The Partisan Divide on Issues

[Classic-Xer]

(01-28-2020, 05:53 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 03:47 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-27-2020, 11:32 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: These days, cities are getting more expensive to live in, especially on the coasts. Poor people can't afford to live in San Francisco or New York anymore. Liberal white people are more likely to live there, unless they are rich liberal non-white people. Maybe what you say about the hood applies to some other cities like Detroit, Milwaukee or Baltimore, but gentrification is also happening in some of these cities. The urban areas are where the jobs are and where the interesting people live. Young, bright people don't live in red, rural areas where people vote by 8 to 1 margins for Trump. These people are dumb and boring. Young people want opportunity and fun. So they move to blue cities, and leave the red areas to those who prefer a declining banana republic or who feel abandoned, resentful and stuck there and drugged up. 

Dude, anything we support or oppose can be viewed or labelled as racist at this point. So, whatever, keep doing it and pray that your leadership doesn't hurt you worse than it's hurting you know with us, does anything stupid that actually impacts us and requires a nasty response  or your state doesn't get itself further in trouble  and collapse. You should also know that when you call  people racists who aren't racists those people will be offended/insulted. Now, I'd love to have an opportunity to challenge one the  dumb  racist blacks or one of them dumb sexist women or dumb Islamic racists or dumb narcissists or dumb socialists of yours in House today. Also, I wouldn't advise that you  continue using us as your scapegoats either. I mean, I watched as people were getting beaten by angry minorities in the streets of LA during the 90's.

Your part of the Right -- working-class white people who support the Tea Party politically -- does not establish the economic ethos that has developed almost without a break for forty years. The real rulers, the asset owners and bureaucratic elites, on have successfully imposed an ethos in which on behalf of their swinish selves, everything possible becomes a privilege of high price, toil becomes a harsh duty with minuscule reward, and life becomes a grim struggle for what should never be a privilege -- survival. Monopolization and vertical integration get the reward of tax cuts for classes that get the passive income of economic rent which has become the majority of income. We get an illusion of prosperity while more of us go poor despite working harder and longer under harsher discipline. So we have increasingly blatant expressions of indulgence in a society that increasingly resembles a Marxist stereotype of capitalism.

We even have our 'opiate of the masses' in dumbed-down entertainment as a diversion from thinking such 'troublesome' thoughts as the need to supplant the every-man-for-himself ethos that the Master Class has imposed. We get a celebrity circus as an anodyne. Wise people can see through it; fools accept it. You, Classic X'er, accept what the economic elites tell you. We even get someone who has made his income either as a landlord to people who must live in Greater New York to avail themselves of certain job opportunities or by supplying schlock entertainment. I found it easy to "fire" The Apprentice with my remote control. 

The conspicuous consumption of the Master Class does about as much good for most of us as did the expensive clothes, jewelry, and cars of wildly-successful criminals of the ghettos in the Boom Awakening to the desperately-poor. The choice of our economic elites, one that they can enforce, is that of cream for the princess' cat over milk for the baby of a farm laborer. Your part of the American political spectrum is the last, except for the amoral and rapacious elites who exploit us all, to recognize the reality of a sick society. The generational cycle itself is creating a desire for a child-friendly order. Severe poverty is not compatible with a child-friendly culture forming under your nose yet invisible to you.

The so called economic elites have little to no influence over me or my decisions related to me or my family. The American right isn't media or all that market driven these days. The American right is pretty much content with sticking to doing things and succeeding it's own way these days. The liberals on the other hand are less independent/mature/financially stable and more herd minded (cliquey) and more susceptible to both influences. Look at you, you're a prime example of the liberal mentality. I assume that you can picture yourself being mistreated (told where you messed up or why you failed or where you didn't do what you should have done) and fired by Trump which is why you hate Trump.

[Classic-Xer]

(01-28-2020, 05:47 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 04:17 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: I agree, ignoring major problems and shifting problems on others and blaming others for problems doesn't make problems go away. I don't know if you will live long enough to see the carnage and violence as the progressive era of old begins to come to end. I hope not for you sake. I don't have a problem with my retirement plan. I'm an X'er you know. I'd say it's better to be wealthier and more self sufficient than being more dependent like must blues these days. The reds themselves will be fine regardless of the situation because the reds are already committed to taking off themselves/their own so to speak.

The way I read it, there was a progressive era from FDR to LBJ.  The conservative policies dominated between Nixon and at least Trump, crashing America’s greatness.  The impeachment of Trump and the ‘OK Boomer’ meme hint that another progressive time may be coming.  Even if so, it is not here yet.

I do believe the reds are more independent, could survive a bad time cleaner.  On the other hand blues work together better, could make a good time better.  The latter seems more likely.

You mean the progressive era from FDR to Obama with Obama being viewed the 2nd coming. Well, that proved to be a bunch of hype and showed the level of ignorance that exists among progressives as to the governments inability to accomplish anything big and expensive these days. Why did we spend a trillion to fix a few hundred billion worth of roads across the country? Where did the other seven hundred billion go? Do blues really work good together or do half prefer to do something other than work these days? I'm an employer too you know.

[Eric the Green]

(01-28-2020, 01:05 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 05:53 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 03:47 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-27-2020, 11:32 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: These days, cities are getting more expensive to live in, especially on the coasts. Poor people can't afford to live in San Francisco or New York anymore. Liberal white people are more likely to live there, unless they are rich liberal non-white people. Maybe what you say about the hood applies to some other cities like Detroit, Milwaukee or Baltimore, but gentrification is also happening in some of these cities. The urban areas are where the jobs are and where the interesting people live. Young, bright people don't live in red, rural areas where people vote by 8 to 1 margins for Trump. These people are dumb and boring. Young people want opportunity and fun. So they move to blue cities, and leave the red areas to those who prefer a declining banana republic or who feel abandoned, resentful and stuck there and drugged up. 

Dude, anything we support or oppose can be viewed or labelled as racist at this point. So, whatever, keep doing it and pray that your leadership doesn't hurt you worse than it's hurting you know with us, does anything stupid that actually impacts us and requires a nasty response  or your state doesn't get itself further in trouble  and collapse. You should also know that when you call  people racists who aren't racists those people will be offended/insulted. Now, I'd love to have an opportunity to challenge one the  dumb  racist blacks or one of them dumb sexist women or dumb Islamic racists or dumb narcissists or dumb socialists of yours in House today. Also, I wouldn't advise that you  continue using us as your scapegoats either. I mean, I watched as people were getting beaten by angry minorities in the streets of LA during the 90's.

Your part of the Right -- working-class white people who support the Tea Party politically -- does not establish the economic ethos that has developed almost without a break for forty years. The real rulers, the asset owners and bureaucratic elites, on have successfully imposed an ethos in which on behalf of their swinish selves, everything possible becomes a privilege of high price, toil becomes a harsh duty with minuscule reward, and life becomes a grim struggle for what should never be a privilege -- survival. Monopolization and vertical integration get the reward of tax cuts for classes that get the passive income of economic rent which has become the majority of income. We get an illusion of prosperity while more of us go poor despite working harder and longer under harsher discipline. So we have increasingly blatant expressions of indulgence in a society that increasingly resembles a Marxist stereotype of capitalism.

We even have our 'opiate of the masses' in dumbed-down entertainment as a diversion from thinking such 'troublesome' thoughts as the need to supplant the every-man-for-himself ethos that the Master Class has imposed. We get a celebrity circus as an anodyne. Wise people can see through it; fools accept it. You, Classic X'er, accept what the economic elites tell you. We even get someone who has made his income either as a landlord to people who must live in Greater New York to avail themselves of certain job opportunities or by supplying schlock entertainment. I found it easy to "fire" The Apprentice with my remote control. 

The conspicuous consumption of the Master Class does about as much good for most of us as did the expensive clothes, jewelry, and cars of wildly-successful criminals of the ghettos in the Boom Awakening to the desperately-poor. The choice of our economic elites, one that they can enforce, is that of cream for the princess' cat over milk for the baby of a farm laborer. Your part of the American political spectrum is the last, except for the amoral and rapacious elites who exploit us all, to recognize the reality of a sick society. The generational cycle itself is creating a desire for a child-friendly order. Severe poverty is not compatible with a child-friendly culture forming under your nose yet invisible to you.

The so called economic elites have little to no influence over me or my decisions related to me or my family. The American right isn't media or all that market driven these days. The American right is pretty much content with sticking to doing things and succeeding it's own way these days. The liberals on the other hand are less independent/mature/financially stable and more herd minded (cliquey) and more susceptible to both influences. Look at you, you're a prime example of the liberal mentality. I assume that you can picture yourself being mistreated (told where you messed up or why you failed or where you didn't do what you should have done) and fired by Trump which is why you hate Trump.

Yes, the American right is indeed "pretty much content with sticking to doing things and succeeding it's own way these days." It loves the neo-liberal, trickle-down economics status quo in which they get big tax breaks and are allowed to screw over their customers and workers, and have their prejudices against immigrants and the poor stroked and their fanatical religious "values" lauded. It's all just fine for them. But the rising younger and more diverse people on the left are not satisfied with an economic system that holds them down for no reason. They don't need to be influenced to know they are being screwed, or to know that climate change and gun violence are real issues that need to be dealt with. They are not brainwashed by the false ideologies of the Christian Right, militarism and neo-liberalism. The Left can see the 40-year trend of America downward toward banana republic status on every measurement you can find. They know that adopting an authoritarian system of government led by an unfit, ego-maniacal demagogue is not what America needs.

[David Horn]

(01-28-2020, 12:15 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 10:32 AM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 04:17 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: ... I don't have a problem with my retirement plan. I'm an X'er you know. I'd say it's better to be wealthier and more self sufficient than being more dependent like must blues these days. The reds themselves will be fine regardless of the situation because the reds are already committed to taking off themselves/their own so to speak.

Using those dreaded statistics shows that robust social infrastructure leads to more satisfying lives and, surprisingly, to greater entrepreneurship. That's why the Scandinavian countries are always rated so high on total life satisfaction.  The US never gets above the mid-20s.

The Scandinavians are Scandinavians. You forget that the US isn't comprised of mainly Scandinavians these days. I'd say Minnesota ranks pretty close to most Scandinavian countries these days. Hint...Minnesota ain't all that liberal like you these days.  Look at our obvious differences and ask how can two Americans have such a major difference in their views of their country and countrymen. I seriously doubt that Norway has anti-Norway liberals like ours to contend with who view themselves as being above the law in Norway who refuse to recognize the laws of Norway. How easy would it be for Norway to do the unthinkable and boot the troublesome high almighty liberals out of Norway. It would be pretty easy compared to here because it would require a state by state constitutionally friendly  approach to accomplish that  task here.

Pick any Scandinavian country.  Given the lousy weather and limited resources (Norway has oil, but that's about it these days), they all do very well.  Are there discontents?  Of course -- they're everywhere.  The big difference: most of the country is OK with high taxes for great benefits.  I don't see the Norwegians running the social democrats away so they can go hard capitalist.  The same applies in Finland, Sweden, Denmark and Iceland.

[David Horn]

(01-28-2020, 12:33 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 10:36 AM)David Horn Wrote: Being independent means one is better able to fend for oneself by oneself.  Being more community focused just shifts the paradigm to the commonweal.  I would argue that, overall, the more communal option is better for most people, but less so for the best of the best.

Being independent means being able to fend for oneself and others during tough times without relying on government. The country boys could bring that lunatic of yours down to his knees and basically shut down the liberal government of your state if they wanted to as they demonstrated the other day. Oh, I heard they didn't cause any trouble or make a big mess and leave a big mess behind for others to pickup up when they left either.

The Gun Guys are a joke, and they proved that on this last trip to Richmond. Most of their potential physical opposition consisted of a few State Police officers -- many of them women. They marched around acting tough, and left. I don't think they'll be back soon.

[pbrower2a]

(01-28-2020, 01:05 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 05:53 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 03:47 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-27-2020, 11:32 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: These days, cities are getting more expensive to live in, especially on the coasts. Poor people can't afford to live in San Francisco or New York anymore. Liberal white people are more likely to live there, unless they are rich liberal non-white people. Maybe what you say about the hood applies to some other cities like Detroit, Milwaukee or Baltimore, but gentrification is also happening in some of these cities. The urban areas are where the jobs are and where the interesting people live. Young, bright people don't live in red, rural areas where people vote by 8 to 1 margins for Trump. These people are dumb and boring. Young people want opportunity and fun. So they move to blue cities, and leave the red areas to those who prefer a declining banana republic or who feel abandoned, resentful and stuck there and drugged up. 

Dude, anything we support or oppose can be viewed or labelled as racist at this point. So, whatever, keep doing it and pray that your leadership doesn't hurt you worse than it's hurting you know with us, does anything stupid that actually impacts us and requires a nasty response  or your state doesn't get itself further in trouble  and collapse. You should also know that when you call  people racists who aren't racists those people will be offended/insulted. Now, I'd love to have an opportunity to challenge one the  dumb  racist blacks or one of them dumb sexist women or dumb Islamic racists or dumb narcissists or dumb socialists of yours in House today. Also, I wouldn't advise that you  continue using us as your scapegoats either. I mean, I watched as people were getting beaten by angry minorities in the streets of LA during the 90's.

Your part of the Right -- working-class white people who support the Tea Party politically -- does not establish the economic ethos that has developed almost without a break for forty years. The real rulers, the asset owners and bureaucratic elites, on have successfully imposed an ethos in which on behalf of their swinish selves, everything possible becomes a privilege of high price, toil becomes a harsh duty with minuscule reward, and life becomes a grim struggle for what should never be a privilege -- survival. Monopolization and vertical integration get the reward of tax cuts for classes that get the passive income of economic rent which has become the majority of income. We get an illusion of prosperity while more of us go poor despite working harder and longer under harsher discipline. So we have increasingly blatant expressions of indulgence in a society that increasingly resembles a Marxist stereotype of capitalism.

We even have our 'opiate of the masses' in dumbed-down entertainment as a diversion from thinking such 'troublesome' thoughts as the need to supplant the every-man-for-himself ethos that the Master Class has imposed. We get a celebrity circus as an anodyne. Wise people can see through it; fools accept it. You, Classic X'er, accept what the economic elites tell you. We even get someone who has made his income either as a landlord to people who must live in Greater New York to avail themselves of certain job opportunities or by supplying schlock entertainment. I found it easy to "fire" The Apprentice with my remote control. 

The conspicuous consumption of the Master Class does about as much good for most of us as did the expensive clothes, jewelry, and cars of wildly-successful criminals of the ghettos in the Boom Awakening to the desperately-poor. The choice of our economic elites, one that they can enforce, is that of cream for the princess' cat over milk for the baby of a farm laborer. Your part of the American political spectrum is the last, except for the amoral and rapacious elites who exploit us all, to recognize the reality of a sick society. The generational cycle itself is creating a desire for a child-friendly order. Severe poverty is not compatible with a child-friendly culture forming under your nose yet invisible to you.

The so called economic elites have little to no influence over me or my decisions related to me or my family. The American right isn't media or all that market driven these days. The American right is pretty much content with sticking to doing things and succeeding it's own way these days. The liberals on the other hand are less independent/mature/financially stable and more herd minded (cliquey) and more susceptible to both influences. Look at you, you're a prime example of the liberal mentality. I assume that you can picture yourself being mistreated (told where you messed up or why you failed or where you didn't do what you should have done) and fired by Trump which is why you hate Trump.

Oh, really? They decide what politicians and political causes get the campaign funds, and those politicians and cases are the ones most amenable to the class interests of our economic elites -- cheap labor toiling under brutal management, lax regulation, monopolized markets, low taxes, wars for profit, and privatization of everything possible. They seek whatever they can get away with, and that means possibly things not quite nasty enough to provoke a proletarian revolution.Life simply gets harder, and for what?

With liberals, life gets better as technology advances. People get better pay and working conditions instead of being squeezed as workers and bled as consumers. I question that we are more reckless with personal spending; we are just as capable of savings and investment as right-wingers. (If anything, those "investors" are more likely to get fleeced in hustles of coins and precious metals as are people on the Right. I actually made some good investments in the spring of 2009... and it is a good thing that I did because those at least bought me a car when I lost everything else with my father in a nursing home).   

People with solid income can spend everything that they have -- but people with low incomes can only deny themselves what they want.  We liberals do not all have the same culture (as should be shown in our ethnic diversity). Honest [pay for honest work is the best that most people can hope for -- but that is adequate so long as one has skills.

Oh, by the way -- Donald Trump is a horrible person. You misread me when I said that I "fired" his bad TV (The Apprentice) show with my remote control much as I could "fire" a baseball game on the air when one team is down 10-2 in the fourth inning. I have never been an employee of Donald Trump or been on his TV show. I prefer to be around people who don't brag about grabbing women by their "kitty-cats". Trump has proved too amoral, immoral, and narcissistic to be a desirable President.  I do not blame him for my economic hardships. I blame a disability.

[Classic-Xer]

(01-28-2020, 03:30 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: Oh, really? They decide what politicians and political causes get the campaign funds, and those politicians and cases are the ones most amenable to the class interests of our economic elites -- cheap labor toiling under brutal management, lax regulation, monopolized markets, low taxes, wars for profit, and privatization of everything possible. They seek whatever they can get away with, and that means possibly things not quite nasty enough to provoke a proletarian revolution.Life simply gets harder, and for what?

With liberals, life gets better as technology advances. People get better pay and working conditions instead of being squeezed as workers and bled as consumers. I question that we are more reckless with personal spending; we are just as capable of savings and investment as right-wingers. (If anything, those "investors" are more likely to get fleeced in hustles of coins and precious metals as are people on the Right. I actually made some good investments in the spring of 2009... and it is a good thing that I did because those at least bought me a car when I lost everything else with my father in a nursing home).   

People with solid income can spend everything that they have -- but people with low incomes can only deny themselves what they want.  We liberals do not all have the same culture (as should be shown in our ethnic diversity). Honest [pay for honest work is the best that most people can hope for -- but that is adequate so long as one has skills.

Oh, by the way -- Donald Trump is a horrible person. You misread me when I said that I "fired" his bad TV (The Apprentice) show with my remote control much as I could "fire" a baseball game on the air when one team is down 10-2 in the fourth inning. I have never been an employee of Donald Trump or been on his TV show. I prefer to be around people who don't brag about grabbing women by their "kitty-cats". Trump has proved too amoral, immoral, and narcissistic to be a desirable President.  I do not blame him for my economic hardships. I blame a disability.

The cheap labor( cheap illegal immigrant labor and cheap foreign labor here and abroad) are mainly on your side and being largely protected and politically represented by your side these days. You bought in even though you'll never see the financial benefits that your so called elites, politicians and their corrupt officials are going to receive from the economic elites supporting your side. I mean, Bloomberg is going to invest a billion in the effort to defeat Trump and kill phase II of the Chinese trade deal for China these days. You guys and your insatiable need for a liberal white knight and a liberal government to protect you from evil Donald Trump and the evil Tea Party these days. Chuckle, chuckle. What a joke, they have you pegged too. You'd have to pack up and move to a sanctuary state to receive some sort of benefit from those taking advantage of them. I don't employ cheap illegal or do business with cheap immigrant labor. I employ Americans who aren't cheap or even close to being as cheap and do business with American business's and American customers. Yes, we've seen the liberals flex their muscles and we seen their groups flex theirs too be neither compare to what 60 million us could do to them. I mean, who are we?

One other thing, like you with Trumps show, I fire liberals on TV all the time. I watch them acting like punks, stuck up elitist snobs, displaying their prejudices and slobbering all over themselves and telling each other how great they are and so forth. I watch them clammering to hope that something bad happens and salivating over the possibility of someone more knowledgeable/ more capable of destroying Trump siding with them or being coaxed into doing something really stupid related to themselves and their political interests for their sake and so forth. Like I said, we'll see which Republican Senators need Republican votes to remain in office and which think they'll remain in office without them these days. Hey, the liberals got the cheap impeachment they needed to stay in office and get paid to do nothing for a couple more years.

[Classic-Xer]

(01-28-2020, 02:15 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 12:33 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: .

The Gun Guys are a joke, and they proved that on this last trip to Richmond.  Most of their potential physical opposition consisted of a few State Police officers -- many of them women.  They marched around acting tough, and left.  I don't think they'll be back soon.

Man, is that all they had to face, a few state troopers that were mostly women. Why did your liberal governor and liberal media wig out over them coming to town? Where was vicious Antifa? I assume that they prefer to terrorize, threaten and beat up unarmed people? Well, you should shoot send them an email and let them know that Minnesotans have the legal right to carry firearms and the right to shoot them here too.

[pbrower2a]

(01-28-2020, 04:38 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 03:30 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: Oh, really? They decide what politicians and political causes get the campaign funds, and those politicians and cases are the ones most amenable to the class interests of our economic elites -- cheap labor toiling under brutal management, lax regulation, monopolized markets, low taxes, wars for profit, and privatization of everything possible. They seek whatever they can get away with, and that means possibly things not quite nasty enough to provoke a proletarian revolution.Life simply gets harder, and for what?

With liberals, life gets better as technology advances. People get better pay and working conditions instead of being squeezed as workers and bled as consumers. I question that we are more reckless with personal spending; we are just as capable of savings and investment as right-wingers. (If anything, those "investors" are more likely to get fleeced in hustles of coins and precious metals as are people on the Right. I actually made some good investments in the spring of 2009... and it is a good thing that I did because those at least bought me a car when I lost everything else with my father in a nursing home).   

People with solid income can spend everything that they have -- but people with low incomes can only deny themselves what they want.  We liberals do not all have the same culture (as should be shown in our ethnic diversity). Honest pay for honest work is the best that most people can hope for -- but that is adequate so long as one has skills.

Oh, by the way -- Donald Trump is a horrible person. You misread me when I said that I "fired" his bad TV (The Apprentice) show with my remote control much as I could "fire" a baseball game on the air when one team is down 10-2 in the fourth inning. I have never been an employee of Donald Trump or been on his TV show. I prefer to be around people who don't brag about grabbing women by their "kitty-cats". Trump has proved too amoral, immoral, and narcissistic to be a desirable President.  I do not blame him for my economic hardships. I blame a disability.

The cheap labor (cheap illegal immigrant labor and cheap foreign labor here and abroad) are mainly on your side and being largely protected and politically represented by your side these days. You bought in even though you'll never see the financial benefits that your so called elites, politicians and their corrupt officials are going to receive from the economic elites supporting your side. I mean, Bloomberg is going to invest a billion in the effort to defeat Trump and kill phase II of the Chinese trade deal for China these days. You guys and your insatiable need for a liberal white knight and a liberal government to protect you from evil Donald Trump and the evil Tea Party these days. Chuckle, chuckle. What a joke, they have you pegged too. You'd have to pack up and move to a sanctuary state to receive some sort of benefit from those taking advantage of them. I don't employ cheap illegal or do business with cheap immigrant labor. I employ Americans who aren't cheap or even close to being as cheap and do business with American business's and American customers. Yes, we've seen the liberals flex their muscles and we seen their groups flex theirs too be neither compare to what 60 million us could do to them. I mean, who are we?

1. Comparative advantage applies. Economics 101: a good trial lawyer might also be a good janitor, but you are not going to use a good trial lawyer to vacuum the floors of a law office. The fellow who gets a job as a janitor at that law firm can almost certainly do little else and is lucky to get that job. $150K a year is far too much to pay for a janitor, but it might be reasonable for a trial attorney. $15K a year might be what a janitor gets, and he might be lucky just to get a job that pays that much.

China has plenty of farm laborers for whom manufacturing work in an industrial sweatshop is a huge improvement even if the pay is abysmal and the conditions are poor. Industrial growth in any country usually reflects the time in which agricultural laborers become factory workers. Maybe American workers need to develop new skills for an advanced economy -- lest America revive the industrial sweatshop jobs that few Americans would now take, the ones that pay near-starvation wages for 65-hour workweeks. 

Free trade is normally the consumer's friend. It promotes technological innovation and cuts the cost of living. It is far more effective than relying upon trade deals to create exceptions for political reasons. 

2. HVAC installation and repair is skilled work. Skilled work ordinarily pays well because few people can do the specific task. You could not find people to work for you from overseas. Many could not speak or write English, so no matter how skilled they are they could not follow your instructions. That would make them useless. Skilled labor is not particularly mobile. Semi-skilled workers have proved mobile in the past, as shown in America getting a huge number of textile workers from the Russian Empire who made possible the garment industry. 

3. We are finding ways to avoid the damaging effects of Donald Trump, thank you. We are teaching our daughters and grand-daughters how to avoid people as vile as he (see also Harvey "Swine-stein", who was once a big supporter of liberal causes). It's going to take significant time before his economic policies cause a serious downturn. Maybe he is wise enough to recognize the folly of supporting a speculative boom as did Coolidge or Dubya -- or perhaps lucky that nothing of the sort is now possible. Some of us on the Blue side are highly creative, which means that we can defeat the Trump agenda with clever words and images. 

Your side is the one to get burned.

[Classic-Xer]

(01-28-2020, 02:11 PM)David Horn Wrote: Pick any Scandinavian country.  Given the lousy weather and limited resources (Norway has oil, but that's about it these days), they all do very well.  Are there discontents?  Of course -- they're everywhere.  The big difference: most of the country is OK with high taxes for great benefits.  I don't see the Norwegians running the social democrats away so they can go hard capitalist.  The same applies in Finland, Sweden, Denmark and Iceland.

I don't see the social Democrats in those countries allowing their people to have the freedom do that either.

[pbrower2a]

(01-28-2020, 06:26 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 02:11 PM)David Horn Wrote: Pick any Scandinavian country.  Given the lousy weather and limited resources (Norway has oil, but that's about it these days), they all do very well.  Are there discontents?  Of course -- they're everywhere.  The big difference: most of the country is OK with high taxes for great benefits.  I don't see the Norwegians running the social democrats away so they can go hard capitalist.  The same applies in Finland, Sweden, Denmark and Iceland.

I don't see the social Democrats in those countries allowing their people to have the freedom do that either.

This is about like some mullah in Iran saying that because the establishment of a regime similar to that in Iran is impossible in America that America lacks political freedom. The Commies used to say much the same about America not being free because Commies had no meaningful chance of winning a free election that would establish a Communist President or Congress.

We may have gone as far as we can with the ultra-individualist manner of government that holds that so long as the Right People get whatever they want, that all is well. It is more likely that America goes to something closer to social democracy than anything that we have ever had. If all that mattered was maximal profits, then we would not have so much and so widespread economic distress as we have. We have an epidemic of meth and opiate addiction. Life expectancy among middle-aged white men is falling in much of America.

The suicide rate has risen in America over twenty years, indicating that something is terribly wrong.

https://www.apa.org/monitor/2019/01/numbers

[Marypoza]

(01-28-2020, 05:47 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 04:17 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: I agree, ignoring major problems and shifting problems on others and blaming others for problems doesn't make problems go away. I don't know if you will live long enough to see the carnage and violence as the progressive era of old begins to come to end. I hope not for you sake. I don't have a problem with my retirement plan. I'm an X'er you know. I'd say it's better to be wealthier and more self sufficient than being more dependent like must blues these days. The reds themselves will be fine regardless of the situation because the reds are already committed to taking off themselves/their own so to speak.

The way I read it, there was a progressive era from FDR to LBJ.  The conservative policies dominated between Nixon and at least Trump, crashing America’s greatness.  The impeachment of Trump and the ‘OK Boomer’ meme hint that another progressive time may be coming.  Even if so, it is not here yet.

I do believe the reds are more independent, could survive a bad time cleaner.  On the other hand blues work together better, could make a good time better.  The latter seems more likely.

-- l would argue progressive from Roosevelt 2 Jimmy Carter. Jimmy was the last old school dem Prez.  lnterestingly he backs Bernie, who despite calling himself a democratic socialist is really an old school dem, like from back in the 60s & 70s

[Bob Butler 54]

(01-28-2020, 07:23 PM)Marypoza Wrote: -- l would argue progressive from Roosevelt 2 Jimmy Carter. Jimmy was the last old school dem Prez.  lnterestingly he backs Bernie, who despite calling himself a democratic socialist is really an old school dem, like from back in the 60s & 70s

In philosophy, you could definitely place Carter with the old school Democrats.  In tone, the mood had already shifted.  The Unraveling had already started.  Things like the oil crisis, hostage crisis and national malaise had already begun to hurt the feeling that America could do anything.  It couldn't.

Crises are often preceded by bad presidents that are really indicating how the old values have failed.  You had Hoover before FDR and Buchanan before Lincoln.  Carter almost feels like that too.  What he did just failed, built a sour taste, grew into the lesser version of America that was Reagan.

Nixon had Watergate and the Fall of Saigon.  It seems his election began the train wreck which was the unravelling.  Carter tried to pull us out of it.  Unfortunately he couldn't.

There seems always to be an argument about just where to put turning boundaries and similar events.  Anywhere you put your finger, there are always people with decent argument who will put a finger somewhere else.

[Classic-Xer]

(01-28-2020, 07:23 PM)Marypoza Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 05:47 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 04:17 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: I agree, ignoring major problems and shifting problems on others and blaming others for problems doesn't make problems go away. I don't know if you will live long enough to see the carnage and violence as the progressive era of old begins to come to end. I hope not for you sake. I don't have a problem with my retirement plan. I'm an X'er you know. I'd say it's better to be wealthier and more self sufficient than being more dependent like must blues these days. The reds themselves will be fine regardless of the situation because the reds are already committed to taking off themselves/their own so to speak.

The way I read it, there was a progressive era from FDR to LBJ.  The conservative policies dominated between Nixon and at least Trump, crashing America’s greatness.  The impeachment of Trump and the ‘OK Boomer’ meme hint that another progressive time may be coming.  Even if so, it is not here yet.

I do believe the reds are more independent, could survive a bad time cleaner.  On the other hand blues work together better, could make a good time better.  The latter seems more likely.

-- l would argue progressive from Roosevelt 2 Jimmy Carter. Jimmy was the last old school dem Prez.  lnterestingly he backs Bernie, who despite calling himself a democratic socialist is really an old school dem, like from back in the 60s & 70s

I would extend it to Obama.

[Classic-Xer]

(01-28-2020, 01:38 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Yes, the American right is indeed "pretty much content with sticking to doing things and succeeding it's own way these days." It loves the neo-liberal, trickle-down economics status quo in which they get big tax breaks and are allowed to screw over their customers and workers, and have their prejudices against immigrants and the poor stroked and their fanatical religious "values" lauded. It's all just fine for them. But the rising younger and more diverse people on the left are not satisfied with an economic system that holds them down for no reason. They don't need to be influenced to know they are being screwed, or to know that climate change and gun violence are real issues that need to be dealt with. They are not brainwashed by the false ideologies of the Christian Right, militarism and neo-liberalism. The Left can see the 40-year trend of America downward toward banana republic status on every measurement you can find. They know that adopting an authoritarian system of government led by an unfit, ego-maniacal demagogue is not what America needs.

Dude, right now the liberal side is the side clinging to neo liberal policies and placing road blocks in the way of pro American policies under the guise of racism and so forth.

[pbrower2a]

(01-28-2020, 11:13 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 07:23 PM)Marypoza Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 05:47 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 04:17 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: I agree, ignoring major problems and shifting problems on others and blaming others for problems doesn't make problems go away. I don't know if you will live long enough to see the carnage and violence as the progressive era of old begins to come to end. I hope not for you sake. I don't have a problem with my retirement plan. I'm an X'er you know. I'd say it's better to be wealthier and more self sufficient than being more dependent like must blues these days. The reds themselves will be fine regardless of the situation because the reds are already committed to taking off themselves/their own so to speak.ior in s

The way I read it, there was a progressive era from FDR to LBJ.  The conservative policies dominated between Nixon and at least Trump, crashing America’s greatness.  The impeachment of Trump and the ‘OK Boomer’ meme hint that another progressive time may be coming.  Even if so, it is not here yet.

I do believe the reds are more independent, could survive a bad time cleaner.  On the other hand blues work together better, could make a good time better.  The latter seems more likely.

-- l would argue progressive from Roosevelt 2 Jimmy Carter. Jimmy was the last old school dem Prez.  lnterestingly he backs Bernie, who despite calling himself a democratic socialist is really an old school dem, like from back in the 60s & 70s

I would extend it to Obama.

Obama may have an admiration for the New Deal, but he could not wave some rhetorical version of a magic wand and bring it back. he could at most prepare Americans for an updated version suited to an America in which the original constituency for the New Deal is practically obsolete, and technology and culture no longer fit the 1930's. Obama could at best co-opt Reagan-style rhetoric and Eisenhower-style behavior in support of some much-needed reforms that the Master Class thwarted with deep-pockets support for reactionary causes.

If Obama is to have any role in shaping any new era it will be as a portent laying the intellectual and ideological foundation. Trump will be (according to the Skowronek cycle) an unambiguous demonstration of how not to do things.

[pbrower2a]

(01-28-2020, 11:54 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 01:38 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Yes, the American right is indeed "pretty much content with sticking to doing things and succeeding it's own way these days." It loves the neo-liberal, trickle-down economics status quo in which they get big tax breaks and are allowed to screw over their customers and workers, and have their prejudices against immigrants and the poor stroked and their fanatical religious "values" lauded. It's all just fine for them. But the rising younger and more diverse people on the left are not satisfied with an economic system that holds them down for no reason. They don't need to be influenced to know they are being screwed, or to know that climate change and gun violence are real issues that need to be dealt with. They are not brainwashed by the false ideologies of the Christian Right, militarism and neo-liberalism. The Left can see the 40-year trend of America downward toward banana republic status on every measurement you can find. They know that adopting an authoritarian system of government led by an unfit, ego-maniacal demagogue is not what America needs.

Dude, right now the liberal side is the side clinging to neo liberal policies and placing road blocks in the way of pro American policies under the guise of racism and so forth.

In view of the Reagan ethos, neoliberal economics may have been the best available option in political life. The Hard Right would have been delighted to establish debt bondage if it could have gotten away with such.

[Bob Butler 54]

(01-28-2020, 11:54 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 01:38 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: Yes, the American right is indeed "pretty much content with sticking to doing things and succeeding it's own way these days." It loves the neo-liberal, trickle-down economics status quo in which they get big tax breaks and are allowed to screw over their customers and workers, and have their prejudices against immigrants and the poor stroked and their fanatical religious "values" lauded. It's all just fine for them. But the rising younger and more diverse people on the left are not satisfied with an economic system that holds them down for no reason. They don't need to be influenced to know they are being screwed, or to know that climate change and gun violence are real issues that need to be dealt with. They are not brainwashed by the false ideologies of the Christian Right, militarism and neo-liberalism. The Left can see the 40-year trend of America downward toward banana republic status on every measurement you can find. They know that adopting an authoritarian system of government led by an unfit, ego-maniacal demagogue is not what America needs.

Dude, right now the liberal side is the side clinging to neo liberal policies and placing road blocks in the way of pro American policies under the guise of racism and so forth.

At times I have opposed both Eric and Classic.  This time I am more with Eric.  His comment referred to a lot of policies.  Classic had the same problem as he did with our recent existing exchange, posting something simple, not talking about specific policies.

What are his real policies?  What does he mean by ‘pro American’?

Now I lump Neo-liberalism with the elites and the division of wealth.  I tend to lean more on Elites and division of wealth language in my posts as the words are more descriptive and simple.  However, if you insist on using the Neo-liberal language, in spite of its being similar to liberal, I am generally with Neo-liberal bashing.

As I see it, the Republican Party has always been for the elites.  The Tea Party, not so much.  That is one place where the Tea Party compares favorably with the Republican Establishment.  They are trying to get rid of the traditional Republican linkage giving the elites as large a balance of wealth advantage as possible.

I would prefer to think that Classic leans that way too, but will not speak for him.  He supposedly favors the common people living on the streets.

But the liberals with their attempts at campaign finance reform, with their attempts at accepting many smaller contributions from individuals rather than large ones for corporations, are more on the anti establishment and anti division of wealth side.  I would side with Eric in saying that the liberal side is more with the people, the Establishment Republicans more with the elites.

I also have my problem with Classic’s ‘American’ label.  As most would use the word, it would mean ‘from America’ or ‘identifies with an American heritage’.  As Classic uses the word, it seems to mean ‘people like me’,  For example, Latinos have a heritage from Central and South America.  That makes them American.  However, this seems not to fit Classic’s usage of the word.

Me, the phrase “all men are created equal’ seems to preclude the word.  You should not be prejudiced towards a person according to race or place of origin.  And yet, Classic’s use of ‘American’ seems to exclude Latinos, seems to be based on race,  seems to be racist.  I would prefer to think Classic has a way of tiptoeing around it.

There are three problems I have been fixated on with some conservatives: racism, a pro elite bias, and a fixation on certain groups of people such as Evangelicals as privileged.  Get rid of those three elements, and I could welcome a conservative slant on politics as part of the normal healthy discourse.

Of the three, I would hope Classic, Eric, myself and most could agree that we should be opposed the oversized influence of the elites, and of the perils of racism.  The influence of the Evangelicals in imposing their religious values on those who do not share their core ethics is more controversial.  Anyone here at the moment willing to advocate for the Evangelicals?

But given that Classic has a tendency to oversimplify, to deal in sides rather than policies, in his readiness to attribute false motives and policies to sides he is not on, it becomes hard to tell where he really stands.

Which pro elite policies are liberals supposedly backing?  Is his definition of ‘American’ really racist?  Does he oppose the three questionable policies of favoring elites, racism, and privilege?

On the emigration issue, I will throw out another possible position.  If we are to fight a War on Drugs, we should offer asylum to those who fight for us in that war.  On the other hand, we should not offer asylum claimed on the grounds of our economy being healthier than that of countries further south.  The process of looking at asylum should be quicker, more humane, and in particular not separate parents from children.  Opposed?

[Bob Butler 54]

(01-29-2020, 07:05 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 11:13 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 07:23 PM)Marypoza Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 05:47 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 04:17 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: I agree, ignoring major problems and shifting problems on others and blaming others for problems doesn't make problems go away. I don't know if you will live long enough to see the carnage and violence as the progressive era of old begins to come to end. I hope not for you sake. I don't have a problem with my retirement plan. I'm an X'er you know. I'd say it's better to be wealthier and more self sufficient than being more dependent like must blues these days. The reds themselves will be fine regardless of the situation because the reds are already committed to taking off themselves/their own so to speak.ior in s

The way I read it, there was a progressive era from FDR to LBJ.  The conservative policies dominated between Nixon and at least Trump, crashing America’s greatness.  The impeachment of Trump and the ‘OK Boomer’ meme hint that another progressive time may be coming.  Even if so, it is not here yet.

I do believe the reds are more independent, could survive a bad time cleaner.  On the other hand blues work together better, could make a good time better.  The latter seems more likely.

-- l would argue progressive from Roosevelt 2 Jimmy Carter. Jimmy was the last old school dem Prez.  lnterestingly he backs Bernie, who despite calling himself a democratic socialist is really an old school dem, like from back in the 60s & 70s

I would extend it to Obama.

Obama may have an admiration for the New Deal, but he could not wave some rhetorical version of a magic wand and bring it back. he could at most prepare Americans for an updated version suited to an America in which the original constituency for the New Deal is practically obsolete, and technology and culture no longer fit the 1930's. Obama could at best co-opt Reagan-style rhetoric and Eisenhower-style behavior in support of some much-needed reforms that the Master Class thwarted with deep-pockets support for reactionary causes.

If Obama is to have any role in shaping any new era it will be as a portent laying the intellectual and ideological foundation. Trump will be (according to the Skowronek cycle) an unambiguous demonstration of how not to do things.

I would say the democratic presidents through the see saw unraveling period all had a respect for the New Deal approach and pulled towards restoring America to its past greatness. They all failed. They each may have succeeded at something or another. Cinton 42 tried to balance the budget. Obama passed health care. Yet while they might moderate a little part of the conservative agenda, they might undo a little bit of the damage done by the conservative presidents between, they did not overturn the overall mood of the country. If many of them relieved the US from a disaster of the conservative excesses, the people voted right back to trying to make the unravelling memes work.

Eventually the conservatives will stop trying and we might see another progressive period. Judging from Classic, not yet.

[pbrower2a]

(01-29-2020, 08:28 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote:

(01-29-2020, 07:05 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 11:13 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 07:23 PM)Marypoza Wrote:

(01-28-2020, 05:47 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: The way I read it, there was a progressive era from FDR to LBJ.  The conservative policies dominated between Nixon and at least Trump, crashing America’s greatness.  The impeachment of Trump and the ‘OK Boomer’ meme hint that another progressive time may be coming.  Even if so, it is not here yet.

I do believe the reds are more independent, could survive a bad time cleaner.  On the other hand blues work together better, could make a good time better.  The latter seems more likely.

-- l would argue progressive from Roosevelt 2 Jimmy Carter. Jimmy was the last old school dem Prez.  lnterestingly he backs Bernie, who despite calling himself a democratic socialist is really an old school dem, like from back in the 60s & 70s

I would extend it to Obama.

Obama may have an admiration for the New Deal, but he could not wave some rhetorical version of a magic wand and bring it back. he could at most prepare Americans for an updated version suited to an America in which the original constituency for the New Deal is practically obsolete, and technology and culture no longer fit the 1930's. Obama could at best co-opt Reagan-style rhetoric and Eisenhower-style behavior in support of some much-needed reforms that the Master Class thwarted with deep-pockets support for reactionary causes.

If Obama is to have any role in shaping any new era it will be as a portent laying the intellectual and ideological foundation. Trump will be (according to the Skowronek cycle) an unambiguous demonstration of how not to do things.

I would say the democratic presidents through the see saw unraveling period all had a respect for the New Deal approach and pulled towards restoring America to its past greatness.  They all failed.  They each may have succeeded at something or another.  Cinton 42 tried to balance the budget.  Obama passed health care.  Yet while they might moderate a little part of the conservative agenda, they might undo a little bit of the damage done by the conservative presidents between, they did not overturn the overall mood of the country.  If many of them relieved the US from a disaster of the conservative excesses, the people voted right back to trying to make the unravelling memes work.

Eventually the conservatives will stop trying and we might see another progressive period.  Judging from Classic, not yet.

From another thread:

Quote:pbrower2a

(01-23-2020, 07:26 PM)jleagans Wrote: Great read!

https://medium.com/@mishaley/how-history...04e6ac19bd

Excellent! For those who despair of the offensive, catastrophic Presidency of Donald Trump, this gives hope. 

I see Donald Trump is Jimmy Carter without the intelligence, integrity, moral compass, and personal decency: without those, Jimmy Carter would have been an unspeakable nightmare as President. 




Maybe it is not comfortable to compare Barack Obama to Richard Nixon; if anything I would more likely compare him to Dwight Eisenhower for being similar in temperament and style and having squeaky-clean administrations. Obama proves to have been more of a hawk than Eisenhower -- then again, Osama bin Laden was still an infant when "the torch has been passed to a new generation". It could be the difference between a Civic type who thought wrongly that he could get away with almost anything (Nixon) as long as he got the desired results and a mature Reactive (Obama) who knew that he could get away with practically nothing -- as House and in turn Senate majorities for the other, increasingly-authoritarian Party made clear. That is a generational difference.  

Going back to the establishment of the Constitutional union:




The Founding era may be unclear, but it is safe to say that 

(1) each political era ranges from 32 to 48 years
(2) two of them make a generational cycle out of Howe and Strauss
(3) each political era begins with either great promise (Awakening era) or great threat (Crisis era)
(4) the last leader of the era is a tired or pathological expression of what started the era.  

So Washington establishes the norms of the Republic and John Quincy Adams is as far as it can go before a populist, Jacksonian era that never tolerates a meaningful challenge to the cancer of chattel slavery. Jackson was a colorful populist and James Buchanan tried to keep the Republic from (imploding? exploding?) by appeasing the slave interests (Hey, Northerners -- you can keep your liberal ideas, but you must enforce the reality of slavery by arresting fugitive slaves!) Lincoln won the Civil War and restored the Union by treating the defeated South in as kindly a way as possible; the industrial basis that gave the North a compelling edge in the Civil War fostered the rise of Gilded Age plutocrats who fostered economic and technological progress that those plutocrats arrogated for themselves in a winner-take-all system. By the time of Teddy Roosevelt, America needed to drop its social myopia and its tolerance for bad business (child labor, horrible patent medicines, free-for-all for polluters)... and got the change. Had TR not done that, then maybe Taft would. Theodore Roosevelt's modest reforms petered out with the return of politics of the disastrous Harding-Coolidge-Hoover return to a "New Era" best compared to another Gilded Age with a bit more gilding. That Little Gilded Age ended with something commonplace in the Gilded Age -- a speculative boom that led to the very nasty economic meltdown that always ensues. (Paradoxically FDR took much from the Progressive Era and enhanced it, so he may be more a throwback to Theodore Roosevelt than to Woodrow Wilson... but that is practically a quibble.

The oddity about Nixon seemed that he was more a throwback to Teddy Roosevelt in his agenda than to Gilded Age or New Gilded Age politics. Reagan started America in earnest into the neoliberal ethos in which enrichment of economic elites would become the sole economic purpose while deprecation of the intellect (ensues) -- fine. If one wanted to be a dolt in the Individualist Era, then such was as much an expression of individualism as was indulging oneself like an aristocrat on executive compensation... or having a huge audio-video collection.

If Dubya seems like a telescoping of the three awful Presidencies of Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover into eight years with a costly and inconclusive war thrown in, and Obama seems to have tried to be another FDR... Trump is beyond any question a moral and political disaster. Trump is Ronald Reagan (even down to possible senility) with far more personal cruelty, less regard for legal niceties, more contempt for learning and expertise, and no loyalty except to his own self esteem. Trump has been appeasing some nasty dictators overseas much as Fillmore, Pierce, and Buchanan appeased the slave-owning planters; I do not see that going well. 

With the exception of McKinley (who came close to being a one-term President, if through assassination instead of electoral defeat), the last Presidents in these cycles are one-term Presidents, Presidents associated with something tired (J Q Adams, Carter), unworkable (Buchanan, Hoover) or corrupt (Trump). Corruption and incompetence on the scale of Donald Trump is rare at the federal level in America; even at the state level it is not good for staying in office. We have no precedent for Trump for his scale of corruption, cruelty, and incompetence. 

Maybe I lack the imagination to see how Trump can redeem himself and establish himself as a pattern for the next forty or so years... but it is now about time for a President who can break some of the objectionable patterns of American life, make life good for more Americans, and create a consensus that completely repudiates what the Individualist Era became -- starting with a flawed, if transformational President (Reagan) and ending with a sick parody (Trump) of the transformational President of the era. America will want an antithesis of Trump very soon if not already. The generational constellation is ill suited for any maintenance of exploitative individualism of the Trump style.

If I follow the thread -- both Bill Clinton and Barack Obama were in no position in which to shake things up politically. The individualist, profits-first ethos was extremely strong. Clinton could do little more than piecemeal change to the overall pattern, and Obama tried to get a national health-care system  but that is all that they got. Foreign policy? Both were orthodox, so neither changed anything -- both fully endorsed the Bush 41 Presidency as a model for foreign policy for a lack of viable alternatives, which was safer than what we now have. (If anything, Obama is the conservative on foreign policy and Trump is a dangerous radical. 

Trump, according to this model, is an unmitigated disaster -- but nearly inevitable. He may have gotten a worse result than Marco Rubio, John Kasich, Jeb Bush, Mitt Romney, or Ted Cruz -- but any Republican elected in 2016 was going to offer at best a tired version of the Reagan agenda. Hillary Clinton might have extended the Obama 'session' four years only to be defeated in 2020 for a Republican to win the Presidency and have a solid hold on the House and Senate at least in 2021 and 2022 just as things go catastrophically wrong -- such as a 1929-style crash. 

It could be that the bigger a disaster that President Trump is, the more ready Americans will be for a sharp change at the least in domestic policy and economic patterns. The idea that nothing matters except the power, indulgence, and gain of economics elites leaves pointless hardships for most -- at the time in which Millennial parents might accept poverty as a necessary reality for creating capital but supreme cruelty to the children that they cherish. Trump is the downer, the hangover, of the Individualist Age.  It is better to give up excessive drinking because of hangovers than because of cirrhosis...  

The past greatness of America was that anyone who worked diligently and with integrity could live well. Although America experiencing a catching-up by other countries, things over the last forty years or so have gotten worse for most people, especially in contrast to Silent or first-wave Boomer parents. Most of us are making the sacrifices necessary for economic 'greatness' without getting the rewards. For someone who has spend almost his entire adult life in the Individualist era (the past 3T and the current 4T), elderhood could get very bleak. Poverty in a society that measures human character solely by his spending power is a nightmare. No technological fix can solve that. If I could live up to the economic promise that I thought that I had in the late 1970's, I could live with the technology and most of the economic patterns (like paying high retail for stuff) of the 1950's.  No microwave ovens, no personal computers, early stereo, vinyl discs? Better those than poverty. (OK, some of the medical technologies and the absence of leaded gasoline, as well as Interstate highways, are good things -- and minority rights, better treatment of women and the handicapped, and LGBT rights are not to be abandoned; they are simply right.   The greatness of America isn't castles and palaces of the elites; it is instead that workers are not obliged to live like livestock on behalf of exploiters such as those aristocrats who owned the castles and palaces due to their exploitation of the masses.