US Politics: Redefining National Security

[Kalbear]

Just now, Ran said:

Doesn't this mean the opposite? That the Republicans in Congress are _more_ likely to be willing to dump Trump and survive the hit with some portion of the base, not less?

I don't see how. This values are saying that the people most likely to vote in the primaries are 90%+ in favor of Trump so far. So if you go against Trump, you're risking all of those people voting for someone else who is more in favor of Trump. 

Which Trump has already shown willingness to work towards, even with huge longshots like the guy opposing Ryan earlier last year.

Now, it's possible that they would lose in the general being super extremist losers - this happened a couple times in 2014, IIRC, after tea partiers primaried good opponents and ended up being complete asshats - but in general the gerrymandered districts that are 60% Republican voters are not going to vote Democrat under essentially any circumstances. 

[Mindwalker]

1 minute ago, Chaircat Meow said:

The suggestion isn't that she'd decide not to receive him but the government would go back on its offer of a state visit.

You are right; sorry, I misread.

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

 Not sure if this was posted up yet or not. Trial Balloon for a Coup? by Yonatan Zunger

https://medium.com/@yonatanzunger/trial-balloon-for-a-coup-e024990891d5#.s6cs1srtv

 

 

/Somewhat alarmist methinks, but it makes some interesting points...

[Altherion]

12 hours ago, mormont said:

This is what you wish had happened, but voting patterns show no evidence that it is what happened.

I'm not sure what you mean. Note that I'm not saying Trump ran on an effectively Marxist platform or the majority of his followers even understood the Law of Accumulation and its consequences for the country. However, Trump and his team did see that inequality had increased so much (or, at any rate, that people in the Rust Belt and similar areas were so miserable) that it was possible to win by shattering the precepts of political correctness and appealing to nativism, nationalism, etc. Somebody like Trump could never have won if the economy was similar to, say, that of the 1950s.

11 hours ago, Jo498 said:

The Marxist explanation is very plausible (and so are some reasons why it cannot be accepted by the establishment, including what passes for "left") but this situation has been the case more or less for about two decades or so, so it is too unspecific to explain Trump's success.

There is always a stochastic element to historical changes; a powder keg can sit there for a while waiting for some spark to light it up. In the US, this spark might have been the Great Recession, but the elites found somebody who looked an awful lot like he could rein in Wall Street... right up until he was elected and utterly betrayed any such promise. This bought them 4 years after which they pushed through an alternative who could justifiably be nicknamed Avatar of the One Percent which bought them another 4 years... and then their luck finally ran out.

11 hours ago, Rippounet said:

I'm sorry, my English must be poor today or my eyes must be tricking me, or my brain not functioning well...
Are you saying that there's Trump policies designed to decrease inequality? Could you elaborate/specify please?

If he is to be successful, he needs either decreased inequality or increased economic growth. It's possible to have increased inequality, but then the growth has to be truly huge to compensate. His policies appear to be aiming at both with the caveat that they're specific to the US.

For example, consider the refugees and immigration in general. Unless there's an exceptional situation wherein additional available labor fuels the need for yet more labor (this sometimes happens in rapidly growing economies, but it's certainly not the case in ours), increasing the labor pool via immigration general lowers the wages in the sectors where the immigrants will compete. Furthermore, if the refugees do not share the language of the native population, they require resources in the form of translators, specialized teachers in schools, etc. all of which diverts already limited resources from the working and middle classes of the communities.

Similarly, outsourcing increases the labor pool and while it does not impose additional costs on public infrastructure such as schools, it still diverts resources from American communities because the money will not be spent in the US. For instance, an American worker employed by a large corporation goes to lunch and buys a sandwich from an American vendor. The vendor is effectively being paid by the corporation through the worker. If, instead, the work is done by a third-world worker, the latter will naturally buy lunch from the local vendor and Americans are unlikely to ever see that money again.

Trump's war on both of these is battling against inequality in the US. Of course, it is not against global inequality as the refugees and third-world workers are both significantly worse off if they're denied entry or jobs, but it is against inequality at home and Trump was honest about that (hence "America first").

[mormont]

5 minutes ago, Altherion said:

I'm not sure what you mean.

It's very simple, and we have been through it before. The groups who supported Trump most strongly are not the groups who suffered most from inequality. The groups who suffer most from inequality (eg black women) supported Clinton very strongly. The correlation between suffering from inequality, and voting for Trump, is at best weak, if not nonexistent. This was not a result caused by economic factors.

[Kalbear]

4 minutes ago, Altherion said:

I'm not sure what you mean. Note that I'm not saying Trump ran on an effectively Marxist platform or the majority of his followers even understood the Law of Accumulation and its consequences for the country. However, Trump and his team did see that inequality had increased so much (or, at any rate, that people in the Rust Belt and similar areas were so miserable) that it was possible to win by shattering the precepts of political correctness and appealing to nativism, nationalism, etc. Somebody like Trump could never have won if the economy was similar to, say, that of the 1950s.

You do know that McCarthyism was a big  deal in the 50s, right? So was massive civil rights violations and Jim Crow laws? You're also assuming that prosperity was the reason that, say, Goldwater lost, instead of all sorts of other things. Again, this is precisely the point stated against you - you're assuming your position is the reason that things happened the way they did.

4 minutes ago, Altherion said:

If he is to be successful, he needs either decreased inequality or increased economic growth. It's possible to have increased inequality, but then the growth has to be truly huge to compensate. His policies appear to be aiming at both with the caveat that they're specific to the US.

Depends greatly on 'success'. He doesn't need either of those things to win a second term. Or a third, for that matter. As to his policies aiming at both, how precisely does repealing health care help either inequality or growth (especially given that the health industry actually did pretty well under the ACA)? 

4 minutes ago, Altherion said:

For example, consider the refugees and immigration in general. Unless there's an exceptional situation wherein additional available labor fuels the need for yet more labor (this sometimes happens in rapidly growing economies, but it's certainly not the case in ours), increasing the labor pool via immigration general lowers the wages in the sectors where the immigrants will compete.

The tech industry begs heavily to differ. As do most economics professors and researchers, who indicate that without exception immigration increases overall wealth of everyone simply because of larger scales and more ability to do more things. As an example, increasing the cost of growing food in the US by restricting migrant workers will have a net deleterious effect on the entire economy in every single way - farms will get less money, people will spend less more on food and less on other things, more imports will be done as the food is cheaper elsewhere, more transportation costs from international shipments will arise, etc. Your idea is true when you have a full employment capacity as we did in the 90s. We don't have that now. 

4 minutes ago, Altherion said:

Trump's war on both of these is battling against inequality in the US. Of course, it is not against global inequality as the refugees and third-world workers are both significantly worse off if they're denied entry or jobs, but it is against inequality at home and Trump was honest about that (hence "America first").

What, precisely, has Trump done so far to indicate that he is at war with either policy? 

[Mlle. Zabzie]

I've been trying to get my news from the WSJ as much as possible.  Finding the following "top headlines" interesting:

1.  "The Markets Don't Believe in Trump for the long Term"

2.  "Rep. Price Got Privileged Offer on Biomedical Stock, Company Says"

3.  "Trump Blames Protests, Delta, Sen. Schumer for Airport Chaos"

4.  "State Department Draft Cable Protests Trump Immigration Ban"

The other top 5 headline was about the Dow losing 123 points.

Of course, the #1 opinion article is "How Liberals Killed the Freedom of Movement".  LOL.  

 

[Seli]

2 hours ago, Mindwalker said:

But high risk countries - you know, where IS terrorists really come from (Saudi Arabia, Lebanon) and/ or who fund the IS (Saudi-Arabia) - are not banned. Maybe they don't know that.

Of course if Trump was really serious about being concerned about terrorists he probably ought to have banned countries like France, Belgium, Netherlands, Germany. Somehow I don't see that happening quite yet.

 

[IheartIheartTesla]

I see Trump's latest EO about regulation is getting little attention. Probably because on the face of it, it appears to be the most benign...

As per usual, it is vaguely worded and can probably be easily circumvented by having one long-ass regulation instead of two shorter ones.

[Aemon Stark]

57 minutes ago, Crazy Cat Lady in Training said:

Apparently there was only one shooter at the mosque in Quebec. And, surprise surprise, he's a Trump supporter.

This is in French but there is a translate option.

http://www.journaldequebec.com/2017/01/29/des-coups-de-feu-dans-un-mosquee-de-sainte-foy

 

So typical socially-isolated type who probably spent more time online trolling than interacting with real people? 

Re Altherion: Exactly what part of Trump's actual policies (let alone his prior business experience) suggest he will rein in outsourcing? His best qualifications amount to "how to recover from repeated bankruptcies with tax evasion/avoidance, fucking over employees, litigating while ignoring contracts, and inventing an asshole reality-TV show persona". 

[Fragile Bird]

1 hour ago, Savannah said:

Just some basics about the area from wikipedia, related to Fragile Birds idea of dismantling it,

Etc etc

My comment was in reaction to your snark about Germany taking back the base. The base does not "belong" to the US, it's located in a foreign country with that country's permission. Your response was, well then, the Germans won't have to buy the land, implying they would have to buy the base.

I have no idea what the agreement is between Germany and the US, but in general leasehold improvements belong to the landlord, not the tenant. Their lease probably says if the US abandons it (and if Trump says fuck NATO, we're leaving, I'd say they were abandoning it) the base belongs to Germany.

And I'm saying Germany should have the right to order the USA clear it off, if they so desire. There's probably large, badly polluted sections filled with dumped oil and aviation fuel and munitions, typical of military bases. The US had bases in northern Canada as part of the early anti-USSR defence systems and when they packed up and left they also left behind toxic chemicals, dumped fuel, used equipment and all kinds of other toxic souvenirs of their stay, which we have been left to deal with.

That swamp they filled in is probably a toxic waste dump.

[Kalbear]

3 minutes ago, IheartIheartTesla said:

I see Trump's latest EO about regulation is getting little attention. Probably because on the face of it, it appears to be the most benign...

As per usual, it is vaguely worded and can probably be easily circumvented by having one long-ass regulation instead of two shorter ones.

There's another problem here, which is the 'as authorized by law'. As most regulations are actually implementations based on laws (such as the Clean Air Act) you can't just repeal two regulations. 

Which is fine, because all they have to do is pick two regulations to advise to repeal. They don't have to repeal them.

[Kalbear]

Oh yeah, that ISIS thing - I'm sure this is fine.

Quote

 

Isis-friendly channels on the Telegram messaging service described the ban as “blessed”, echoing how the US 2003 invasion of Iraq was called a “blessed invasion” for reinvigorating anti-US sentiment in the region.

 

One user greeted the news of the “Muslim ban” as “the best caller to Islam”, hoping it will draw Muslim Americans to their cause. 

Several posts suggested that the prediction of Anwar al-Awlaki – a US-born al Qaeda leader killed in Yemen in 2011 – that “the West would eventually turn against its Muslim citizens” was coming true.

 

 

[Fragile Bird]

1 hour ago, Dr. Pepper said:

Holy fuck. I can't I can't I can't.

 

They will pass a law with some kind of grotesque title like "The Strengthening and Protection of American Values Act".

[Datepalm]

1 hour ago, mormont said:

So today's nonsense from Sean Spicer: 'by and large' Trump has been 'praised' for not referencing Jewish people in his Holocaust Memorial day statement. Also, it would be 'wrong' to assume that five year olds aren't a threat to America.

Good day at the office.

Did see a list somewhere pointing out that more people are killed in the USA every year by 'armed toddlers' (dear god, there's two words that should never go together) than by terror by illegal immigrants from those 7 countries. So I suppose they're being consistent.

Do y'all really think that Trump (et al) are genuinely trying to draw lines to infuriate resistance in order to clamp down on civil rights? I'm not saying it seems like they wouldn't - I think the Trump administration is turning out every bit as scary as the very worst case predictions so far, and more nakedly racist and repressive than anyone thought political norms would allow for today - but rather that it seems to me like they're possibly too stupid and disorganized to think that far ahead, and more strongly, that this is simply what they want to do. They're pushing towards a muslim ban and planning on passing anti-LGBT legislation because they're homophobes and islamophbes and thats what they want to see in the world, with extra doses of humiliation and pain for people they don't like where they can find room for it. Getting huge, angry protests they can declare martial law on will just be the icing on the cake.

[Kalbear]

Just now, Fragile Bird said:

They will pass a law with some kind of grotesque title like "The Strengthening and Protection of American Values Act".

The law is called 'First amendment Defense Act', which trump has stated he'll sign into law if it gets voted on again. What he's proposing as an XO is unclear, though likely a similar vein but for the agencies that he runs.

[Commodore]

1 hour ago, Kalbear said:

So @Commodore, are you in favor of not allowing 5 year olds in to the US as a refugee? That's what Spicer is advocating.

 

the parent/guardian would fall under the same temporary freeze in entries as other adults

[Mindwalker]

19 minutes ago, Seli said:

Of course if Trump was really serious about being concerned about terrorists he probably ought to have banned countries like France, Belgium, Netherlands, Germany. Somehow I don't see that happening quite yet.

 

I know.

[Kalbear]

1 minute ago, Commodore said:

the parent/guardian would fall under the same temporary freeze in entries as other adults

Sorry, that's not what was asked. Spicer said that you have to make sure that you vet these 5 year olds carefully and can't assume just because they're 5 that they aren't dangerous. They can - and often are - traveling alone. 

Are you cool with banning their entry and keeping them detained in an airport for up to 90 days?

[Week]

Just saw this as well - any credence for what is being said here?