Grey Champions and the Election of 2016

[Kinser79]

(05-05-2016, 07:50 AM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: First, I'd agree that the best tool for identifying a GC is 20 20 hindsight.

It also depends on what one understands the GC to be.  I'm more concerned with the values aspect of turning theory than most.  Thus, I look for someone who best personifies the values that can resolve the crisis issues.  Samples might include Lincoln for Union and against slavery while FDR aligned the government to help the working man, and made the US a superpower to deter the expansion of tyrannical autocratic powers.

So, what are the great issues facing us this crisis?

1. Domestic division of wealth and power.  The GOP has been the party of the wealthy, and I haven't seen that Trump intends to change this.  This makes him seem more part of the problem than part of the answer.
   
2. Dysfunctional democracy.  The New Deal focus on using government to aid the working man has been diminished by the Reagan push for small government that doesn't interfere with big business.  This is in many ways the same as 1, above.  Trump is attracting the Reagan believers rather than diminishing the influence of the Reagan memes.  Again, he's part of the problem.
   
3. Foreign division of wealth and power leading to immigration problems.  Trump's solution, make the poor countries build walls to protect the wealthy countries, isn't real.
   
4. Foreign dysfunctional democracy.  We have failed states in the Middle East and autocratic regimes pushing to use military force to create economic advantage.  I haven't seen much in the way of a real solution from Trump here, let alone Trump personifying the values necessary for solution.  Hey, he's Putin's pal.
   
5. Global Warming might get an honorable mention, but it isn't clear this is going to be an issue resolved in this crisis period.
   

So color me dubious.  I'd ask what the crisis problems are, and who looks like they might represent the values necessary to solve the problems.  I know my identification of the problems won't be the same as others, but that's what I'd look for in a GC.

Now, I know in the past you have looked for Trump as president as he is most apt to provoke a communist revolution.  I see this as unlikely, though more likely than Trump as a true GC.

It will take a while to figure out how to use the quoting function here.  So bear with me if the post seems disjointed.

I would say that over all the Grey Champion is a title given, after the fact, to the leader or leaders of a 4T who implement the new strategy on which the success or failure of the 4T depends.

Quote:

1. Domestic division of wealth and power.  The GOP has been the party of the wealthy, and I haven't seen that Trump intends to change this.  This makes him seem more part of the problem than part of the answer.
   

I don't think that that aspect of the GOP can be changed.  The wealthy have been a sub-set of the GOP base since the Guilded Age, and so long as the GOP continues that will likely remain the case.  That being said, I will say that breaking with the Washington Consensus around so-called free trade, globalism, and massive importation of cheap labor is the very thing that Trump opposes.  This is just one of the angles of attack used by the GOP Establishment against Daddy.

Quote:Dysfunctional democracy.  The New Deal focus on using government to aid the working man has been diminished by the Reagan push for small government that doesn't interfere with big business.  This is in many ways the same as 1, above.  Trump is attracting the Reagan believers rather than diminishing the influence of the Reagan memes.  Again, he's part of the problem.

Actually if you listen to Trump he has called for such things as universal health care, greater investments in education and infrastructure.  All planks he shares with none other than Bernie Sanders.  Granted, the reasons behind his support of pretty much the same thing as Sanders is different.  It would be ludicrous to think otherwise, but it is there.

As for the dysfunctional democracy aspect the only solution is either a constitutional amendment to undo Citizens United, or a constitutional convention.  I'd support either.  As for Daddy himself, I've heard over and over among Trump circles (where I've been spending more time since Shillary is going to be anointed the Dem Nominee) one refrain over and over...that is unlike everyone else (except perhaps Sanders) he simply can't be bought.

Quote:

1. Foreign division of wealth and power leading to immigration problems.  Trump's solution, make the poor countries build walls to protect the wealthy countries, isn't real.
   

I think the line about making Mexico pay for the wall is a throw-away.  Would we seriously want the Mexicans building our border wall?  Sounds like an invitation to sabotage.  That being said having been to Mexico quite recently  (how the BF and I got roped into being chaperones on a school trip escapes me--maybe it is we both speak fluent Spanish [although be it with Cuban accent in my case, because I learned it from Cubans]) I can say that Mexico while being poorer than the US is clearly a low level 1st world country these days.

That being said the division of wealth and power internationally is the result of and a consequence of the Washington Consensus and their push for so-called free trade.  The very thing that Trump is campaigning against.

Quote:Foreign dysfunctional democracy.  We have failed states in the Middle East and autocratic regimes pushing to use military force to create economic advantage.  I haven't seen much in the way of a real solution from Trump here, let alone Trump personifying the values necessary for solution.  Hey, he's Putin's pal.

I agree that many states in the Middle East are failed.  It should also be remembered that the push to break them to start with (Seriously Iraq was a hell hole but it wasn't a failed state under Saddam) came from the Neo-Cons of which Hillary Clinton is one of the biggest. 

From Daddy we have heard on the foreign affairs front that he wishes to re-negotiate our alliances, go to Europe sometime they really do resent the US Military Presence there and as a consequence the US in general.  The pull back from the hundreds of bases that cost a fortune to defend not our homeland, but the homelands of other people, many of which openly resent us.

As for Putin, the simple fact is Russia is a major country, one with a nuclear arsenal, and enough oil and gas to cut off Europe at anytime freezing them out in the winter or making them swelter in the summer.  The simple fact is that poking a bear is generally not a good idea--especially not for a bunch of Neo-Nazis in Ukraine which is to Russia what Texas is to the US.

His lines on foreign affairs stretch back to the 1980s.  He's been consistent, trade with everyone, defend the country, and don't go looking for trouble.  Someone else had the same view of foreign affairs too...his name was George Washington.

Quote:Global Warming might get an honorable mention, but it isn't clear this is going to be an issue resolved in this crisis period.

I think climate change (the more current and more scientifically accurate term) is a major issue this 4T but I don't think it will be addressed.  Honestly I don't think even if a crash program of Thorium reactors and solar and wind power was implemented much could be done to stop it.  Too much carbon has already been put up into the atmosphere and without some sort of new fantastic technology it will take several centuries at least for the planet to scrub the CO2 out itself and that is if we stopped burning everything today.  That cake is already baked I'm afraid.