which a journalist criticized the local governor
and was charged with libel. A grand jury refused to indict Zenger, accepting his defense that
the things he printed were true. Thanks to this case, Americans can claim truth as an absolute
defense in libel cases, something
our British cousins lack .
A highlight of Dr. Hart's history is his careful attention to demographic issues. For
example, he scoffs at the claim sometimes heard within the
dimmer quarters of the
American Conservative Movement that the Constitution was a "miracle." Instead, Dr. Hart
shows that the authors of America's governing document shared linguistic, cultural, racial, and
experiential factors that
allowed them to work together. (Contemporary American statesmen possess no such unanimity.)
Dr. Hart is also not blind to the Constitution's faults, especially its failure to designate
how and who has the power to interpret it -- specifically, not necessarily the Kritarchs on the Supreme Court.
Dr. Hart is also clearsighted regarding immigration. He does not accept the now de
rigueur analysis that immigration from widely disparate regions was always a feature of
American life. "Before 1849,
immigrants to the Untied States came mostly from the Protestant
regions of northwest Europe, including Holland , Sweden, Norway , Germany and Great
Britain," he observes. He also provides an honest assessment of the difficulties Irish immigration
presented for 19 th century America and argues that despite speaking English, "they
assimilated very slowly."
Dr. Hart argues the "Golden Age" of the United States extended from 1865 to 1991. "During
that interval the United States stood out for its wealth, for its military might, and for its
unprecedented set of practical inventions and scientific discoveries," he argues. Indeed, one
of the best parts of the book is when Dr. Hart recounts the numerous inventions and scientific
advances America has given to the world.
However, Dr. Hart's most invaluable contribution is in detailing what he sees as the
symptoms of America's decline after the Cold War. America's indebtedness, relatively poor military
performance , loss of Constitutional liberties, and collapse of artistic standards are all
covered. Two other issues highly relevant to immigration patriots are what Dr. Hart calls
"political problems" and "loss of confidence and national pride."
Dr. Hart details how Democratic politicians have diligently opposed any efforts to
implement common-sense voter ID laws to prevent election fraud. Media bias is another major
political problem, one an increasing number of Americans are awakening to. Finally, Dr. Hart
identifies the "increase in racial hostilities" as both a symptom and a cause of America's
increasing political problems. "Black hostility towards whites is constantly being stirred up
by 'race hustlers' such as
Al Sharpton , who deny any good faith on the part of whites," he writes. "Many people deny
that any progress has been made in the status and treatment of black Americans -- a blatant
untruth which increases black suspicions and hostilities."
Similarly, the decline in national pride is partially a product of how the charge of
"racism" has delegitimized our entire national history. "According to many of these critics,
our Constitution was produced by a group of 'Dead White European Males' (DWEMs, for short) who
do not deserve any respect," he writes. As a result of internalizing this poisonous attack on
America's heritage, some advocate Open Borders as a kind of historical reparations of
punishment for a "racist" country.
Dr. Hart writes:
One result of these attitudes is that many Americans find it unreasonable for the United
States to defend its borders. (After all, since we stole the country from the Indians, we
have no real claim on our land.) Sometimes these views lead to people suggesting that
non-citizens should be permitted to vote in American elections. In any disagreement or
conflict between the United States and a foreign group, many of these critics tend to blame
America first. Many of these critics do not even pretend to be patriotic.
Dr. Hart identifies a host of causes to explain the emergence of these symptoms. Though they
are too many to cover here, two very much worth mentioning are
Dr. Hart points out that for all the talk about white racism, the vast majority of
interracial crime is committed by blacks against whites. Hatred of whites is not only
mainstream but cultivated by the Main Stream Media, the education system, and even some
Democratic politicians -- a coalition that Dr. Hart judges is too powerful to break.
Similarly, Dr. Hart details the disastrous consequences of the 1965 Immigration Act and
explicitly calls for its repeal, but he is pessimistic about the prospects for doing so.
The most explosive part of the book is its concluding chapter, in which Dr. Hart discusses
the various scenarios by which the United States could "fall," either by breaking up, being
extinguished, or losing its political independence and being subsumed into a larger polity. All
of these terrible scenarios have vastly increased in likelihood because of the destabilizing
and destructive effects of mass immigration.
The "fall" of the United States may even occur without most people even noticing it at the
time. "Without any foreign conquest, and without any sharp break, the USA might be transformed
into a multinational state without any loyalty to our English origin," he writes. "In fact,
such a process may already be in process."
During his discussion of causes for American decline, Dr. Hart identifies the most important
"by far" as the "loss of pride and confidence." He blames this on the relentless hate campaign
waged against "our ancestors" by educators and the Main Stream Media, leading to a situation in
which Americans feel "ashamed of their country." In other words, Dr. Hart is really talking
about a loss of identity.
With his history of the United States, and his frank discussion of the issues endangering
its existence, Dr. Hart has performed a valuable service for Americans seeking to reclaim their
national identity. For anyone curious about their country's past and concerned about its
future, The Rise And
Fall Of The United States (full disclosure: A VDARE book -- who else would
publish it?) is well worth purchasing.
If/when America does break apart, it will not be a result of conventional war. The
attack/upheaval will come from within.
Ironically, the trillions spent by Washington on our global MIC will not, in the end,
protect the American people from what is now our greatest threat: internal treason against
Historic America and its core people.
Ironically, instead of returning home to protect US borders when the cold war ended,
American troops were dispersed around the world to fight phantom threats and protect
non-essential foreign entities and extra-national interests.
This ongoing waste of US resources abroad continues to serve the interests of globalists,
militarists, and Zionists. Meanwhile, our domestic security, our Main Street economy, and the
continuity of white, European-derived culture and people inside America gets short shrift.
This glaring disconnect may be our nation's undoing.
The 'proposition nation' concept was a fraud from the start since it ignores the vital
significance of race, culture, language, and IQ.
The engine for America's coming implosion is demographic: uninterrupted, illegal,
non-white immigration by Third World refugees. Hostile elites who now dominate America are
also key. They refuse to acknowledge the perils of 'diversity'. Many want America changed,
irreversibly so.
Meanwhile, white identity and white cohesion have been demonized in our schools as well as
by our dominant mass media. This campaign has undermined white identity, white cohesion and
white interests in general.
Numerous, politically-correct expressions of anti-white hatred are now in wide
circulation. These hate-terms are, ironically, protected from criticism even though they are
applied selectively to target whites. Those few who contest these double-standards (including
Pres. Trump) are routinely defamed by comparisons to 'Hitler' or references to the KKK. The
basic translation comes down to this: Shut up.
This unhealthy and insidious paradigm is here by design. It is used to not only justify
anti-white animus, but to legitimize anti-white violence whenever and wherever whites try to
assemble and express their grievances and/or aspirations. This very sinister double-standard
has taken deep root. It is nurtured by biased reporting and coverage. It has spawned
'antifa'.
Modern speech rules and penalties favor privileged 'minorities' just as they cleary
disfavor and penalize white advocacy.
Among the popular terms that lend support to anti-white bigotry are: 'racist', 'nativist',
'white supremacy', 'Islamophobia', and 'anti-Semitism'.
These shame-inducing memes have 1) contaminated the American mind and 2) empowered our
race-conscious adversaries. They must be deconstructed and deligimized if we are to protect
our interests and preserve America's demographic core.
Resistance, cohesion and self-defense are not fascistic sentiments. They are legitimate
expressions of democratic self-determination.
"... "I would be willing to 'shut down' government if the Democrats do not give us the votes for Border Security," the president tweeted, "which includes the Wall! Must get rid of Lottery, Catch & Release etc." ..."
The Sunday morning tirade saw the president claim he "would be willing to 'shut
down'" the federal government if members of Congress from the opposition party didn't row
in behind Republicans in voting for his immigration reform package, which includes releasing
funds for the US-Mexico border wall that formed the cornerstone of his election campaign.
"I would be willing to 'shut down' government if the Democrats do not give us the votes
for Border Security," the president tweeted, "which includes the Wall! Must get rid of Lottery,
Catch & Release etc."
I would be willing to "shut down" government if the Democrats do not give us the votes for
Border Security, which includes the Wall! Must get rid of Lottery, Catch & Release etc.
and finally go to system of Immigration based on MERIT! We need great people coming into our
Country!
"... "I would be willing to 'shut down' government if the Democrats do not give us the votes for Border Security," the president tweeted, "which includes the Wall! Must get rid of Lottery, Catch & Release etc." ..."
The Sunday morning tirade saw the president claim he "would be willing to 'shut
down'" the federal government if members of Congress from the opposition party didn't row
in behind Republicans in voting for his immigration reform package, which includes releasing
funds for the US-Mexico border wall that formed the cornerstone of his election campaign.
"I would be willing to 'shut down' government if the Democrats do not give us the votes
for Border Security," the president tweeted, "which includes the Wall! Must get rid of Lottery,
Catch & Release etc."
I would be willing to "shut down" government if the Democrats do not give us the votes for
Border Security, which includes the Wall! Must get rid of Lottery, Catch & Release etc.
and finally go to system of Immigration based on MERIT! We need great people coming into our
Country!
"... By Enrico Verga, a writer, consultant, and entrepreneur based in Milan. As a consultant, he concentrates on firms interested in opportunities in international and digital markets. His articles have appeared in Il Sole 24 Ore, Capo Horn, Longitude, Il Fatto Quotidiano, and many other publications. You can follow him on Twitter @enricoverga . ..."
"... Continuing flows of low-cost labor can be useful for cutting costs. West Germany successfully absorbed East Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall, but the dirty secret of this achievement is the exploitation of workers from the former East, as Reuters reports . ..."
"... The expansion of the EU to Poland (and the failed attempt to incorporate the Ukraine) has allowed many European businesses to shift local production to nations where the average cost of a blue or white collar worker is much lower ( by 60-70% on average ) than in Western European countries. ..."
"... The middle class is a silent mass that for many years has painfully digested globalization, while believing in the promises of globalist politicians," explains Luciano Ghelfi, a journalist of international affairs who has followed Lega from its beginnings. Ghelfi continues: ..."
"... I think unrestrained globalization has taken a hit. In Italy as well, as we have seen recently, businesses are relocating abroad. And the impoverished middle class finds itself forced to compete for state resources (subsidies) and jobs which can be threatened by an influx of economic migrants towards which enormous resources have been dedicated – just think of the 4.3 billion Euros that the last government allocated toward economic migrants. ..."
"... In all of this, migrants are more victims than willing actors, and they become an object on which the fatigue, fear, and in the most extreme cases, hatred of the middle class can easily focus. ..."
"... If for the last twenty years, with only occasional oscillation, the pro-globalization side has been dominant in the West, elections are starting to swing the balance in a new direction. ..."
"... "Klein analyzes a future (already here to some degree) in which multinational corporations freely fish from one market or another in an effort to find the most suitable (i.e. cheapest) labor force." ..."
"... never export their way out of poverty and misery ..."
By Enrico Verga,
a writer, consultant, and entrepreneur based in Milan. As a consultant, he
concentrates on firms interested in opportunities in international and digital markets. His
articles have appeared in Il Sole 24 Ore, Capo Horn, Longitude, Il Fatto Quotidiano, and many
other publications. You can follow him on Twitter @enricoverga .
International commerce, jobs, and economic migrants are propelled by a common force:
profit.
In recent times, the Western middle class (by which I mean in particular industrial workers
and office employees) has lost a large number of jobs and has seen its buying power fall. It
isn't true that migrants are the source of all evil in the world. However, under current
conditions, they become a locus for the exasperation of the population at twenty years of
pro-globalization politics. They are tragically placed in the role of the straw that breaks the
camel's back.
Western businesses have slipped jobs overseas to countries with low labor costs, while the
middle class has been pushed into debt in order to try to keep up. The Glass-Steagall law and
other brakes on American banks were abolished by a cheerleader for globalization, Bill Clinton,
and these banks subsequently lost all restraints in their enthusiasm to lend. The cherry on top
of the sundae was the real estate bubble and ensuing crash of 2008.
A damning picture of the results of 20 years of globalization is provided by
Forbes , capitalism's magazine par excellence. Already in 2016, the surprise victory of
Trump led to questions about whether the blond candidate's win was due in part to the straits
of the American middle class, impoverished as a result of the pro-globalization politics of
figures like Clinton and Obama.
Further support for this thesis is furnished by the
New York Times , describing the collapse of the stars-and-stripes middle class. Its
analysis is buttressed by lengthy research from the very mainstream
Pew Center , which agrees that the American middle class is vanishing.
And Europe? Although the European middle class has been squeezed less than its American
counterpart, for us as well the picture doesn't look good. See for example the
analysis of the Brookings Institute , which discusses not only the flagging economic
fortunes of the European middle class, but also the fear of prosperity collapsing that
currently grips Europe.
Migrants and the Shock Doctrine
What do economic migrants have to do with any of this?
Far be it from me to criticize large corporations, but clearly they – and their
managers and stockholders – benefit from higher margins. Profits (revenue minus costs and
expenses) can be maximized by reducing expenses. To this end, the costs of acquiring goods
(metals, agricultural products, energy, etc.) and services (labor) need to fall steadily.
In the quest to lower the cost of labor, the most desirable scenario is a sort of blank
slate: to erase ongoing arrangements with workers and start over from zero, building a new
"happy and productive" economy. This operation can be understood as a sort of "shock
doctrine."
The term "economic shock therapy" is based on an analogy with electroshock therapy for
mental patients. One important analysis of it comes from Naomi Klein , who became
famous explaining in 2000 the system of fashion production through subsidiaries that don't
adhere to the safety rules taken so seriously in Western countries (some of you may recall the
scandal of
Benetton and Rana Plaza , where more than a thousand workers at a Bangladesh factory
producing Benetton (and other) clothes were crushed under a collapsing building).
Klein analyzes a future (already here to some degree) in which multinational corporations
freely fish from one market or another in an effort to find the most suitable (i.e. cheapest)
labor force. Sometimes relocating from one nation to another is not possible, but if you can
bring the job market of other countries here in the form of a low-cost mass of people competing
for employment, then why bother?
The Doctrine in Practice
Continuing flows of low-cost labor can be useful for cutting costs. West Germany
successfully absorbed East Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall, but the dirty secret of
this achievement is the exploitation of workers
from the former East, as Reuters reports .
The expansion of the EU to Poland (and the failed attempt to incorporate the Ukraine) has
allowed many European businesses to
shift local production to nations where the average cost of a blue or white collar worker
is much lower (
by 60-70% on average ) than in Western European countries.
The migrant phenomenon is a perfect counterpoint to a threadbare middle class, given its
role as a success story within the narrative of globalization.
Economic migrants are eager to obtain wealth on the level of the Western middle class
– and this is of course a legitimate desire. However, to climb the social ladder, they
are willing to do anything: from accepting low albeit legal salaries to picking tomatoes
illegally (
as Alessandro Gassman, son of the famous actor, reminded us ).
The middle class is a silent mass that for many years has painfully digested globalization,
while believing in the promises of globalist politicians," explains Luciano Ghelfi, a
journalist of international affairs who has followed Lega from its beginnings. Ghelfi
continues:
This mirage has fallen under the blows it has received from the most serious economic
crisis since the Second World War. Foreign trade, easy credit (with the American real estate
bubble of 2008 as a direct consequence), peace missions in Libya (carried out by
pro-globalization French and English actors, with one motive being in my opinion the
diversion of energy resources away from [the Italian] ENI) were supposed to have created a
miracle; they have in reality created a climate of global instability.
Italy is of course not untouched by this phenomenon. It's easy enough to give an
explanation for the Five Stars getting votes from part of the southern electorate that is
financially in trouble and might hope for some sort of subsidy, but the North? The choice of
voting center right (with a majority leaning toward Lega) can be explained in only one way
– the herd (the middle class) has tried to rise up.
I asked him, "So in your opinion, is globalization in stasis? Or is it radically
changing?" He replied:
I think unrestrained globalization has taken a hit. In Italy as well, as we have seen
recently, businesses are relocating abroad. And the impoverished middle class finds itself
forced to compete for state resources (subsidies) and jobs which can be threatened by an
influx of economic migrants towards which enormous resources have been dedicated – just
think of the 4.3 billion Euros that the last government allocated toward economic
migrants.
This is an important element in the success of Lega: it is a force that has managed to
understand clearly the exhaustion of the impoverished middle class, and that has proposed a
way out, or has at least elaborated a vision opposing the rose-colored glasses of
globalization.
In all of this, migrants are more victims than willing actors, and they become an object on
which the fatigue, fear, and in the most extreme cases, hatred of the middle class can easily
focus.
What Conflicts Are Most Relevant Today?
At the same time, if we observe, for example in Italy, the positions taken by the
(pro-globalization?) Left, it becomes easier to understand why the middle class and also many
blue collar workers are abandoning it. Examples range from the unfortunate declarations of
deputy Lia Quartapelle on
the need to support the Muslim Brotherhood to the explanations of the former president of
the Chamber of Deputies, Laura Boldrini, on how the status of economic migrant should be seen as a model for the
lifestyle of all Italians . These remarks were perhaps uttered lightly (Quartapelle
subsequently took her post down and explained that she had made a mistake), but they are
symptomatic of a certain sort of pro-globalization cultural "Left" that finds talking to
potential voters less interesting than other matters.
From Italy to America (where
Hillary Clinton was rejected after promoting major international trade arrangements that
she claimed would benefit middle-class American workers) to the UK (where Brexit has been taken as a sort of
exhaust valve), the middle class no longer seems to be snoring.
We are currently seeing a political conflict between globalist and nationalist forces.
Globalists want more open borders and freer international trade. Nationalists want protection
for work and workers, a clamping down on economic migrants, and rules with teeth aimed at
controlling international trade.
If for the last twenty years, with only occasional oscillation, the pro-globalization side
has been dominant in the West, elections are starting to swing the balance in a new
direction.
Meanwhile, many who self-identify as on the Left seem utterly uninterested in the concerns
of ordinary people, at least in cases where these would conflict with the commitment to
globalization.
If the distinction between globalism and nationalism is in practice trumping other
differences, then we should not let ourselves be distracted by bright and shiny objects, and
keep our focus on what really matters.
From the Forbes link:
"The first downside of international trade that even proponents of freer trade must
acknowledge is that while the country as a whole gains some people do lose."
More accurate to say a tiny, tiny, TINY percentage gain.
Nice how they use the euphemism "country as a whole" for GDP. Yes, GDP goes up – but
that word that can never be uttered by American corporate media – DISTRIBUTION –
that essentially ALL gains in GDP have gone to the very top. AND THAT THIS IS A POLITICAL
DECISION, not like the waves of the ocean or natural selection. There is plenty that could be
done about it – BUT it STARTS with WANTING to do something effective about it .
Nice how they use the euphemism "country as a whole" for GDP.
Fresno Dan,
You have identified one of my pet peeves about economists and their fellow traveler
politicians. They hide behind platitudes, and the former are more obnoxious about that.
Economists will tell people that they just don't understand all that complexity, and that in
the name of efficiency, etc, free trade and the long slide toward neo-liberal hell must
continue.
I think the assertion that all economic gains have gone to the very top is not accurate.
According to 'Unintended Consequences' by Ed Conard, the 'composition of the work force has
shifted to demographics with lower incomes' between 1980 and 2005. If you held the workforce
of 1980 steady through 2005, wages would be up 30% in real terms, not including benefits.
I think the author has highlighted some home truths in the article. I once remember
several years ago just trying to raise the issue of immigration* and its impact on workers on
an Irish so-called socialist forum. Either I met silence or received a reply along the lines:
'that when socialists rule the EU we'll establish continental wide standards that will ensure
fairness for everyone'. Fairy dust stuff. I'm not anti immigrant in any degree but it seems
unwise not to understand and mitigate the negative aspects of policies on all workers. Those
chickens are coming home to roost by creating the type of political parties (new or
established) that now control the EU and many world economies.
During the same period many younger middle and upper middle class Irish extolled the
virtues, quite openly, of immigration as way of lowering the power and wages of existing
Irish workers so that the costs of building homes, labour intensive services and the like
would be concretely reduced; and that was supposed to be a good thing for the material well
being of these middle and upper middle classes. Sod manual labour.
One part of the working class was quite happy to thrown another part of the working class
under the bus and the Left**, such as it was and is, was content to let it happen. Then
established Leftist parties often facilitated the rightward economic process via a host of
policies, often against their own stated policies in election manifestos. The Left appeared
deceitful. The Irish Labour party is barely alive and subsisting on die-hard traditionalists
for their support by those who can somehow ignore the deceit of their party. Surreaslist
stuff from so-called working class parties,
And now the middle-middle classes are ailing and we're supposed to take notice. Hmmm. Yet,
as a Leftist, myself, it is incumbent upon us to address the situation and assist all
workers, whatever their own perceived status.
*I'm an immigrant in the UK currently, though that is about to change next year.
** Whether the "Left", such as the Irish Labour Party, was just confused or bamboozled
matters not a jot. After the financial crises that became an economic crisis, they zealously
implemented austerity policies that predominantly cleared the way for a right wing political
landscape to dominate throughout Europe. One could be forgiven for thinking that those who
called themselves Leftists secretly believed that only right wing, neo-liberal economic
policies were correct. And I suppose, being a bit cynical, that a few politicos were paid
handsomely for their services.
I think its easy to see why the more middle class elements of the left wing parties never
saw immigration as a problem – but harder to see why the Trade Unions also bought into
this. Partly I think it was a laudable and genuine attempt to ensure they didn't buy into
racism – when you look at much trade union history, its not always pleasant reading
when you see how nakedly racist some early trade union activists were, especially in the US.
But I think there was also a process whereby Unions increasingly represented relatively
protected trades and professions, while they lost ground in more vulnerable sectors, such as
in construction.
I think there was also an underestimation of the 'balancing' effect within Europe. I think
a lot of activists understimated the poverty in parts of Europe, and so didn't see the
expansion of the EU into eastern Europe as resulting in the same sort of labour arbitrage
thats occurred between the west and Asia. I remember the discussions over the enlargement of
the EU to cover eastern Europe and I recall that there seemed to be an inbuilt assumption
(certainly in the left), that rising general prosperity would ensure there would be no real
migration impact on local jobs. This proved to be entirely untrue.
Incidentally, in my constituency (Dublin Central) in past elections the local Labour party
was as guilty as any of pandering to the frequent racism encountered on the doorsteps in
working class areas. But it didn't do them much good. Interestingly, SF was the only party
who would consistently refuse to pander (At least in Dublin), making the distinction between
nationalist and internationalist minded left wingers even more confusing.
Yes, one has to praise the fact that the Unions didn't pander to racism – but that's
about all the (insert expletive of choice) did correctly.
Your other points, as ever, are relevant and valid but (and I must but) I tend to think
that parties like Labour were too far "breezy" about the repercussions about labour
arbitrage. But that's water under the bridge now.
Speaking about SF and the North West in general, they have aggressively canvassed recent
immigrants and have not tolerated racism among their ranks. Their simple reasoning was that
is unthinkable that SF could tolerate such behaviour amongst themselves when they has waged a
campaign against such attitudes and practices in the six counties. (SF are no saints, often
fumble the ball badly, and are certainly not the end-all-be-all, but this is something they
get right).
It has to be understood that much of immigration is occurring because of war, famine,
collapsing societies (mostly due to massive wealth inequality and corrupt governments).
Immigration is not the cause of the economic issues in the EU, it's a symptom (or a feature
if you're on top). If you don't correct the causes – neo-liberalism, kleptocracy,
rigged game – what ever you want to call it, then you too will become an immigrant in
your own country (and it will be a third world country by the time the crooks on top are
done).
Don't get caught up in the blame the other poor people game. It's a means to get the
powerless to fight among themselves. They are not in charge, they are victims just like
you.
Having spent a lot of time in the Indian subcontinent and Afghanistan and Iraq I have to
say that rampant overpopulation plays a big part. Anyone who can get out is getting out. It
makes sense. And with modern communications they all know how life is in Europe or the US in
contrast to the grinding horror that surrounds them.
But Conan tells me that Haiti is a tropical paradise! (my brother too spent a lot of time
in Afghanistan and Iraq working with the locals during his deployments)
"Twitter liberalism" is doing itself by not recognizing that much of the developing world
IS a corrupt cesspool.
Instead of railing against Trump, the Twitter-sphere needs to rail against the bipartisan
policies that drive corruption, and economic dislocations and political dislocations. and
rail against religious fundamentalism that hinders family planning.
But if you actually do that, rail against bipartisan neoliberal policies on social media
and IRL, the conservatives are far less hostile than the die-hard Dems. This is especially
true now, with all the frothing at the mouth and bloodlust about Russia. Its raised their
"it's ALL *YOUR* FAULT"-ism by at least an order of magnitude.
Actually, that's been true since the 18th C., at least for the US. TV may make it more
vivid, and Europe has changed places, but most Americans have immigrant ancestors, most often
from Europe.
However, it does seem that the policy of the EU, especially under the influence of Mutti
Merkel, signalled a free-for-all immigration stance over the last several years, completely
ignoring the plight of existing workers (many of whom would be recent immigrants themselves
and the children of immigrants). That the so-called Left either sat idly by or jumped on
Mutti's band wagon didn't do them any favours with working people. Every country or customs
union has and needs to regulate its borders. It also makes some sense to monitor labour
markets when unfavourable conditions appear.
It appears that only the wealthy are largely reaping the rewards of the globalist
direction trade has taken. These issues need to be addressed by the emerging Left political
parties in the West. Failure to address these issues must, I would contend, play into the
hands of the more right wing parties whose job is to often enrich the local rich.
But, bottom line, your are correct workers do not come out well when blaming other workers
for economies that have been intentionally created to produce favourable conditions for the
few over the many.
It's a blade with two sides.
There are push factors like the wars and poor countries. However neither of these causes can
be fixed. Not possible. Europe can gnash their teeth all they want, not even when they did
the unthinkable and put the US under sanctions for their warcrimes would the US ever stop.
First there would be color revolutions in western europe.
As important as the push factors are the pull ones. 90% or so of all refugees 2015 went to
Germany. Some were sent to other countries by the EU, these too immediately moved to Germany
and didn't stay where they were assigned. So the EU has to clean up their act and would need
to put the last 10 or so US presidents and administrations before a judge in Den Haag for
continued war crimes and crimes against humanity (please let me my dreams). The EU would also
need to clean up their one sided trade treaties with Africa and generally reign in their own
corporations. All that is however not enough by far and at most only half the battle. Even
when the EU itself all did these things, the poverty would remain and therefore the biggest
push factor. Humans always migrate to the place where the economy is better.
The pull factors is however at least as big. The first thing to do is for Germany to fix
their laws to be in sync with the other EU countries. At this point, Germany is utterly
alone, at most some countries simply don't speak out against german policy since they want
concessions in other areas. Main one here is France with their proposed EU and Euro reforms
but not alone by far.
Nationalists want protection for work and workers, a clamping down on economic
migrants, and rules with teeth aimed at controlling international trade.
Socialism in one country is a Stalinist theory, and falling back upon it in fear of
international capital is not only regressive but (assuming we aren't intentionally ignoring
history) relective of a defensive mentality.
In other words, this kind of thinking is the thinking of the whipped dog cringing before
the next blow.
Or perhaps they want to regulate and control the power of capital in their country. Which
is an entirely impossible proposition considering that capital can flee any jurisdiction and
cross any border. After all, transnational capital flows which were leveraged to the hilt in
speculative assets played an oversized role in generating the financial crisis and subsequent
crash.
It wouldn't be the first time I've been called a Stalinist though.
And why would we care whether it's a "Stalinist" theory? For that matter, although worker
ownership would solve some of these problems, we needn't be talking about socialism, but
rather about more functional capitalism.
Quite a leap in that last sentence; you haven't actually established anything of the
sort.
Personally, I believe capitalism needs to go away, but for it, or any other economic
system, to work, we would need a fair, equal, just, enforced rule of law that
everyone would be under, wouldn't we?
Right now the blessed of our various nations do not want this, so they make so that one
set is unfair, unequal, unjust, harshly enforced on most of their country's population while
they get the gentle rules.
For a society to function long term, it needs to have a fair and just set of rules that
everyone understands and follow, although the rules don't have to equal; people will tolerate
different levels of punishments and strictness of the rules. The less that is the case the
more dysfunctional, and usually the more repressive it is. See the Western Roman Empire, the
fall of just about every Chinese dynasty, the Russian Empire, heck even the American War of
Independence, and the American Civil War. In example, people either actively worked to
destroy the system or did not care to support it.
Thank you for the article, a pretty lucid analysis of the recent electoral results in
Italy and trends elsewhere. Although I would have liked to read something about people voting
the way they do because they are xenophobe fascist baby-eating pedophile racist Putin
friends. Just for fun.
Funny how the author's company promotes "Daily international job vacancies in UNDP, FAO,
UN, UNCTAD, UNIDO and the other Governative Organization, Non Governative Organization,
Multinationals Corporations. Public Relations, Marketing, Business Development."
Precisely the sort of jobs that infuriates the impoverishing middle classes.
As recently as 2015, Bernie Sanders defended not only border security, but also national
sovereignty. Asked about expanded immigration, Sanders flipped the question into a critique
of open-borders libertarianism: "That's a Koch brothers proposal which says essentially there
is no United States."
Unfortunately the ethnic division of the campaign and Hillary's attack seems to have led him
to change his mind.
That's probably due to the fact that just about everybody can't seem to differentiate
between immigration and mass migration. The latter issue is a matter of distributing the pain
of a collapsing order. state failure, and climate change while the former is simply engaging
in the comfortable rhetoric of politics dominated by the American middle class.
1 people vote they like. im not updated if the voters eat babies but i'll check and let u
know.
2 My company is not dream job. It is a for free ( and not making a penny) daily bulleting
that using a fre soft (paper.li) collect international qualified job offers for whoever is
willing to work in these sector.
i'm not pro or contro migrants. i actually only reported simple fact collating differents
point :)
Economic migrants seek prosperity and are justified in doing so, yet they can also be
seen as pawns in an international strategy that destroys the negotiating leverage of
workers. The resulting contradictions potentially render conventional political
classifications obsolete.
This appears on the homepage, but not here.
In any case, the 10% also seek prosperity. They are said to be the enablers of the 1%.
Until the left alters its thinking to reflect the crucial information presented in this
video, information more clearly and comprehensively spelled out in "Reclaiming the State" by
Mitchell and Fazi, resurgent rightwing nationalism will be the only outlet for those who
reject global neoliberalism's race to the bottom. It's that simple and sad.
To paint this as two pro-globalisation (within which you place the left) and
pro-nationalism is simplistic and repositions the false dichotomy of left vs right with
something just as useless. We should instead seek to speak to the complexities of the modern
political spectrum. This is an example of poor journalism and analysis and shouldn't have
been posted here, sorry Yves.
Thanks for your opinion. Check the format of this place: articles selected for information
or provoking thoughts, in support of a general position of driving toward betterment of the
general welfare, writ large.
The political economy is at least as complex as the Krebs or citric acid cycle that
biology students and scientists try to master. There are so many moving parts and
intersecting and competing interests that in the few words that the format can accommodate,
regarding each link, it's a little unkind to expect some master work of explication and
rhetorical closure every time.
The Krebs cycle is basically driven by the homeostatic thrust, bred of billions of years
of refinement, to maintain the healthy functioning and prolong life of the organism. There's
a perceivable axis to all the many parts of respiration, digestion, energy flows and such,
all inter-related with a clear organizing principle at the level of the organism. On the
record, it's hardly clear that at the level of the political economy, and all the many parts
that make it up, there is sufficient cohesion around a set of organizing principles that
parallel the drive, at the society and species level, to regulate and promote the energy
flows and interactions that would keep things healthy and prolong the life of the larger
entity. Or that their is not maybe a death wish built into the "cultural DNA" of most of the
human population.
Looks a lot to me that we actually have been invested (in both the financial and military
senses of the word) by a bunch of different cancer processes, wild and unregulated
proliferation of ecnomic and political tumor tissues that have invaded and undermined the
healthy organs of the body politic. Not so clear what the treatments might be, or the
prognosis. It is a little hopeful, continuing the biological analogy, that the equivalents of
inflammation and immune system processes appear to be overcoming the sneaky tricks that
cancer genes and cells employ to evade being identified and rendered innocuous.
Yes, "invested in a bunch of cancer processes" is a good description of allowing excessive
levels of predatory wealth. Thus you end up with a bunch of Jay Gould hyper capitalists whose
guiding principle is: I can always pay one half of the working class to kill the other half.
Divide and conquer rules.
It's mostly simply wrong. This doesn't describe the political views of almost anyone near
power anywhere as far as I can tell:
"Globalists want more open borders and freer international trade. Nationalists want
protection for work and workers, "
Most of the nationalist forces are on the right and give @#$# all for workers rights.
Really they may be anti-immigrant but they are absolutely anti-worker.
The middle class does not really exist, it was a concept invented by capitalists to
distract the workers from their essential unity as fellow wage slaves. Some make more wages,
some make less wages but they all have their surplus value, the money left over after they
have enough to take care of themselves, taken by the capitalist and used for his ends even
though he may not have worked in the value creation process at all.
Economic migrants are members of the working class who have been driven from their home
country to somewhere else by the capitalist system. While the article does mention capitalist
shock doctrine methods for establishing imperialism and correctly notes that economic
migrants are victims, it then goes on to try to lay a weak and insidious argument against
them. The author goes on citing multiple different cases of worker wages being driven lower
or stagnating, many of these cases have differing and sometimes complex reasons for why this
happened. But migrants and globalization are to blame he says and that our struggle is
nationalism vs globalism. He refuses to see what is staring him in the face, workers produce
surplus value for society, more workers produce more surplus value. If society finds itself
wealthier with more workers then why do workers wage fall or stagnate? He does note correctly
that this is due to the workers now having a weaker bargaining position with the capitalist,
but he seems to conclude from this without stating outrightly that we should then reject the
economic migrants because of this.
However, we could instead conclude that if more workers produce more surplus value but yet
their wages fall because the capitalist takes a larger share of the overall pot, that the
problem is not more workers but instead the capitalist system itself which was rigged to
exploit workers everywhere. Plus the workers bargaining position only weakens with a greater
number of them if they are all just bargaining for themselves, but if they were to bargain
togather collectively then there bargaining position has actually only grown even
stronger.
Also he falsly equates democratic party policies with leftists, instead of correctly
noting that the democratic party represents capitalist interests from a centrist position and
not the left. The strength of global capitalism can only be fought by a global coalition of
the working class. The struggle of Mexican and American workers are interrelated to each
other and the same goes for that of European and Middle Eastern workers. The time has come
for the left to raise the rallying cry of its great and glorious past.
You claim, as if it were obvious, that "economic migrants are members of the working class
who have been driven from their home country to somewhere else by the capitalist system."
Are all economic migrants therefore bereft of agency?
If the borders of the US were abruptly left completely open, a huge number of people would
enter the country tomorrow, for economic reasons. Would they all have been "driven" here, or
would they have some choice in the matter?
When you say, "he refuses to say what is staring him in the face, that [ ] more workers
produce more surplus value," you are not only taking a gratuitously pedantic tone, you are
actually not making a coherent critique. If economic migrants move from one country to
another, the total pool of workers in the world has not increased; while according to your
logic, if all the workers in the world were to move to Rhode Island, Rhode Island would
suddenly be swimming in the richness of surplus value.
When you say, "we could instead conclude that [..] the problem is not more workers but
instead the capitalist system itself which was rigged to exploit workers everywhere," you are
straw-manning the author but also making a purely rhetorical argument. If you think the
capitalist system can be replaced with a better one within the near future, then you can work
toward that; but in the meanwhile, nations, assuming that they will continue to exist, will
either have open borders or something short of that, and these decisions do affect
the lives of workers.
When you say he "falsly equates democratic party policies with leftists," the false
equivalence is coming from you. The article barely touches on the Democratic Party, and
instead draws most of its examples from Europe, especially Italy. In Italy, the public
figures he mentions call themselves part of the sinistra and are generally referred
to that way. You might perhaps feel that they are not entitled to that name (and in fact, the
article sometimes places "left" in quotation marks), but you should at least read the article
and look them up before discussing the matter.
From the article: "Meanwhile, many who self-identify as on the Left seem utterly
uninterested in the concerns of ordinary people, at least in cases where these would conflict
with the commitment to globalization."
To Be Fair, Verga clearly is skeptical about those claims to be "on the Left," as he
should be. Nonetheless, his initial mention of Democratic exemplars of globalization triggers
American reflexes.
Something before this failed to post; was rejected as a double post.
In brief: corporate globalization is a conservative, Republican policy that Bill Clinton
imposed on the Dems, where it has since become doctrine, since it pays. It's ultimately the
reason I'm a Green, not a Democrat, and in a sense the reason there IS a Green Party in the
US.
The author points to stagnant middle class income in USA and Western Europe but fail to
look the big picture. Middle class income has increased sharply in the past decades in Asia
and Eastern Europe. Overall the gain huge, even though life is tougher in richer
countries.
Overall the gain huge, even thought life is tougher in richer countries.
Please accept my apologies for saying this. I don't mean to offend. I just have to point
out something.
Many in the Democratic Party, as well as the left, are pointing to other countries and
peoples as well as the American 9.9% and saying things are great, why are you complaining?
With the not so hidden implications, sometimes openly stated that those who do are losers and
deplorables.
Saying that middle class incomes are merely stagnant is a sick, sick joke as well as an
untruth. As an American, I do not really care about the middle classes in Asia and Eastern
Europe. Bleep the big picture. The huge gains comes with a commensurate increase in homeless
in the United States, and a falling standard of living for most the of the population,
especially in the "wealthy" states, like my state of California. Most of us are using
fingernails to stay alive and homed. If those gains had not been caused by the losses, I
would be very please to see them. As it is, I have to live under President Trump and worry
about surviving. Heck, worry about the rest of my family doing so.
"Saying that middle class incomes are merely stagnant is a sick, sick joke as well as an
untruth."
+10,000
I mean I actually do care somewhat about the people of the world, but we here in "rich
countries" are being driven to homelessness at this point and told the goddamn lie that we
live in a rich country, rather than the truth that we live in a plutocracy with levels of
inequality approaching truly 3rd world. We are literally killing ourselves because we have to
live in this plutocracy and our one existence itself is not even worth it anymore in this
economic system (and we are lacking even a few of the positives of many other 3rd world
countries). And those that aren't killing ourselves still can't find work, and even if we do,
it doesn't pay enough to meet the most basic necessities.
1. It is unfortunate that Verga raises the rising cost of material inputs but fails to
meaningfully address the issue. One of the drivers of migration, as mentioned in Comments
above, is the population volcano currently erupting. Labor is cheap and globalization
possible in large part because the world population has grown from 2 Billion to over 7
Billion in the past 60-odd years. This slow-growing mountain of human beings has created
stresses on material inputs which are having a negative impact on the benefits derived from
declining labor costs. This becomes a death-spiral as capital seeks to balance the rising
cost of raw materials and agricultural products by driving down the cost of labor ever
further.
2. Verga touches on the interplay of Nationalism and Racism in the responses of political
parties and institutions in Italy and elsewhere. Voters appear to be abandoning Left and
left-ish parties because the Left have been unable to come up with a definintion of national
sovereignty that protects worker rights largely due to the importance of anti-racism in
current Left-wing thought. Working people were briefly bought-off with cheap consumer goods
and easy credit, but they now realize that low-wage migrant and off-shore workers mean that
even these goodies are now out of reach. The only political alternative currently on offer is
a brand of Nationalism defined by Racism -- which becomes acceptable to voters when the
alternative is Third-World levels of poverty for those outside the 1% and their 9%
enablers.
I don't see any simple solutions. Things may get very ugly.
I certainly see that policies tampering down free trade, both of capital and labor, can
benefit workers within a particular country. However, especially in the context of said
policies in "Western" countries, this can tend towards a, protect the working class within
the borders, leave those outside of it in impoverished squalor. Which doesn't mesh well with
the leftist goal of global class consciousness. Much like the racially segregated labor
policies of yesteryear, it's playing a zero-sum game with the working class while the
ownership class gets the "rising tide lifts all boats" treatment.
So how do we protect workers within the sovereign, while not doing so at the cost of the
workers outside of it? Schwieckart has an interesting idea, that tariffs on imports are used
to fund non-profits/higher education/cooperatives in the country of export. However, I think
we'd need something a bit more fine-tuned than that.
It has always baffled me that governments enable this global musical chairs game with the
labor market. Nearly all Western governments allow tax dodging by those who benefit the most
from their Navies, Armies, Patents, and Customs enforcement systems. However, it is the
working class that carries the brunt of that cost while corporations off-shore their
profits.
A simple-minded fix might be to start taxing foreign profits commensurate with the cost of
enabling those overseas profits.
Interesting that a corporation is a person just like us mortals when it is to their
advantage, but unlike us humans, they can legally escape taxation on much of their income
whereas a human being who is a US citizen cannot. A human citizen is generally taxed by the
US on all income regardless of its source. OTOH, corporations (among other means) routinely
transfer intellectual property to a non tax jurisdiction and then pay artificial payments to
that entity for the rights to use such property. It is a scam akin to a human creating a tax
deduction by transferring money from one pocket to another. Yes, proper taxation of
corporations is a simple-minded fix which is absolutely not simple to legislate. Nice try
though. Something else to ponder: Taxation without representation was said to be a major
factor in our war of independence from Britain. Today no one seems to be concerned that we
have evolved into representation without taxation. Doesn't see right to me.
"Klein analyzes a future (already here to some degree) in which multinational
corporations freely fish from one market or another in an effort to find the most suitable
(i.e. cheapest) labor force."
FWIW I don't think it's productive to talk about things like immigration in (or to) the US
in terms of just the here – as in what should/could we be doing here
to fix the problem. It's just as much if not more about the there . If we
view the global economic order as an enriched center feeding off a developing periphery, then
fixing the periphery should be first aim. #Wall or #NoBorders are largely incendiary
extremes. Ending Original Sin and creating some
sort of supranational
IOU/credit system (not controlled by World Bank or IMF!) will end the economic imbalance
and allow countries who will never export their way out of poverty and misery a way
to become equal first world nation states. With this equality, there will be less economic
migration, less peripheral poverty and potentially less political unrest. It's a gargantuan
task to be sure, but with rising Socialist sentiment here and abroad, I'd like to think we
are at least moving in the right direction.
If the rich were properly taxed then social tensions would be greatly reduced and if the
revenue raised were used to help the poorest in society much distress could be
alleviated.
I worry that debate on migration/globalisation is being encouraged to distract attention
from this issue.
I may indeed have taken a gratuitously pedantic tone and could have chosen a better one,
for that i apologise. I do however believe that much of my critique still stands, I will try
to go through your points one by one.
"Are all economic migrants therefore bereft of agency?"
Not all but many are, especially the ones that most people are complaining about. Many of
them are being driven from their home countries not simply for a better life but so they can
have something approaching a life at all. While to fully prove this point would require an
analysis of all the different migrants and their home country conditions, I do feel that if
we are talking about Syrian refugees, migrants from Africa risking their lives crossing the
Mediteranian sea, or CentralAmerican refugees than yes i do think these people to an extent
have had their agency taken from them by global events. For Syrians, by being caught in an
imperialist power struggle which while the civil war may not have been caused by it, it
certainly has been prolonged because of it. Not too mention America played a very significant
role in creating the conditions for ISIS, and western European powers don't have completely
clean hands either due to their long history of brutal imperialism in the mideast. Africa of
course also has an extensive past of colonization and suffers from a present of colonization
and exploitation as well. For Central Americans there is of course the voracious american
drug market as well as our politicians consistent appetite for its criminalisation to blame.
There is also of course global climate change. Many of these contributing conditions are not
being dealt with and so i believe that the migrations we have witnessed these last few years
are only the first ining of perhaps even greater migrations to come. How we deal with it now,
could determine whether our era is defined by mass deaths or something better. So to the
extent that i believe many of these migrants have agency is similiar to how a person climbing
onto the roof of there house to escape a flood does.
If the borders of the US were left completely open then, yes, there would most likely be a
rush of people at first but over time they would migrate back and forth according to their
needs, through the opening of the border they would gain agency. People often think that a
country not permitting its citizens to leave is wrong and immoral, but if most countries
close their borders to the people of a country going through great suffering, then it seems
to me that is essentially the same even if the rhetoric may be different. The likeliness of
this is high if the rich countries close there borders, since if the rich countries like the
US and Italy feel they can not take them in, then its doubtful countries on the way that are
much poorer will be able to either.
At the begining of your article you stated that "International commerce, jobs, and
economic migrants are propelled by a common force: profit." This is the capitalist system,
which is a system built upon the accumulation of capital, which are profits invested in
instruments of labor, aka machines and various labor enhancements. Now Rhode island is quite
small so there are geographical limitations of course, but if that was not an issue then yes.
Wage workers in the capitalist system produce more value than they consume, if this was not
the case they would not be hired or be hired for long. So if Rhode Island did not have the
geographical limitations that it does, then with more workers the overall pot of valuable
products and services would increase per capita in relation to the population. If the workers
are divided and not unified into cohesive and responsive institutions to fight for there
right share of the overall pie, which I believe should be all of it, then most of the gain to
society will go to the capitalist as increased profits. So it is not the migrant workers who
take from the native but instead actually the capitalist who exploits and trys to magnify
there difference. So if the capitalist system through imperialism helped to contribute to the
underlying conditions driving mass migration, and then it exploits there gratitude and
willingness to work for less than native workers, than I believe it follows that they will
wish to drive native anger towards the migrants with the ultimate goal of allowing them to
exploit the migrant workers at an even more severe level. This could be true within the
country, such as the US right now where the overarching result of anti-immigrant policies has
been to not get rid of them but to drive there exploitation more into the shadows, or through
mass deportations back to their home country followed by investments to exploit their
desperation at super low wages that will then compete with the rich country workers, it is
also possible they will all just die and everyone will look away. Either way the result will
still be lower wages for rich country workers, it seems to me the only way out of the impass
is for the native workers to realize their unity with migrant workers as exploited workers
and instead of directing that energy of hostility at each other instead focus it upon the
real root which is the capitalists themselves. Without the capitalists, more workers, held
withing certain geographic limitations of course, would in fact only enrich each other.
So while nations may indeed continue to exist for awhile, the long term benefit of native
workers is better served by making common cause with migrants against their mutual oppressors
then allowing themselves to be stirred up against them. Making this argument to workers is
much harder, but its the most beneficial if it can be made successfully.
This last point i do agree i may have been unfair to you, historically I believe the left
generally referred to anarchists, socialists and communists. So I often dislike the way
modern commentators use the left to refer to anything from a center right democrat like
Hillary Clinton all the way to the most hard core communist, it can make understanding
political subtleties difficult since anarchists, socialists and communists have radically
different politics than liberals, much more so than can be expressed along a linear line. But
as you point out you used quotes which i admit i did not notice, and of course one must
generally use the jargon of the times in order to be understood.
Overall i think my main critique was that it seemed that throughout your article you were
referencing different negative symptoms of capitalism but was instead taking that evidence
for the negatives of globalism. I may come from a more radical tradition than you may be used
to, but i would consider globalism to be an inherent aspect of capitalism. Capitalism in its
algorithmic quest for ever increasing profits generally will not allow its self to be bound
for long by people, nations, or even the physical and environmental limitations of the earth.
While one country may be able to restrict it for a time unless it is overcome completely it
will eventually reach out globally again. The only way to stop it is a prolonged struggle of
the international working class cooperating with each other against capitalism in all its
exploitive forms. I would also say that what we are seeing is not so much globalism vs
nationalism but instead a rearrangement of the competing imperial powers, Russia, China, US,
Germany and perh
By Michelle Ye Hee Lee July 8, 2015
