Generational Dynamics World View

[pbrower2a]

With the extensive privatization (repudiation of the collective economy that was a failure) and practically no welfare state, China is more capitalist than many advanced western societies. Because of the heavy role of the military it is less capitalist than such an analogue of the USA in the 1920s.

I interpret Donald Trump's "Make America Great Again" as a return to most of the norms of the 1920s -- no welfare state, no concern for the environment except for profits that can be extracted from it, much higher inequality of income, weak-to-nonexistent unions, ess reliance upon education, bosses fully in control of employees, and no welfare state. He can't shrink the military, and he would not dare bring back Jim Crow. Obviously he can't undo the technological improvements from then.

This is what I expect from someone whose behavior resembles that of medieval nobility -- someone with an insatiable appetite for indulgence, a despotic attitude toward subordinates, an unromantic and exploitative view of women or girls, a contempt for formal learning, and a quick temper (a/k/a "short fuse"). His type used to dominate the Western World (including Russia until 1917). This type went down in revolutions or aligned itself with fascism in the 1930s and 1940s only to fall with fascism to the Soviet Army. Trump is an anomaly in most of the West, and he is beginning to look like such in the USA. He is not the normal conservative.

Addendum:

Character matters greatly in any leadership. Consider the expenditure that the federal government puts into a cadet at the Service academies, and what it expects of a cadet. The Army. Navy, and Air Force have their cultures in the officer corps befitting the purposes of hose services. Figuring that the armed forces can be the difference between annexing territory and losing it, maintaining independence and losing it, and that war is the most costly of activities in critical times (that is, Crisis eras) it is best that officers from the Lieutenant or Ensign to the top General and Admiral of the time be competent, loyal, and ethical. That is character. The Academies select cadets carefully and then do everything possible to instill character beyond what the cadet comes in with. Any officer can be in a critical position in battle, whether in a skirmish or a major campaign depending on rank.

Maybe the needs of combat are not relevant to political life, commerce, or the professions -- but all of them require some minimum standard of character. It should be obvious by now that those who lead the leaders need to weed people out for themselves alone before those people can advance through an organization or have responsibilities, failure at which can have grievous consequences, toward assets and people. I don't know if there is an 'embezzler' profile, but if someone shows signs of being an embezzler you do not want him as an accountant. K-12 teaching may not be the most respected profession that you think of, but there are some people that you do not want near a classroom -- like those with hot tempers, those who get too far from a lesson plan, and those who would exploit children or expose them to age-inappropriate behavior. I've been there as a sub, and I try to keep the classroom 'rated G'. You may be surprised that I have used a marginally-vile word (specifically "Damn!") in any semblance of anger. Circumstances: I had a student on the brink of expulsion, and he disrupted the class. That usually takes more than one, but his fellow students were trying to get him to stop, and that made things only worse. I told those students not to even talk back to him, and he kept acting up. I promptly made clear what situation he was in and issued sanctions appropriate for the situation. As a sub, I expect that students will talk a little more than they might with a regular teacher, but I made clear that he was not to say anything without my permission and that he could agree or face consequences. I think that he had used a not-so-marginal word, but I couldn't connect it to him. He mocked what I said, and for that I referred him to the principal's office. He was expelled for the rest of the school year, and he flunked every class and had to repeat seventh grade. He took a file of classwork from the previous hour, spat upon it, and emptied the file into the waste basket. That's when I said "Damn!"

But that is a middle-school classroom. I have said much about President Trump that you may consider harsh, but that is about behavior below my expectations of myself and of people over whom I have responsibility. This is not about ideology. A liberal Democrat who pulled the shenanigans that President Trump does would be a disaster.

Obviously there is no book entitled "How to Be President"; I look at some of the stuff that President Trump does and think "I would never do that". I wouldn't bait the mercurial tyrant in charge in North Korea. I would never tweet opinions as he does, as those have been the source of almost all my gaffes. I would put anything that I say publicly to the critical eye of someone capable of telling me that I need to change it to avoid ambiguity, just as an author expects an editor to check material before it is published. If I were to do something outside the norms for 44 other Presidents I would want an advisor capable of telling me that such is unwise. Yes, I can get away with saying derogatory things about people by twisting their names, as in "Harvey Swinestein" for the disgraced movie mogul, on the web. But the President cannot get away with such. Whatever faults I might have and whatever tendencies I have I would try to be better than those. I know as well as anyone that my first instinct is not invariably the best.

If I had any economic interests, I would make sure that those would not show any evidence of leading me to certain decisions. Surely I would be looking at th e history of the United States through the Presidency to inform me on what to do and what not to do. No, that might not be enough to have an adequate Presidency.

Of course that is cheap on my part. I never went into politics. After all, I would have to go up the political chain, with the US Senate or the Governorship of a State