Do they not teach ethics in B-School? Part Boogaloo (Open Thread!)

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by Ugh

Seriously, WTF?  I understand many businesses seem to think anything that keeps them from making as much $$ as possible is illegitimate and/or a threat to capitalism/apple pie/mom, but ISTM complying with the law/regulation while trying to get things changed – while problematic for many reasons – would be the prudent course for business owners/managers.  Instead, it appears actively violating the law while covering your tracks and/or deceiving authorities is often chosen.  And who are these in-house lawyers blessing all this stuff – although I suppose sometimes they are circumvented.

I wonder if that this case and the VW emissions cheating was done with software somehow makes it less "real."  That is, because it's the software doing the work of deceiving/cheating it seems more okay than if, e.g., the owner/managers had to personally lie to government officials.  

Anyways, I was thinking of drafting a longer post on how anyone who thinks healthcare costs could be brought under control by somehow incentivizing "healthcare consumers" to make choices based on prices is nuts, based on recent personal experience, but that was going to be too much work for a Friday.

Instead – OPEN THREAD!  

Anyone going to see Logan this weekend?

402 thoughts on “Do they not teach ethics in B-School? Part Boogaloo (Open Thread!)”

  1. I think what happens is that business schools go on at great length about the wonders of the market. And, especially, about how brilliant businessmen are. With the result that their graduates think they are so much smarter than government employees that nobody will ever catch them. Because they are just way too clever.
    It must be a bit of a shock to them when that turns out to be wrong. But maybe they just chalk it up to bad luck….

  2. Another point of view:
    […]
    What’s fascinating about the story is how it fails to identify a single person victimized by the Greyball tool other than the authorities who are unable to operate their stings. Meanwhile, as the story     does note, it’s the Uber drivers who faced harassment and had their cars impounded or ticketed by authorities, which Uber then had to reimburse. And in other countries, Uber drivers (and passengers) had to worry about actual physical attacks from workers in the entrenched taxi cartels.
    […]
    What Do You Call a Tool to Help Uber Avoid Gov’t Stings? A Good Start.: Company used a secret method of getting around regulators trying to shut them down. If only the rest of us were so lucky.

  3. Maybe the are assuming that under Republican control there will be no enforcement of rules or standards aor anything else.

  5. I don’t understand Reason’s point of view.
    Wasn’t Uber violating the law in Portland? OK, Reason thinks it’s an unwise law, but this hardly seems like a situation that justifies civil disobedience.

  6. The salient feature of “civil disobedience” is that you break the law, publicly, and take the punishment for having done so. (Or, if you think the law was not only unwise but unconstitutional, fight it in court.)
    Hiding the fact that you were breaking the law . . . doesn’t qualify as civil disobedience.

  7. It seems to me that the customers who think they have an account with uber but secretly do not have an action for fraud.

  8. Corporations want to have the rights and privileges of persons, but they do not want any of the obligations and responsibilities that come with personhood.
    Or, more accurately, that is what their owners and managers do and do not want for them.
    It doesn’t work.

  9. Corporations want to have the rights and privileges of persons, but they do not want any of the obligations and responsibilities that come with personhood.
    This just sounds so, so much like teenagers’ view of adulthood: all about the benefits; nothing about the costs.
    Except that (most) teenagers eventually grow up. And somehow I don’t see a corporation doing so.

  10. Huh, they came up with a real world version of hellbanning. That seems like a clever idea if you’re targeting thugs beating up your drivers but downright criminal if you’re targeting LEOs.
    I’ve been working for big silicone valley tech companies for a while (most of you use them every day) and that means I’ve had to do time in the valley. I…do not like the valley. Tech culture in the valley is permeated with bullshit (yes, much more so than NYC or Boston). And where normal engineers have professional ethics, many valley engineers have this bizarre fusion of Ayn Rand and nanometer deep hipster faux Buddhism (a la Steve Jobs). Not all of them, but it is definitely more common than outside the valley.
    One thing I’ve seen that I think might be at work at Uber is that some companies have a siege mentality. They’re convinced that everyone on the outside who critiques them doesn’t understand how they’re changing the world for the better and must be evil. There’s no possible reason for critique except evil. Soon enough, it is not just critics on the outside who are evil…that makes it really hard for folks on the inside who see ethical problems from doing anything about them.
    I went to engineering school and both my parents were engineers. I learned about professional ethics at the kitchen table as well as at school. But when I brought up an ethical concern with my colleagues at a big valley tech company, one of them, a math postdoc literally said “oh, we can’t think about stuff like that…I mean, where do you draw the line? cell phone mineral extraction is an ethical nightmare!”. Which, fair enough, it is. But the existence of some ethical problems is not a license to ignore all others! At school, the engineering departments taught ethics and the math department didn’t; a lot of the “engineers” writing code in the valley are math majors or folks otherwise disconnected from the culture and practice of engineering. No one has explained to them that they have broader responsibilities to society beyond doing what they’re told — they are an army of mercs, not unlike the wall street quants who come up with clever ways to blow up the economy or impoverish poor people.

  12. Just wanna say, besides where you been turbulence, that “this bizarre fusion of Ayn Rand and nanometer deep hipster faux Buddhism (a la Steve Jobs)”, I will hold as aspirational for the next time I want to nail something at OBWI.

  15. Great stuff, but I don’t think I’m alone when I want to ask Turbulence where this “silicone valley” is located.
    Near the Gran Tetons, perhaps?
    Okay, maybe I am alone in wanting to ask.

  16. From my twitter feed:
    The premise was cruelty. The ideology is cruelty. The big philosophical underpinning is cruelty. The policy is cruelty. The point is cruelty.
    I think that sums up the approach of Stephen Miller and Steve Bannon to governing pretty well.

  17. That reason piece is quite something. Several euphemisms for breaking the law are employed, it purports to know “the perspective of the lives of ordinary people,” it says the NYTimes story didn’t identify anyone “victimized” by the tool and yet notes the tool was designed to “trick the user into wasting time”, bemoans that when the uber drivers were caught violating the law they were punished and poor uber “had” to reimburse them.
    IMHO if reason wanted to make the reasonable underlying point that perhaps we should be cautious that regulators aren’t in league with the “taxi cartels” (cartel? really?) to inhibit competition it could have done so without the snotty condescending “businesses breaking the law is great!” libertarianism bent. But then, it wouldn’t be reason.

  20. It’s a bit mystifying. Why bother to wiretap Trump, when you can just give him a Twitter account?
    But I suppose if the motivation is just to drum up outrage, it doesn’t actually need to make any sense….

  21. As someone noted, if they wired tapped Trump, that meant they convinced a federal judge that they had probable cause to believe he was a criminal or an agent of a foreign power (or both). Of course, Trump probably thinks POTUS can order up wiretaps of whoever he wants.
    This from TPM was sly:
    Trump capped off his busy morning of tweets with a knock on Arnold Schwarzenegger, who announced Friday that he was leaving the “Celebrity Apprentice.”
    “busy morning of tweets” hah! At the Mar-a-Lago no less.
    This, also, too.

  22. Today’s tweets seem to me like an attempted distraction from the embarrassing events around Sessions at the end of the week. Which raises a rather disturbing thought.
    Suppose, strictly for the sake of discussion, that there actually is something seriously embarrassing (never mind criminal) in the Trump relationship with Russia. What do you suppose would be his response when it got close to coming out?
    Terrorist attack, to get the country to rally ’round? Possible. Although someone in the habit of looking ahead might consider that it would be a strictly temporary bandaid. (Unless you generated a succession of them….)
    Start a war? Or at least a serious threat of one. Maybe pick out one of the rocks in the South China Sea that has been expanded to house a base.
    Carpet bomb it back to an uninhabited rock! Shows how macho we can be, and increases tensions with China — can’t have an impeachment when the country is under threat of attack like that.
    Would Trump actually do something like that IF he felt personally threatened? You be the judge.

  23. “As someone noted, if they wired tapped Trump, that meant they convinced a federal judge that they had probable cause to believe he was a criminal or an agent of a foreign power (or both).”
    This is just as factual as his crap. So when you say this every Trump supporter goes, see they just make shit up. I read both sides this morning and just shrugged. It is perfectly clear that Obama could have gotten any wiretap put in place he wanted, no judge would have had to be involved. And Trump could just be making shit up.
    It is also clear from multiple sources that Obamas people were feeding stuff to the press/agencies to “protect it from being squashed when Trump gained office”. Which just lends more credence to the claims that he was actively trying to create issues for Trump. So everyone believes either side of this they started on.
    I couldn’t possibly know from any actual evidence.

  24. I wonder if that this case and the VW emissions cheating was done with software somehow makes it less “real.”

    That’s part of the goal. Outsourcing evil is fundamental to modern capitalism. If you have half a dozen entities involved, each one can pretend it’s “just doing it’s job” or “doing what it has to to survive”.

  28. I visit OBWI to keep abreast of current events.
    I’m sure Marty agrees with me that it’s nice to see some facts.

  29. I have never been a great fan of Uber, Uber management or Jeff Sessions. No company with the possible exception of Draftkings/Fanduel, has so blatantly just broke the law in their attempts to massively take over a market. And not just the taxi laws, they ignore labor laws, take advantage of their drivers while creating the illusion that somehow replacing people that have jobs with part time under paid contract resources is good for anything and reinforcing the notion that everyone having multiple gigs rather than actual employment is not only good but something to be striven for in the future.
    Sessions lied and should have to resign and be charged, just like Clinton should have been charged and forced to resign when she lied to Congress. Someone explain to me how that statement isn’t true.

  30. Clinton.
    I’d actually love it if all the folks yelling about Her Emails would just bring the freaking charges, make the case, and be done with it.
    Bring the damned charges.
    But they won’t, because there’s too much political capital to be had in pretending that some vast Soros-funded latter-day Illuminati conspiracy protects her and her ill-gotten wealth.
    Maybe the reason nobody is actually bringing charges is that there is no case.
    Bring the damned charges or give it the hell up. Please.
    I frankly doubt there is a solid case against Sessions for perjury. He’s a sneaky little lying weasel, but that’s not against the law, and perjury is really hard to prove.
    What does need to happen is Sessions needs to get the hell out of the DOJ, because he has no, zero, nada, zilch credibility.

  31. More on Clinton.
    The House (R)’s spent years and millions trying to pin something on Clinton. They were unsuccessful. Give it a freaking rest.
    She’s not my favorite person, she and her husband have made an unseemly amount of money out of being plugged in, like every other person who holds national office appears to do. Apparently, it’s one of the perks. That, and having ready access to lovely young ambitious people to sleep with. I’m sure she lies her head off every day, because it’s what folks in her business do. When someone in the sorts of positions Clinton has held makes a public statement, I just always assume it’s being made for some instrumental purpose rather than for its inherent truth value.
    Politics and C-level corporate management. Both empires of bullshit. That’s what the gig is.
    Conservatives have been trying to get one or the other of the Clintons in jail for 25 years now. There is no part of their public or personal lives that has not been examined with seventeen microscopes.
    Either there’s nothing there, or they’re just too good to catch.
    In either case, enough is enough. I’m tired of having my tax dollars spent on it, frankly.
    The (R)’s had their shot, over and over and over and over and over, for 25 freaking years. They couldn’t make anything stick.
    Either there’s no there there, or we ain’t gonna find it.
    Give it a rest.

  32. “The House (R)’s spent years and millions trying to pin something on Clinton. They were unsuccessful. Give it a freaking rest.”
    She lied to Congress as blatantly as Sessions did. If you don’t believe Sessions should resign or be charged for it fine, I think they both should be held accountable for it.

  33. Marty, check out the link in my 12:38 post. It appears that lying, or just misstating blatantly, to Congress does get prosecuted. Sessions hasn’t gotten prosecuted, but then there has hardly been time.
    Why hasn’t Clinton been prosecuted? I have trouble seeing the Republicans in Congress just giving her a pass, if there was any evidence. (Not sure I’m buying Russell’s thesis that they would rather make political hay out of accusations.)

  34. Marty, you have completely blown your credibility in all manners Clinton. That’s what you get for crying “wolf” over and over, and failing to deliver the actual wolf.
    I’ll be kind, and assume that you are deluded. And not in an entertaining way, either.
    WRS: if the fire-breathing RW congress couldn’t get charges brought, there’s nothing there. Get over it.

  35. first, my credibility in all things Clinton is irrelevant. There is, in all of the links, certainty that she lied to Congress. I am also sure that she, nor Sessions, will get charged for it. She never resigned, he may or may not, but every Dem official should give it a rest. They already staked out their position.
    He should resign because he staked out his.
    I am not in a position to provide the links but he is a weasel. They just don’t have the standing to call him on it.

  36. I think they both should be held accountable for it.
    fine with me.
    my point is that “holding Clinton accountable” has been a (R) talking point, campaign promise, fund-raising slogan, reliable career builder, fast track to increased visibilty and cool committee appointments, and general professional hobby for, like, 25 years.
    if there’s a case, bring it and get on with it.
    IMO there’s too much wiggle room to bring a criminal case against sessions. he should go because he’s too compromised at this point to lead the DOJ. that’s not an advisory position, it’s pretty hands-on. it needs somebody who is not obviously partisan and not obviously mendacious.

  37. re: Clinton.
    The issue at hand is Jeff Sessions, right?
    Marty, as he always does, clearly illustrates russell’s point about the Clintons being handy as political capital. Without being able to cry “A CLINTON ONCE DID SOMETHING!” Marty et al would be forced to deal with the bullshit that’s oozing out of his own goddamned party. And that would be uncomfortable.
    Don’t make me come back here.

  38. “The issue at hand is Jeff Sessions, right?”
    no my issue is every D politician acting so self righteous while demanding his resignation. I don’t think his need to resign is even at issue.

  39. In the spirit of open threadedness, somone told me this week that the reason we built on 180 f-22s is that it loses its stealth capabilities if it gets wet. Permanently.

  40. no my issue is every D politician acting so self righteous while demanding his resignation.
    Of course. It has nothing at all to do with the fact that you are unwilling to countenance criticism of your party without jumping up and down about how some Democrat somewhere once did something.

  41. sigh, yes that’s the problem. I cant stand those critiques of a guy I don’t like, didn’t want appointed and would be happy if he would resign.

  42. I hate to admit it, because I think Marty’s attitudes towards the Clintons is deluded and in fact borderline demented, but he has consistently said since Trump (who he didn’t support or vote for) nominated Sessions, that the latter was an appalling pick and he hoped that he would not be confirmed. Fair’s fair.

  43. That’s “attitude” singular, and really it’s his attitude towards Hillary.

  44. trump has now cleared the way for me to finally, after all these decades of strangled freedom, to purchase a coal-burning automobile.
    I’m opting for the the high-sulphur bitumunous coal engine.
    It’s a convertible for ease of littering.
    Yes.

  45. Just so you run it on coal from Wyoming. You wouldn’t want to get coal from Appalachia — gotta back stab Trump’s supporters there after all. Because unless someone loses (and they’re handiest), Trump won’t have won. And he’s all about winning.

  46. Marty’s attitude toward Hillary Clinton is hard to interpret any other way but this: Hillary is so despicable that Marty would not vote for her even to stop He, Trump.
    It’s an attitude not unique to Marty. I know people in real life who blame He, Trump’s rise to power on the Democrats’ perverse insistence on nominating someone as despicable as Hillary.
    People like that can kiss my ass, of course. I have more respect for outright fascists, racists, and plutocrats who straight-up supported He, Trump because of his fascist, racist, and plutocratic tendencies. Such people may be anything from stupid to evil, but at least they don’t hide behind the pretense that He, Trump is somebody else’s fault.
    –TP

  48. I cant stand those critiques of a guy I don’t like,
    Whatever dislike you have is made irrelevant by the fact that you leap to their defense, whenever a liberal criticizes them.

  49. I cant stand those critiques of a guy I don’t like, didn’t want appointed and would be happy if he would resign.
    Pray, tell, what then are the “correct” critiques of mr sessions?

  50. Pretty sure “I can’t stand those critiques” is a sarcastic statement (genus: exasperated).

  53. Jesus. This is an actual thing:
    “Under ICE’s Voluntary Work Program, detainees sign up to work and are paid $1 a day. The nationwide program, ICE says, “provides detainees opportunities to work and earn money while confined, subject to the number of work opportunities available and within the constraints of the safety, security and good order of the facility.””
    “Detainees work for up to eight hours a day, 40 hours a week, cleaning bathrooms, showers, toilets, windows, patient rooms and staff offices, waxing floors, and preparing and serving meals. ICE says detainees “shall be able to volunteer for work assignments but otherwise shall not be required to work, except to do personal housekeeping.””
    i mean, what the hell?

  55. The documentary “13th,” available on Netflix, is very important regarding the private prison question.

  56. How many conservatives, republicans, and trumpaloozas will those private prisons hold?
    We’re gonna need MORE prison capacity.
    In fact, we should declare the space taken up in Mar-a-Lago and the trump tower by these enemies of our once-great country nationalized and now part of the federal prison system.

  57. Just for something a little different, how about a relatively positive take on the US today. Here, from an optimistic leftist

    So the idea that Trump will somehow successfully relitigate the role of immigrants, minorities, gays and women in American society is scary but absurd. He may continue the Republican campaign to restrict voting rights. He may seek to overturn Roe v. Wade (supported by 70 percent of the American public). He may promote prejudice against Muslim Americans. Such actions may in fact be cheered on by his hard-core supporters. But he will ultimately fail, because what he wishes to do is both massively unpopular and runs against the grain of legal precedent and institutional norms.

    It’s all too easy to focus on the negatives; and negatives there certainly are. But if we lose the bigger picture, that’s the road to despair. Which would be a mistake.

  59. Tony P.: I wouldn’t have voted for Clinton because her stance on foreign policy has been extremely militaristic and belligerent. She voted in favour of the Iraq war and hasn’t learned anything since – there was rarely an intervention she didn’t like and didn’t want expanded. Now such a position is often adorned with euphemisms like “hawkishness” and “toughness” but all I see lots of destroyed lives.
    http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/04/hillary-clinton-really-loves-military-intervention
    https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/28/us/politics/hillary-clinton-libya.html?_r=0
    http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/24/magazine/how-hillary-clinton-became-a-hawk.html

  60. I wouldn’t have voted for Clinton because her stance on foreign policy has been extremely militaristic and belligerent
    As so often in politics, you can find yourself in the position of having to choose between bad and worse. Granting that Clinton was bad on this, do you really see Trump as better? A man whose lifelong response to opposition (or even just disrespect) is to lash out? Now with the power of the US military to lash out with.
    Yeah, it would be nice to have a choice who you actually like on an issue that is important to you. But that wasn’t on offer. If you refuse to take “less bad”, you share responsibility for “worse” if it happens.

  61. I wouldn’t have voted for Clinton
    all I see lots of destroyed lives.
    Since you’re not eligible to vote here (from what I gather) perhaps you should explain how you’re dealing with your own country’s hawks or Putin puppets, and what you’re actually doing there, instead of what you theoretically might have done if you cared about the future of the United States, and had a stake in it.

  62. wj,
    Not just the land. Assuming it’s really going to all be solid concrete 35-50 feet high — Trump’s usual description — there will be violations of the Endangered Species Act, water treaties with Mexico, and will probably put either New Mexico or Texas in violation of their water compact for Rio Grande tributaries.
    A 50-foot-tall concrete wall built across some of the arroyos in Arizona and New Mexico isn’t a wall, it’s a badly-designed dam. Parts of it are going to disappear the first time a North American Monsoon thunderstorm dumps six inches of rain in the proper place, and the resulting flash flood hits the wall.

  63. Since you’re not eligible to vote here (from what I gather) perhaps you should explain how you’re dealing with your own country’s hawks or Putin puppets, and what you’re actually doing there, instead of what you theoretically might have done if you cared about the future of the United States, and had a stake in it.
    sapient, I think you’re forgetting once again that we can say whatever we want here, whether it’s theoretical or not. And I cannot imagine why you say “if you cared about the future of the United States”, when it’s perfectly clear that everybody who takes the trouble to comment here cares about the future of the United States, and for some reason or other (if my own case is anything to go by) feels they have a stake in that future. As you presumably know, my own stance is much closer to Tony P’s and wj’s (and your own) than to novakant’s, and I tried to fight Marty and McKinney on the right and NV on the left about the fact that they should vote for HRC instead of not voting for Trump, but their decision was not to, and that was their right. And it’s novakant’s right to say what he wants, and put a perfectly rational view, even if it’s one with which many of us disagree.
    Now. I’ve had a completely hijacked day for various reasons, so haven’t read the Sunday papers yet and may not be able to until around Tuesday (driving up to the North Country tomorrow). However, I have the Observer (Sunday stablemate of the Guardian) in front of me, and I see that half its front page and two whole pages (of a broadsheet newspaper) are on the subject of Cambridge Analytica etc. So, although I haven’t read them yet, I link to the separate pieces below in case any of you are interested.
    Front page (doesn’t appear to be the whole thing): https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/mar/04/cambridge-analytics-data-brexit-trump
    From inside, piece I:
    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/mar/04/nigel-oakes-cambridge-analytica-what-role-brexit-trump
    Piece 2:
    https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/mar/04/cambridge-analytica-democracy-digital-age

  64. novakant,
    I fervently hope that in a long and happy life you never have to choose between surgery and chemotherapy. And I especially hope that if (FSM forbid) you are ever faced with that awful choice you do not reject both unsavory alternatives in favor of acupuncture or something.
    It is of course your right, as GftNC points out, to make your own choices for your own reasons. And it is not my place to judge either your choices or your reasons — as long as their consequences apply only to you and not to me.
    That works both ways, of course. How and why I vote the way I do affects you as well as me, so you are perfectly entitled to judge right back at me. Have at it. History will have the final say anyhow.
    –TP

  65. wj / tony p.:
    Maybe I can make it clearer this way: I am very close with some people from the ME – it would be a bit hard to explain to them that I would have voted for somebody who has a track record of wanting to bomb the sh@t out of them. So it’s a red line for me, but it should be for everybody.
    sapient:
    How am I dealing with our hawks?
    Well, I don’t vote for them.
    Everybody has a stake in the future of the US and is affected by US FP, there is nothing theoretical about it. I am less bothered about the elections in Costa Rica – though I wish them all the best.

  66. Maybe I can make it clearer this way: I am very close with some people from the ME – it would be a bit hard to explain to them that I would have voted for somebody who has a track record of wanting to bomb the sh@t out of them
    I can certainly understand the difficulty. But when the alternative is someone who not only enthuses about bombing them, but thinks we should have (and should in the future) stolen their oil to pay us back for the bombs we expended . . . ? Might make the explanation a little easier.

  67. sapient, I think you’re forgetting once again that we can say whatever we want here, whether it’s theoretical or not.
    Does that apply to me too? Apparently not, and thanks for the reminder.
    So it’s a red line for me, but it should be for everybody.
    That’s fine. Perhaps you’re more impressed by the way Donald Trump treats people in and from the Middle East. I hope that he doesn’t harm people in the way I believe he will.

  68. Sapient, I think you’re forgetting that my remark was in response to your suggestion that novakant say what you wanted him to say, rather than what he wanted to say.

  71. But he will ultimately fail
    But what will be damage between now and then?
    And what about all the people who are basically all in for Trump?
    A 50-foot-tall concrete wall built across some of the arroyos in Arizona and New Mexico isn’t a wall, it’s a badly-designed dam.
    It’s dumb-assery and political theater. Which doesn’t mean it won’t get built, at least some of it.
    Public policy in the US has left the world of tangible reality far behind. We’re in fantasy land now.

  72. Trump has multiple priorities — or, at least, multiple talking points for his base. But, as gets clearer by the day, he doesn’t have people who can effectively turn them into laws. So which happens first depends on the priorities of the folks who do have the requisite expertise. Which is to say Congress.
    It appears, for the moment, that Congress’ priority is the ACA repeal. (Tax cuts are a close second, but will take longer.) Without, since they can’t agree amongst themselves, replace. At which point, Trump’s base starts hurting. Bad.

  73. Trump has multiple priorities — or, at least, multiple talking points for his base. But, as gets clearer by the day, he doesn’t have people who can effectively turn them into laws. So which happens first depends on the priorities of the folks who do have the requisite expertise. Which is to say Congress.
    It appears, for the moment, that Congress’ priority is the ACA repeal. (Tax cuts are a close second, but will take longer.) Without, since they can’t agree amongst themselves, replace. At which point, Trump’s base starts hurting. Bad.

  74. Public policy in the US has left the world of tangible reality far behind. We’re in fantasy land now.
    Actually, we’re in civil war. For most of us, it’s nonviolent, and I hope that it stays that way. But let’s not be having rhetoric that ruins our side.
    With respect and thanks to all here.

  76. wtf? are we supposed to feel sorry for trump because his life has become complicated and frustrating?
    being POTUS is not like being the boss of your own family-owned-and-run private business. you have 300 million bosses. it’s freaking hard, orders of magnitude harder than building a high-rise, or running a TV show, or selling your name as a brand to slap on consumer goods.
    which is all that Trump had done prior to running for office.
    you can’t tell people what to do and expect them to jump. you can’t run around shooting your mouth off and not expect push-back. a lot of people are going to disagree with you and generally tell you you suck, and you aren’t going to be able to go run and hide from it in your gold-plated apartment or golf course hideaway.
    he wanted the job, now he’s got it. he needs to get his shit together and get busy. turn off the tv, put the phone down, get off of twitter, quit reading breitbart and watching fox, and get the hell to work.
    quit complaining about everybody saying bad things about you, and get to work. get shit done.
    yeah, being POTUS is really freaking hard. quit bitching and do your job.
    I can’t believe we have almost four more years of this BS ahead of us.
    and yes sapient, i agree, it’s basically a mostly non-violent civil war at this point. two nations trying to pretend to be one.

  77. novakant,
    Just to be more direct (and in no way disrespectful), what do your ME close friends think of Donald Trump? How do you explain him to them?
    I too have friends abroad, and they’re freaking out.
    Love,

  78. he wanted the job, now he’s got it
    Actually, I don’t think so. The more I see, the more I think his plan/desire was to run, build up a fan base (no, not a figure of speech; exactly that), lose, and then spend years and years giving speeches/rallies to hordes of adoring fans who believe he was cheated out of the Presidency. For big, huuuge, bucks.
    He was OK with losing the election, because his fans would believe that he won. And the cash flow would prove it.
    The best laid plans….

  79. The more I see, the more I think his plan/desire was to run, build up a fan base (no, not a figure of speech; exactly that), lose…
    According to Howard Stern, apparently a long-time friend of Trump, Trump’s goal was to finish second in the race for the Republican nomination. Then squeeze NBC for more money for The Apprentice.

  80. Trump may have started out with plans not to win, but once it became a real possibility of course he wanted to win. A mean, jesus, President of the US effin’ A, why not?
    Of course, he probably thought the only part of the job was what he saw on the TV. And that as POTUS he would just order up things and they would be done and he could play golf on the weekends. And that “winning” meant he was popular and loved and could go around giving speeches to rallies like the campaign.
    That none of those things are true just enrages him, I imagine. Hence what we see on a near daily basis from him.

  81. Actually, I don’t think so.
    own goal.
    too bad, he won. time for DJT to grow the f*** up and deal.
    his supporters, too.
    he’s got a (R) house and senate, is likely to have a co-operative SCOTUS, has mostly the cabinet he wanted.
    time for him to start making america great again. early signs are not enouraging.

  82. In case of doubt blame a typo and say that the word is ‘grate’ not ‘great’. On that part he definitely delivered byond the call of duty already.

  83. ‘beyond’ not ‘byond’ (which sounds like a Scandinavian secret agent: Byond, Jógvan Byond, Faroese Section of Her Danish Majesty’s Special Service).

  86. too bad, he won. time for DJT to grow the f*** up and deal.
    If a man has reached age 70 without growing up, it seems unlikely that he will do so now. Even assuming that he is emotionally capable of it, which I beg leave to doubt.

  89. Will Congress investigate it? Over to you, Reps. Chaffetz and Thornberry. Do your nation proud.
    Adding, I guess the Marines are not part of the Army, and thus might not fall under that clause of the Constitution.

  92. …you’ll get a bit more and closer perspective than the articles you posted. The comments are unfortunately the, ah, distinctly-more-informative part of that article, but T&P is aimed at a military audience, so it is offering a different perspective than the civilian articles and a bit more detail in certain directions.

  93. Ah, the comments were about what I expected. People are lovely on the internets, and in real life, it seems, even in the Marine Corps. Semper feh.

  95. ral – so good to see a reference to the Goon show!
    Hey cleek – so good to see you back!

  96. GftNC, I’m glad you appreciate it, although I had mixed feelings about posting that comment as the subject (above) is far from a joke.

  97. Very proper sentiment, ral, but don’t forget: this is an open thread. By introducing the Goons, you allowed those with the memory of them a moment of delight. One of my favourites, from the last Goon Show of All:

    SEAGOON:
    What are you doing down here?
    ECCLES:
    Everybody’s got to be somewhere.
    SEAGOON:
    Yes, but who are you?
    ECCLES:
    Oooh, da hard ones first, eh? Now, I don’t want you to spread this around … but I’m the coal man.
    SEAGOON:
    Coal man? It’s three in the morning.
    ECCLES:
    Yup. Never too late to be a coal man.

    Ah blessed memories, even without the voices, and not just of the genius Spike Milligna, that well-known typing error. I think the Pythons, the Goodies, and all surrealistic comedians since, rightly and openly acknowledge their debt.

  101. Sapient, you are disrespectful and so is Tony P. I will reiterate my point betraying one’s core beliefs by voting strategically is ethically misguided. It won’t help bring about the desired result in the long term either, rather it will facilitate the never-ending shift to the right.

  102. Sapient, you are disrespectful and so is Tony P. I will reiterate my point betraying one’s core beliefs by voting strategically is ethically misguided. It won’t help bring about the desired result in the long term either, rather it will facilitate the never-ending shift to the right.
    I haven’t betrayed my core beliefs. I strongly support the Democratic platform. Unless I vote for myself, I will not be voting for everything I believe in any case. I live in a political system with two choices. I strongly prefer Democratic policies to Republican policies. You have no evidence at all that there is a “never-ending shift to the right” by voting for progressive Democrats, (but, of course, you would have to define “right”).
    Obama’s eight-year term was not a shift to the right, no matter how much you may have disapproved of his foreign policy. Congress has shifted to the right over the past thirty years, but that is the result of many forces, including a well-organized and well-financed local level right wing, that managed to gerrymander our system so that our representatives don’t really represent the will of the people.
    In any case, electing Donald Trump will not bring the kind of world I want, not in the short or the long term. Perhaps you should provide some support for your apparent belief that his election will bring peace and love to the world (or whatever part of it you care about).

  103. withholding your support for 70% because it’s not 100% is a guarantee that you will lose ground in a democracy.
    unbending adherence to ‘core beliefs’ is simply unworkable in a representative democracy. to start with, there will never be a perfect candidate, so you will never have someone to vote for. beyond that, the system requires compromise, so there will always be a strong likelihood that your beliefs will be used as bargaining chips. it’s simply how the system works.
    over here in the real world, we can reasonably expect that Trump will do damage that will take a generation to recover from. and, while that damage gets fixed, actual living people will suffer because of it – not abstract Platonic ideals of people, real people. and they will suffer, at least partially, because Hillary Clinton was not perfect. too many people, left and right, simply could not vote for someone who wasn’t perfect. and so we have Trump and his empowered GOP Congress.

  104. This argument is going the way it usually goes.
    I do the strategic voting thing because of what cleek says, but there is a rhetorical bait and switch thing going on–real people are hurt if we follow novakant’s model, but only Platonic ideals if we vote Democratic.
    Actually, real people are blown up because we accept the lesser evil logic if we don’t also tell the Democrats very loudly that this is not acceptable. Of course if they get our votes anyway maybe they won’t change. But I think a lot of loud unruly critics who refuse to shut up on certain issues might have an effect. We don’t know, because what actually seems to happen is that many leave the party or refuse to vote and their critics within the party attack them for that and the original issue gets lost because we discuss voting ethics. I don’t think that is an accident on the part of Democratic Party leaders– they want the either you are with us or you are evil logic to dominate. They have rich donors to placate. And they tend to be warmongers themselves in some cases.
    So you end up with blogs like LawyersGunsand Money spending many more posts attacking people like Susan Sarandon than they ever spend on the bombing of Yemen. They don’t approve of the bombing– I saw a post once–but it doesn’t interest them like Sarandon does. So on foreign policy I read non mainstream conservatives like Bacevich and Larison ( who voted for someone I have never heard mentioned before or since) rather than most liberal blogs, which tend to be worthless unless a Republican can be blamed.

  107. Actually, real people are blown up because we accept the lesser evil logic if we don’t also tell the Democrats very loudly that this is not acceptable.
    Actually, real people are blown up because there are wars going on. There is no evidence whatsoever that Trump has any formula for making wars less brutal or less likely.

  108. clinton sucks.
    trump sucks worse, by orders of magnitude.
    johnson seems to be.. unclear on a number of concepts.
    stein is a nutjob and an opportunist.
    you can always write in ted cruz or bernie as a protest vote. that will surely stick it to the man!
    or you can stay home.
    pick one.
    if none of that suits, there’s always canada.
    do we all want to blow up yemenis? no, we do not.
    even less do we want to blow up yemenis, die from the flu, spend our golden years living on cat food, or have a fucking gas pipeline built in our front yard.
    guess what? stay home, and yemenis get blown up anyway. you get to pretend none of their blood is on your hands, so good for you.

  109. I don’t want to gang up here, but I feel like if a commentor has a handle of novakant (which I am assuming is New Kant), you are probably going to face that sort of outlook on things. I don’t say that to dismiss novakant, (I think we could probably use a few categorical imperatives these days), just that the handle reflects the opinion.

  111. unbending adherence to ‘core beliefs’ is simply unworkable in a representative democracy.
    …unless you’re a centerist. Then it’s just common sense and pragmatism!
    Like sapient said, “I haven’t betrayed my core beliefs” (emphasis added). Lecturing other people about how always voting your preference is practical and strategic because they can’t get everything they want is spectacularly hypocritical. Centerist liberals have perpetually chided everyone to their left that everyone must compromise, and that the only reasonable (“electable”) compromise is to support what they’d choose if they weren’t required to compromise. Even when that electable candidate is blatantly and predictably unelectable.
    Lectures about pragmatism and electability require credibility and a willingness to follow your own advice; if your vision of pragmatism is invariably “let’s compromise and do it my way”, you’re going to have a hard time being credible outside of the choir.

  112. the millions of people who about to lose their health insurance don’t give a crap about your beliefs, NV.

  114. They don’t care about yours either, cleek. And your prescription was someone who couldn’t beat the least popular presidential candidate in a lifetime. Ah, but what’s that? She was the candidate we had? Only after we had her. You’re complaining about things been and done, so it’s absurd to tell me that we mustn’t complain about things been and done. You and your ilk gave us Clinton as the only alternative to Trump, and it was not good enough even with massive funding, media support, and disgusted centerist never-Trumper defectors. And this was not something no one saw coming.
    Do you really think Cruz or Rubio or Kasich or Bush would have preserved the ACA? They would not have, and any one of them would have denied Clinton even the symbolic-but-practically-meaningless (remember, this discussion is all about practicality!) popular vote. So don’t lecture me about how we just had to do what you told us to, even though we told you over and over you were making an entirely predictable mistake. If now is a good time for you to wallow in hindsight, it’s just as good a time for me to do so.
    Your cohort wants to argue it’s always 1938 so the stakes are always too high for their manipulative and exploitative tactics to have repercussions (for them). However: 1) it’s not always 1938, and 2) if we accept your logic that it is, there’s never going to be a better time than now to tear down the oligarchs whose cynical complicity and aggressive adherence to the Iron Law of Institutions got us where we are.

  115. novakant:I will reiterate my point betraying one’s core beliefs by voting strategically is ethically misguided.
    sapient: I haven’t betrayed my core beliefs. I strongly support the Democratic platform.
    Just a quick and obvious comment: novakant was talking about how he would be betraying his core beliefs if he voted for a hawkish Dem-type on a lesser-evil basis, not accusing sapient of betraying his. It’s true, this does seem to be the perennial argument. I’m strongly on the side of the pragmatist lesser-evil crowd, but I think Donald Johnson may state a possible way out of this when he says:
    Actually, real people are blown up because we accept the lesser evil logic if we don’t also tell the Democrats very loudly that this is not acceptable. Of course if they get our votes anyway maybe they won’t change. But I think a lot of loud unruly critics who refuse to shut up on certain issues might have an effect.
    Maybe once Indivisible et al (which is to say all of you) get rid of Trump and the ever rightward shifting Republicans (from my lips to God’s ear etc etc), this is the way forward to try and ensure the Democratic party starts representing whatever are the views of the majority of its voters, rather than the views of the plutocrats and hawkish FP establishment (although personally I am not anti-intervention on principle, unlike it seems to me many of you).

  116. They don’t care about yours either, cleek
    and they don’t have to. i voted to help them keep their insurance, despite the problems i had with Clinton. you didn’t.
    i chose to not put some arbitrary ideal above the greater good. you did.
    my conscience is clear.

  117. novakant was talking about how he would be betraying his core beliefs if he voted for a hawkish Dem-type on a lesser-evil basis, not accusing sapient of betraying his
    That’s not what novakant said, but you are welcome to your more benevolent interpretation. novakant said this:
    Sapient, you are disrespectful and so is Tony P. I will reiterate my point betraying one’s core beliefs by voting strategically is ethically misguided.
    Let’s be honest. People who incessantly criticize Clinton and other liberals whose policies “aren’t quite good enough” rarely get around to presenting their own policies for vetting. To the extent that Bernie Sanders tried, his numbers didn’t add up (although that minor problem, as well as his history of inconvenient votes, his lack of transparency regarding personal finances, etc., didn’t seem to worry his supporters, because [?]).
    I asked novakant for whom he has cast a vote. Perhaps he abstains entirely. It would be interesting to square his vote with his fidelity to “core beliefs, and put his candidate up to some critical analysis.

  118. Yes sapient, but he was the only one who had stated core beliefs that would be betrayed if he voted the way you were endorsing (enforcing?), so it was clear that was what he meant.
    However, I agree it would be interesting to know, if he cared to divulge, which candidates he has felt able to vote for.

  119. For the past few decades, major candidate have ALWAYS been in hock to the wealthy: because it takes a ton of cash to run a major campaign.
    Now, Trump may have actually done some “good”, in showing how one could win a national campaign without spending a lot of money.
    I put “good” in quotes, because the campaign strategy seems to be “act barking mad, to get free media coverage”, and “get free IT support from Russia”.
    The times are changing: a huge fraction of that old-style campaign cash went toward TV advertising. And TV just doesn’t get the eyeballs it once did.
    Except FOX.
    “Hey, Thor? Lightning bolt. Right down that cable, okay?”

  120. It would be interesting to square his vote with his fidelity to “core beliefs, and put his candidate up to some critical analysis.
    Not so much. This moves us into the territory of demanding that people show us how they behaved, which is problematic when we think about this medium of a comment thread on a blog. While there are any number of stories about people who find themselves surprised that what they did (or did not do) at the ballot box turned to bite them on the ass. I’m not sure if that gets us anywhere, so let’s move away from this, shall we? thx

  122. How much are you willing to risk in the short term to have a better chance at achieving a longer term goal? How do you calculate that risk? How do you determine that chance? What are your priorities? How much more important are your higher priorities than your lower priorities?
    We’re arguing within the fuzz of the fuzzy logic we employ when we don’t know the future. To what end are we doing this?
    I voted for Clinton. I wish she had won. I also voted for Sanders, when it didn’t really matter anymore, but wish he had won (ultimately, at least).
    I would prefer Mitt Romney over Trump, at least in the short term. What would the longer-term implications of such a presidency be relative to the Trump presidency? Who the fnck knows?

  123. To what end are we doing this?
    personally, i’m skeptical of those who claim to hold unbending moral standards. because, life simply does not work like that. every day, in countless ways, we all choose lesser evils. usually we get to pick between acceptable and unacceptable, sometimes between damned-good and just-OK. very few decisions of consequence are between perfection and close-to-perfection. and, nobody requires that every situation they find themselves in must turn out perfectly according to their own core values – we all compromise, all the time, on matters large and small. life is simply not possible otherwise.
    but choosing a President who will give you 70% of what you want vs one who will give you -70% is an impossible choice to make?
    /skeptical

  124. Do you really think Cruz or Rubio or Kasich or Bush would have preserved the ACA? They would not have, and any one of them would have denied Clinton even the symbolic-but-practically-meaningless (remember, this discussion is all about practicality!) popular vote.
    To take the second point first, I’m not at all sure that they would have even won. Trump pulled in a number of folks who might well not have voted for one of the alternative Republicans.
    As for what they would have done with the ACA, they would be faced with the same problem that the Republican Congress is facing right now:
    – The Freedom Caucus won’t sign on for anything short of total repeal. And won’t sign on for any kind of replace which involves a government mandate, or spending government money, or raising taxes (or fees!) in any way. Can’t pass something without them.
    – A bunch of far less (ideologically) rigid members won’t pass a repeal without something that is at least a partial replace, because they can see already that it would be electoral suicide. Can’t pass something without them either.
    – The Democrats aren’t going to step up and help you overcome either of the above, for reasons which should be obvious. And probably wouldn’t, even if we hadn’t just had 6 years of total obstruction.
    The only differences on the subject with Trump instead of one of the others are:
    – He keeps saying that he wants everybody covered. Which means that even if the whole party in Congress caves to the “total repeal and no replace” folks, it might not get signed.
    – He is providing zero help in getting the members into line on anything. And probably would have no clue how to do so, even if he could be convinced to try. Wheedling and stroking others don’t seem to be among his core competencies.

  125. I don’t mind if novakant (or whoever) doesn’t want to vote for Clinton (or a similar center-leftish individual). I think Clinton’s a hawk, too.
    I probably object to as much of US foreign policy as Donald does, and have no issue with him raising any of that here or elsewhere.
    But sometimes you have to advocate for things that are important to you, *and* work with the reality that is available to you.

    betraying one’s core beliefs by voting strategically is ethically misguided.

    Maybe. Then again, sometimes it’s just called “voting”.
    In order to be completely true to my core beliefs, without hint of compromise, I’d probably have to separate myself from pretty much the rest of the world.
    That’s a legitimate choice, and lots of people make it.
    I don’t. So, I live with compromise.
    We all make our own choices.

  126. Real people are blown up by American allies with American help under Obama and it will continue to happen under Trump. It might get worse.
    I think Democrats will find it difficult to criticize Trump if he doubles down on support for the Saudi war. Not impossible, but difficult. Some Democratic politicians ( and a few Republicans) have been doing it, but it seems to go largely unnoticed. This is odd to me, but I am guessing it was because Obama was responsible, so most liberal pundits just looked the other way. If it became a major front page issue, people would ask embarrassing questions, like, for instance, what would Americans do if we were bombed, our children were starving and people in the democratic superpower that helped the bombers spent their time complaining about how some foreign power stole some emails in order to– gasp– interfere in their internal affairs?
    Again, notice that this fact is completely independent of whatever views you may hold about strategic voting. I agree with lesser evil voting while recognizing that it provides no incentive whatsoever for a Democrats to stop committing war crimes. I do it anyway because, you know, lesser evil.
    My point is that people should talk about issues without caring about how it reflects on this or that political party. You can do this and still vote lesser evil. I don’t know how to get Democratic politicians to behave better. But politely ignoring their support for war crimes probably won’t do it.

  127. I think the best opportunity for making a push for issues that both parties are bad on is in the primaries. First, it can get you a lesser lesser evil for the general election. Second, even if you don’t accomplish that, a serious primary challenge will get the attention of a member of Congress like nothing else. Might even get him to change his position.

  128. My point is that people should talk about issues without caring about how it reflects on this or that political party
    agreed

  129. To my chagrin, I see some both on the Chris Hedges left and the InfoWars right speak confidently of a “deep state”, revealing a common deep intellectual confusion regarding the nature of politics and political power.
    Please stop.

  130. i chose to not put some arbitrary ideal above the greater good. you did.
    Please, cleek, lecture me again about how vote-swapping to deny both Trump and Clinton a vote makes someone morally inferior to not vote-swapping so you can cast a vote that will be canceled out by a reluctant Trump voter. Perhaps this thousandth time I’ll finally see the deceitful evil of basic arithmetic and at long last come to understand the flaws in my essentially-fascistic reasoning.
    Also, tell me more about how hill climbing is never problematic and “the greater good” is always and only achieved by seeking local optima.
    Finally, pretend as you always do that the first point doesn’t exist and tell me how my vote made any damned difference one way or the other since it was cast in OH, and Clinton cast us into the outer darkness since we’re a bunch of deplorables and she had her “firewall”.
    Your cohort gave us Clinton, because primaries and organization and deal with it and move on, it’s over. Clinton gave us Trump because elections and hubris and deal with it and move on, it’s over. Pragmatism means being realistic about things you want to be realistic about and things you’d rather not. The behavior you advocate is how we got here; consequences only being for little people and DFHs encourages arrogant, reckless behavior since it won’t hurt its perpetrators where they’ll really feel it. And that’s nothing new, and it’s nothing new because anyone who tries to challenge it gets told it’s 1938, and how dare they not sit down, shut up, and clap when told to clap.
    My conscience is far from clear, but on the subject of strategic voting it is.
    personally, i’m skeptical of those who claim to hold unbending moral standards.
    Personally, I’m skeptical of those who claim that they act rationally, but people they disagree with can only possibly be purists engaged in onanistic virtue signalling.
    —
    wj, I agree with most of what you said except the outcome of the election against a traditional Republican being unlikely. It would not have been certain, but Clinton’s only big bumps aside from the convention were when various unique-to-Trump PR catastrophes occurred, while her drops were not related to her opponent in any meaningful way. Trump may have pulled in some fringe elements (though the “it’s the racists, stupid!” apolgetics are facile, self-serving, and have never stood up to close scrutiny), but he also alienated a lot of voters. Chin-rubbing about the former but not the latter is somewhat dubious.
    However, agreeing that gutting ACA wholesale would be equally difficult had a “normal” Republican won doesn’t really undermine my point – if it wouldn’t happen then for the same reasons it wouldn’t happen now,

  131. The hill climbing local optima analogy is a good one– despite reading a bit of evolutionary theory now and then I wouldn’t have thought of it. I am still a local optimizer,I guess, but one who thinks it is a good idea to point out the higher peaks across the valley. Not sure how to fill it.

  132. NV, I’d agree that the “it’s the racists, stupid!” “analysis” is off the mark. After all, they didn’t manage to defeat Obama, so crediting/blaming them for the result of this election seems like a real stretch.
    Far more important, I think, were the folks who feel desperate and believed Trump’s snake oil prescription. Given a different Republican candidate, they might have voted differently (i.e. for Clinton). But more likely, I think, they just stay home.
    The question, and I see no way to get a definitive answer, is how their numbers compare to the number of those alienated by Trump. And, at least as important, where the members of the two groups were.

  134. they didn’t manage to defeat Obama, so crediting/blaming them for the result of this election seems like a real stretch.
    I’m not so sure about that. I don’t know if this makes sense, but I have this impression (and it is just an impression) that the racist demographic was initially convinced that Obama would be unsuccessful, and would prove himself to be a flash in the pan. This is easy to believe if you think he is a product of affirmative action with no ideas of his own. If someone has racist thoughts, and they assume that Obama was going to show the world that his people were shiftless and lazy, why worry? The second term, when Romney and other Republicans had convinced themselves that they had won, why expose yourself as an out and out racist? In fact, it might have been a lot harder for a particular class of racists to have gone after an actual black man, and much easier, especially in terms of rationalization, to take out their frustration on the white woman.
    There seemed, at least to me, a growing fury with Obama, the anger that he didn’t fall flat on his face, that he name checked so much of black culture and history, that he (and Michelle) were able to do so well. Bill O’Reily taking issue with the notion that slaves built the White House is something that comes to mind.
    Here’s another example
    http://www.rawstory.com/2016/11/fox-shares-white-voters-crackpot-theory-racism-started-when-obama-won-because-he-is-a-racist/
    He (and others) probably sincerely believe that there was no racism until Obama started it. So they were willing to let the Kenyan usurper have his day in the sun, and make jokes at their expense, but the payback was to organize themselves behind the most racist candidate they could have found.
    The worst thing you can do to a racist is show everyone that they are full of shit
    http://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/obamas-parting-gift-the-power-not-to-fear-white-racism
    That’s what Obama did and that’s why this demographic has exerted themselves so much more this time, but not so much previously. It’s important to convince themselves that they aren’t racist, how could they be, they allowed a black man to be president. But for them, that’s as far as it’s going to go.

  135. What lj said, plus this: I read somewhere, but now can’t remember where (probably a TNC piece linked here) that Obama had an unusual quality for an American black man because he had been raised by white people who loved him. This led, the piece posited, to him lacking the instinctive fear and antagonism towards white people that black people (men particularly I guess) quite understandably feel, and that white people subconsciously register, dislike, resent and fear. His relaxed, optimistic vibe may well have significantly reduced the racist reflex in white voters, and even enabled the subconsciously racist ones to congratulate themselves on their lack of racism when they voted for him. And then, he started inviting “too many” black artists to the White House. He was relentlessly demonised by the Right (a dictator! a Muslim! an incompetent!), and a lot of people ended up believing some, or all of it. And that’s when the racism, and all its other foul bedfellows (sexism pretty notably) bubbled up again with renewed vigour, enabled by self-serving condemnations of “political correctness”.

  136. GftNC, the problem with that narrative is that it’s facile and designed to avoid introspection. Clinton did worse with demographic groups that supported Obama, and Trump did as well or better than Romney, yet rather than this contradicting the narrative it turns into a subtle proof. It doesn’t look like this explanation is falsifiable. It’s a self-contained narrative that doesn’t really need any proof beyond “feeling true”, and not coincidentally that’s precisely what it provides. It’s a lecture about who “those people” are and how they think, derived not from their words or actions but from the writer’s narrative and deeply-held beliefs. It’s an extremely well-rounded and all-encompassing explanation because the field of view has been limited to what it explains. It’s typical of political analysis based on identity politics; voting blocs are motivated by single factors which are easily determined and invariably tied to race, gender, or religion. Pointedly, class is a four-letter word.
    “It’s the racists, stupid” is a very comforting explanation for the same reason it’s a dangerous one: it proclaims that Nice Respectable Liberal demographic virtue signalling coupled with neoliberal economic policy is all that’s needed to win elections, that words speak louder than actions, and above all that the reason Clinton lost is because the Evil Ones were too evil despite her flawless campaign. IOW: double down, and never look back.

  137. it proclaims that Nice Respectable Liberal demographic virtue signalling coupled with neoliberal economic policy is all that’s needed to win elections, that words speak louder than actions, and above all that the reason Clinton lost is because the Evil Ones were too evil despite her flawless campaign. IOW: double down, and never look back.
    Well, maybe yes and maybe no (or maybe both). I mean, what did Trump offer in terms of “actions speak louder than words” during the campaign? Did he offer specific policies that would make the four-letter-class better off as compared to what Clinton was offering?
    Because ISTM that, from the perspective of which candidate was going to be better for the working class (white, black, hispanic, etc.) as President, Hillary’s policies were the winner hands down. Am I wrong in that assessment?

  138. Moreover, I’m wary that there needs to be some kind of wholesale rethinking of Dem POTUS election strategy given the popular vote totals. I mean, if she had won the popular vote by, say, six million votes and still lost the electoral college, what’s wrong with Deam policies and message?

  139. Hillary also got MILLIONS more votes; in the states that put Trump over the top, his victory was by narrow margins.
    So, if it was racists that did it, there’s not so many of them, they’re just distributed in a particularly harmful way.

  140. How about this: Obama was sui generis and so was the 2016 election, but in entirely different ways, so trying to draw a bunch of conclusions is pointless. Better to ask, going forward: does either party have a stable of POTUS-ready, POTUS-capable candidates. I think not.

  142. You know NV, several things can be true at the same time. What I said above was only addressing (following lj) the contention that
    they didn’t manage to defeat Obama, so crediting/blaming them for the result of this election seems like a real stretch.
    White racists, unconscious or not, can also be sexist (is this part of the definition of intersectionality? Enquiring minds want to know) which might explain why at a particular juncture some couldn’t vote for HRC, despite having voted for Obama for various reasons, and nobody is suggesting that it’s *only* the racists, stupid. You know perfectly well, because you have commented on it in the past, that I thought HRC a very faulty candidate. Nor do I think class is a four-letter word; it clearly played a part in HRC’s rejection by large swathes of the working class, who correctly assessed that nothing much had been done for them in a long time, and thought she, as the continuity candidate, would do just as little. However, I believe that despite her riches, and plutocratic friends, and neoliberal economic policies, she would have been better for the working class than the current disaster in the White House. Do you disagree?

  143. I agree with lesser evil voting while recognizing that it provides no incentive whatsoever for a Democrats to stop committing war crimes.
    don’t wait for others to be the candidate you want, run for office yourself?
    the people in office are self-selected, after all. and if the people who chose to run aren’t your cup of tea, bring your own tea.
    ok, i’m only 1/4 kidding.
    but my point is, again: there will never be perfect candidates.
    Please, cleek, lecture me again…
    well that’s a funny way to start another of your overblown hectoring screeds. no, not funny: typically hypocritical. i believe i’m done reading you. good bye, NV. enjoy your pie.

  144. It certainly is wonderful that a significant number of GOPers in Congress and the “grassroots” seem to think that the House ACA repeal isn’t as horrible or cruel as it should be. And if straight up repeal is just fine and dandy.
    I mean, it’s one thing to think that the ACA is horrible and has ruined or will ruin American healthcare and is one step short of the state owning the means of production and putting CCCP on our US national hockey team jerseys, but quite another to think repeal the law wholesale and immediately is a solution to anything at all and wouldn’t have any consequences, or the consequences would only fall on those (in their view) societal leeches who only have health insurance because of the ACA.
    Fncking reality, how does it work?

  145. I don’t get the bickering over lesser-evil versus principled voting. One approach sees the near term as being more important, under the circumstances, than the longer term. The other favors the longer term over the near term, under the circumstances. These are circumstances none of us can claim to be able to assess with great accuracy.
    We’re all best-guessing on how best to achieve our policy goals over some, as we see it, realistic timeframe. Why is it so hard to agree to disagree without rancor when we’re not discussing a simple matter of fact?
    I chose more or less the same strategy as cleek, but it doesn’t make me angry at NV. I think we’re in “reasonable people can disagree” territory here. WTF?
    On the question of racism, it’s entirely possible that some number of racists will be more motivated to vote for someone who appears to be supportive of racism than to vote against someone who opposes racism (or even who is black).
    Obama never ran against someone who racists saw as “their guy.”
    That’s not to say racism is THE explanation for Trump’s victory. It is to say that, just because Obama won in some of the same places that Trump did, it doesn’t mean racism wasn’t a factor.

  148. I don’t get the bickering over lesser-evil versus principled voting.
    Let me explain: Donald Trump won.

  150. I suppose you knew that was going to happen on November 7th.
    I didn’t know what would happen, which is why I campaigned, did poll watching, and voted for Hillary Clinton. That’s how you make sure we don’t get at least four years of goo.

  151. That’s how you make sure we don’t get at least four years of goo.
    Oops, that’s how you fight to ward off four years of goo. Obviously, wasn’t enough for just the majority of the voters to do it.

  152. There’s still the counter-argument that 4 years of goo is worth it because it will be the most energizing force for progressivism and greater change in the right direction than we’ve seen in decades. I don’t necessarily subscribe to that theory, but it’s not unreasonable.
    Some people think the status quo has been in place for an unacceptably long time and are willing to take bigger chances in the short term for long-term gains. I’m not suggesting that they’re right. I am suggesting that they aren’t the enemy.

  153. I am suggesting that they aren’t the enemy.
    They certainly are not the friend of those who are harmed or who die in the meantime in service to their extremely dangerous crapshoot.

  154. does either party have a stable of POTUS-ready, POTUS-capable candidates. I think not.
    I don’t really agree with this. I think there are a number of people in both the (D) and (R) – and other, probably – parties who would be perfectly good Presidents, and who would, in normal times, be seen as such.
    Tim Kaine, who ran for VPOTUS, and Evan McMullin, who ran an independent campaign as a (R), come to mind. If I wanted to spend another 10 minutes, I’m sure I could come with 10 or more from either party.
    I’m not talking about whether any particular person here would vote for them, I’m just saying that there are lots of people in public life who would make perfectly good presidents.
    The question I have is: why aren’t those folks nominated?

  155. ISTM that, from the perspective of which candidate was going to be better for the working class (white, black, hispanic, etc.) as President, Hillary’s policies were the winner hands down. Am I wrong in that assessment?
    Ugh, I think you are wrong in one way. I think you are automatically discounting all the places where Trump was promising things that are simply not possible. And assuming that everybody listening to him would realize that they needed to do the same.
    If you just take the things he said he would do that are possible, then yeah Clinton was far better for working people. But if you buy the magic promises, then Trump could well look better. And for some people, the will to believe in the magic is very strong.

  156. I have a number of friends and family who are strong Trump supporters. The reasons they voted for Trump vary. I try to find a common thread, but it’s not clear what that would be.
    One friend buys into the whole Soros Is The Antichrist thing, thinks the kind of internationlist foreign policy favored by folks like Obama and Clinton undermines our sovereignty as a Judeo-Christian nation, believes Europe is on its way to sharia law, and sees Trump as a bulwark against all of that.
    My brother in law has spent the last 8 years convinced that Obama was going to take his guns. Nuff said there.
    My niece and her husband think liberals are hypocrites and that they are the real racists, and that Clinton is a criminal and should be in jail. They follow Breitbart and are large fans of Yiannopolis.
    I know a number of folks who are Trump supporters basically as an expression of being generally hostile to authority.
    I know some folks who seem to be Trump supporters mostly because he’s rude coarse and blunt and that appeals to their sense that “being nice is for pussies”.
    I don’t live in the blighted industrial rust belt, so I don’t really know any folks who think Trump is going to bring their $30/hour factory job back. There haven’t been $30/hour factory jobs or their equivalent in any significant numbers around here for the last 50 years.
    And I don’t really know anyone who supports Trump out of anything like a considered opinion that his policies are going to improve anything. I don’t really count Build The Wall, Keep The Muslims Out, and Make America Great as policies that inspire considered opinions, they just seem – to me – like emotional appeals to fear and nostalgia.
    So, to me, it all seems like a big confused ball of paranoia and bizarre anti-social resentment. I’m sure that seems unkind to a lot of folks, but that’s how it looks to me.
    I think there are probably lots of (R)’s who would make reasonable presidents. The folks who vote in the (R) primaries liked Trump better. I don’t know why, you have to ask them.

  157. Whelp, my phone just ate a long (for a phone) comment. Mixed blessing, I suppose. So I’ll note that I’m glad cleek has decided to plonk me instead of continuing to subject me to repetative and un-self-aware sermons (this way everyone wins), and that my “actions v. words” comment was based as much on long-term behaviour as the recent election. For the record, the overwhelming majority of the eaten post was regarding the latter point.
    —
    Ugh, the editorial commentary portion of the LGM post is amusing in its lack of self-awareness, to continue harping on that theme. The other part is obvious, but… not really moving?
    —
    sapient, those who are harmed or who die by trying to change course need to be balanced against those who are being harmed or dying by refusing to change course. And given that you oppose pressuring you beloved neolib hawks to moderate their impeccable judgement, it’s always cute to see you claiming credit for the effects of leftward-tacking forced upon your unwilling centerist darlings.

  158. I don’t get the bickering over lesser-evil versus principled voting. One approach sees the near term as being more important, under the circumstances, than the longer term.
    here’s the thing: “the longer term” may be decades – just think of the damage a rabidly “conservative” SCOTUS can do. that means real people will spend a significant part of their actual lives suffering the real consequences of a crappy government.
    this is not the proper response: ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

  159. I’m just saying that there are lots of people in public life who would make perfectly good presidents.
    Two things.
    First, I’d agree that there are a fair number.
    Second, I’d note that the bar for “perfectly good presidents” has been lowered substantially. I see a lot of people who were blistering in their criticism of Bush II the whole time he was in office. But who are now saying how they wish we had a President who was anywhere near as competent, informed, hard-working, etc. as he was.
    The question I have is: why aren’t those folks nominated?
    That’s an excellent question. I think it comes down to money. If you don’t think you can raise enough, why bother to run? If you run, and it turns out that you can’t raise enough, you can’t get to the nomination.
    So you need either:
    1) the ability to raise big bucks early. Which means at least a few of the super-donors pick you. (“Genuflect! Genuflect! Genuflect!” **)
    2) the ability to fund your own run, i.e. you have to be super rich yourself.
    3) the ability to generate lots of free exposure (ala Trump)
    4) a really great process for raising lots of money from small donors, and raising it early.
    The first one being by far the most common because it is by far the easiest. But it means you have to support the positions that at least some of those super-donors care about. Or be willing to talk and act like you do (ala Romney).
    If you want to get more good candidates, perhaps the best thing you could do is work on ways to do #4.
    ** A line from an old Allan Sherman song, on a totally different subject, which just popped into my mind. Sorry.

  160. those who are harmed or who die by trying to change course
    Most of “those who are harmed or who die” are not the ones trying to change course. If you can show me that “changing course” has eliminated fighting or war, please do.
    I’m not sure it’s going so well in Yemen.
    Or elsewhere.

  161. who in their right mind would want to be President?
    in exchange for having your picture in textbooks you get four years of constant slander, blame and death threats.

  162. wj, “Allan Sherman”? Surely you mean Tom Lehrer’s Vatican Rag.
    I wouldn’t call George W. Bush a “perfectly good president” but sure, he was better than Donald.
    *sigh* how low can the bar go? I can’t bend that far.

  165. Most of “those who are harmed or who die” are not the ones trying to change course.
    Most of the ones harmed or dying by not changing course aren’t trying to maintain the status quo either. What’s your point?
    If you can show me that “changing course” has eliminated fighting or war, please do.
    Eliminated? No. But shall we compare post-WWII Europe to pre-WWII Europe? Shall we look at the amount of political violence in South America now vs. in the 70s and 80s? Status quo über alles is something you support only because the neolib hawk strong-statist faction you favor is the status quo. Your favored group has done everything in their power to ensure that certain types of change are essentially impossible without much more widespread change, and they’ve done so to preserve their power, not to promote the greater good. Holding vulnerable portions of the population hostage to retain your political influence is not an admirable tactic, but it’s part and parcel for the cohort you refuse to even deem a lesser evil rather than the best of all possible politicians.

  166. A clutch as a theft-prevention device. Who knew?
    I’ve heard it said more than once over the last 10-15y or so that stick shift is the best anti-theft device you can now buy in the US – not just because a would-be thief may not be able to drive it, but because there’s less of a domestic black market for sticks.

  168. “Brawndo” … cleek, thanks for this; I guess I’m not fully familiar with all Internet traditions after all.

    drinking BRAWNDO is like riding a pony, which probably sounds not dangerous except that the pony is 300 feet tall and covered in chainsaws!

    See Making Fiends – Pony

  169. ral, watch Idiocracy, ASAP.
    it’ll give you a whole bunch of new ways to see just how screwed we are!

  170. Geez, ral, you’re definitely not aware of all Internet traditions, since it’s not “fully familiar with”.
    —
    here’s the thing: “the longer term” may be decades – just think of the damage a rabidly “conservative” SCOTUS can do. that means real people will spend a significant part of their actual lives suffering the real consequences of a crappy government.
    The flip side of this is that the exact same logic applies to pro-corporatist, pro-autocratic-executive, etc. justices appointed to promote the unwavering ideals of the “pragmatic moderates” who we can never, ever dare to challenge.

  171. here’s the thing: “the longer term” may be decades – just think of the damage a rabidly “conservative” SCOTUS can do. that means real people will spend a significant part of their actual lives suffering the real consequences of a crappy government.
    this is not the proper response:     ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
    I chose not to italicize the shrugging guy at the end. Who knows what would have happened?
    At any rate, I don’t think the shrugging guy is accurate. I’m sure NV isn’t happy about a Trump presidency or indifferent to the consequences of it. The conversation is one that places people who didn’t support Clinton for mostly FP reasons from the progressive/liberal side on defense, rather than one that explores all aspects of such decisions, including whatever may have made those decisions reluctant ones to some degree or other.
    I’m sure, FREX, that a Trump SCOTUS nominee is on the minus side of the equation. I’m sure LGBTQ issues are as well. Ditto health care, policing, immigration, etc., etc., etc.
    Like I said, I voted for Clinton (with feeling!). I disagree with people who didn’t. I think Trump supporters were deeply wrong on many, many levels, to the extent that they made an unreasonable choice.
    I think people like NV made some different calculations than I did. Technically, that means I think they were wrong, too – just not idiotically or immorally so.

  172. But shall we compare post-WWII Europe to pre-WWII Europe?
    Oh, so you think we should have another world war rather than maintain the relative peace that your despised neoliberal hawks created and kept (not without some egregious decisions and mistakes which have always been acknowledged)? You take a lot for granted.
    it’s part and parcel for the cohort you refuse to even deem a lesser evil rather than the best of all possible politicians.
    Ummm … what? I’m not the purity pony. I work hard and support strongly the best one of available choices. Thanks.
    I think I need to follow cleek’s strategy now. Bye.

  173. The conversation is one that places people who didn’t support Clinton for mostly FP reasons from the progressive/liberal side on defense,
    i have no problem with that.
    their decision helped put Trump into office.
    and there should be consequences.

  174. “the clutch as an anti-theft device”
    There was a point when I considered importing a right-hand-drive stick car from Japan, so that it would be essentially impossible to steal.
    Except by old postmen, I guess.
    No, not an *English* car, a *Japanese* car, because I’m not fond of oil leaking all over the road.

  176. and there should be consequences.
    Like what? (And what are you going to do to the people who actively supported Trump?)

  177. I think it comes down to money.
    Same here.
    I personally have avoided having my car stolen by driving a manual transmission. That, plus the highly inebriated state of the would-be thief.
    But the manual is what was the show-stopper.

  178. There’s still the counter-argument that 4 years of goo is worth it because it will be the most energizing force for progressivism and greater change in the right direction than we’ve seen in decades. I don’t necessarily subscribe to that theory, but it’s not unreasonable.
    Some people think the status quo has been in place for an unacceptably long time and are willing to take bigger chances in the short term for long-term gains. I’m not suggesting that they’re right. I am suggesting that they aren’t the enemy.

    This. Plus, what the hell is goo?

  179. Goo is bad stuff, you know, generally.
    I should add that I’m not particularly keen on being called a moral monster for voting for Clinton, either. But I’m fine with reasonable disagreement. (I’m not talking about Trump supporters here, of course.)

  180. Like what? (And what are you going to do to the people who actively supported Trump?)
    I won’t answer for cleek, of course, but I’ll tell you what I’ll do.
    The election of Donald Trump was a monumental failure of citizenship. People who allowed it to happen, as well as those who actively supported it, can’t be allowed to pretend that they had no role in it. They share responsibility for the lives that are affected, for the additional refugees that are being banned, for the additional immigrants who are being denied entry, for the environmental degradation that occurs, for the taxpayer money that is supporting Trump’s personal wealth and Exxon, for the corruption and degradation of trust in Government, for government workers who are being deprived of jobs, for government departments (including the State Department) who have fewer experts, for climate data that won’t be collected, for national parks that won’t be supported, for public schools that won’t be funded, for whatever miserable thing happens to health care and Medicaid, not to mention Medicare and Social Security.
    That’s what I can think of off the top of my head without going into how he’s threatening nuclear war, destroying NATO, praising human rights abusers such as Dutarte, cutting off funding for humanitarian NGOs, and undermining the credibility of our intelligence agencies and our military.
    I am holding them responsible.

  181. Like what?
    see above. when the opportunity presents itself, i’ll use it to point out that their decision contributed to Trump’s win and that they now own a share of everything he does. maybe i’ll draw up a nice Certificate Of Ownership PDF to hand out!
    i’ll let you handle the inclusive and understanding stuff. it was never my thing anyway.
    And what are you going to do to the people who actively supported Trump?
    they’ve been removed from my life. there’s no point in continuing to pretend we have anything in common. i’m not sure we would even describe America in a way the other would recognize – so why pretend we even have that anymore?
    and, i’m going to spend some money to get Dems elected.

  182. But the manual [transmission] is what was the show-stopper.
    So, to tie these two parts of the thread together, How do we make voting more like a manual transmission?

  183. i’ll let you handle the inclusive and understanding stuff.
    that’s supposed to sound a lot less dismissive than it does 🙂

  185. “but my point is, again: there will never be perfect candidates.”
    And my point is that we should focus first on issues–support for the less evil candidate is a choice one makes sort of in passing. Arguing about voting ethics and making everything about which candidate is less evil means that some subjects are simply swept under the rug, because they don’t fit the partisan narrative. And in effect the campaign season lasts four years, because people never stop thinking of partisan narratives. Yemen has been in the news lately, but solely because of the raid that went sour, so people could argue about whether Trump was at fault. The bigger issue, which is what the frack are we doing helping the idiot Saudi incompetents starve and murder children, goes pretty much unmentioned most of the time.
    And even on subjects where there is a clear massive distinction, like, say, global warming, we still talk more about the politicians than the issue. Not that I follow that one closely enough myself. But I read the Real Climate blog from time to time and right after the election they said that if you were frantic because of Trump’s victory and its effect on global warming, logically you should have been almost as frantic before. I linked to it a few months back. The phrase I’ve seen there (which applies to me) is “soft climate denial”. That is, most of us who admit the science don’t actually act very much like we believe it. There is a good chance we are on the verge of catastrophe, but it’s more of a tribal talking point. The issue is so vast it is hard to get a handle on and so we do this instead. (This definitely applies to me.)
    If we focused first on issues then of course come election time those of us who see things a certain way will end up voting for the Democrat, unless we have some theory about how voting third party will make things better. That’s a tactical disagreement. But instead how we should vote and how talking about a given issue reflects on how we should vote seems to trump (no pun intended) everything else. So it becomes tribal flag waving.
    As for holding people responsible, this boils down to more tribal flag waving. People yell at each other in comment threads. They read blogs like LGM which spends a good chunk of its time (vastly more than they spend on Yemen) ridiculing celebrities like Sarandon who didn’t support Clinton. I would prefer holding politicians accountable, especially when they support war crimes, but of course that won’t happen. And that’s another thing that’s gone topsy turvy. Nowadays the voter is supposed to have an ethical obligation to support the politician–the politician deserves your vote and has no ethical obligation to try to win it, except by being less evil than the other side.

  186. “The phrase I’ve seen there…”
    That was poorly phrased. Soft climate denial is a phrase I’ve seen somewhere, but I forget where. It wasn’t at Real Climate.

  187. And my point is that we should focus first on issues
    i get what you’re saying but the problem is that – outside of referendums – the US election system is not about issues; it’s about candidates. and per Duverger there will always be two major party candidates who have a valid chance of winning the Presidency. it will always be about the lesser of two evils. that’s simply how the system works.
    and given that, our only choice is to choose the candidate who best represents us across the whole range of issues, and we have to allow for differences on particulars.
    if a pacifist FP is literally your only issue i’m sure Presidential elections are pretty bleak. but is pacifist FP literally the only thing you care about?

  188. Perhaps everyone has moved on, but I just wanted to return to this
    GftNC, the problem with that narrative is that it’s facile and designed to avoid introspection.
    GftNC’s response is close to mine, but I’d amplify it to say that the urge to claim that racism had nothing to do with this election can be seen as avoiding the admission that the US still has a huge problem with racism. So when people say ‘It can’t be racism’, there seems to be a lack of introspection that you are decrying. Of course, if we are only talking about the problems of the Democratic Party, yes, it does betray a lack of introspection, but given both GftNC and my location, we generally aren’t looking at just the Democratic party.
    McT’s suggestion that Obama was sui generis is also possible, but it has me wonder, how long before we have another black president and what does that say about the US?

  189. it has me wonder, how long before we have another black president and what does that say about the US?
    I’d say the answer starts with: How many black** Senators and/or Governors do we have? Because, realistically, someone running for President successfully is going to have had experience as one of those.
    I suppose a black billionaire with a very high media profile could attempt to replicate Trump’s path. But I’m not sure it would work; actually, after this experience I’m not sure how well it would work for anyone with no government experience.
    ** Applies to any other minority group, or women, too of course.

  190. As for holding people responsible, this boils down to more tribal flag waving. People yell at each other in comment threads.
    Despite all the exposition on the goo of the Trump admin, this is what we’re left with (and possibly a PDF). And that doesn’t really bother me. I certainly don’t want to disuade anyone from pointing out the nastiness that results from a Trump presidency. At the same time, I don’t think you’re telling someone like NV anything they don’t already know. Trump supporters are another story.
    Also, too, there’s a lot of space between not wanting to support war crimes and being a pacifist.

  191. Ugh, I think you are wrong in one way. I think you are automatically discounting all the places where Trump was promising things that are simply not possible. And assuming that everybody listening to him would realize that they needed to do the same.
    I agree. I guess I was wondering about NV’s arugment that the Dems think neoliberal corporatism + words (and not action) = win; and thus will double down on same instead of rethinking.
    My response was – to put it differently and perhaps better – that all Trump seemed to have was words and very little action. Indeed, it seems other than withdrawing from the TPP and trying to renegotiate NAFTA he’s following the GOP playbook (other than saying the quite parts loud – but that’s what makes him popular!).
    In any event, on another point, it is very hard to get any traction in the U.S. when the two major political parties agree on something – e.g., DJ’s point on foreign policy. Whenever there is enough traction on an issue that it might threaten one of the parties, then they tend to change their position and adopt the third party point and the third party disappears.
    But in any event, I guess we will have a pretty good real life experiment here on how the Democratic party reacts to the Trump presidency over the next four years and who the nominee is.

  192. In any event, on another point, it is very hard to get any traction in the U.S. when the two major political parties agree on something – e.g., DJ’s point on foreign policy.
    The parties most certainly do not agree on foreign policy, especially if you’re talking about Donald Trump. Democrats are known to make bad deals with the devil. Republicans embrace and emulate the devil. Big difference.

  194. lj: McT’s suggestion that Obama was sui generis is also possible …
    Every election is unique. Yet American presidential elections for many decades have largely adhered to a pattern. Americans tend to re-elect their presidents, then turn around and throw the presidency to the opposite party.
    Was Obama sui generis as an individual? Sure. We are all unique snowflakes. Did his election and re-election fit the typical historical pattern? You bet it did. Just like Dubya’s election and re-election did.
    Racism, lesser-evilism, principled issue-driven voting, “white working class” petulance — all these are fun to talk about, but the American electorate is a creature of habit and that is the zero-th order term in the American political formula.
    He, Trump benefited from the electorate’s failure to kick the habit. He may get re-elected for the same reason. Assuming He does not tweet himself into impeachment or croak in a fit of apoplectic rage, some of us will be trying hard to elect his Democratic opponent in 2020. If we have to do it without help from NV and his “cohort”, tough. We’ll just have to try that much harder.
    –TP

  195. The flip side of this is that the exact same logic applies to pro-corporatist, pro-autocratic-executive, etc. justices appointed to promote the unwavering ideals of the “pragmatic moderates” who we can never, ever dare to challenge.
    I get where you’re coming form here NV. I, too, enjoy reading a good Tom Frank screed (alas Chris Hedges has simply gone ’round the bend). I share a lot of your opinions on “corporate Democrats”.
    The question is, in my humble opinion, one of effective political action, not “morals”.*
    The answer, given the party duopoly we have to endure (until we overthrow the government by force or other violent means), is to unceasingly push the Democratic Party to the left.
    To the left on everything.
    I know you would find it amazing, but that is exactly what has happened over the first years of the 21st century.
    Third parties don’t work. The Green Party, as currently construed, is a hapless joke with its pop leftyism and moronic leadership.
    The answer is to roll up your sleeves, show up at local Dem functions, and give them hell. But if your candidate doesn’t make the general, don’t despair.
    Keep fighting.
    It’s all I have to offer.
    *If you pay taxes, then you effectively do contribute to the maintenance of our corporatist imperium, and implicitly consent to its policies. Hello collective guilt! Walden Pond next!

  196. The parties most certainly do not agree on foreign policy, especially if you’re talking about Donald Trump. Democrats are known to make bad deals with the devil. Republicans embrace and emulate the devil. Big difference.
    I opine this is really overstating the case, Sapient. The consensus across party elites on foreign policy is deep and profound. It has its roots in our expansionist history and our widely held belief in our exceptionalism. It was cemented at the onset of the Cold War, and the devastating social and institutional effects of the subsequent military build-up.
    I mean, fer Christ’s sake, I had to endure the foreign policy tantrums of Henry ‘scoop’ Jackson, an otherwise bog standard liberal, for decades.

  198. I think it comes down to money.
    Tell that to JEB!
    Money is absolutely a necessary condition. But, as Jeb’s experience shows, it isn’t a sufficient one.
    Still, as a response to the question asked (why don’t we see better candidates?), Money is at least a major part of the answer.

  199. Was Obama sui generis as an individual? Sure. We are all unique snowflakes. Did his election and re-election fit the typical historical pattern? You bet it did.
    Did his victory in the general election fit the historical pattern? Sure. The serious anomaly was his getting the nomination in the first place. If you want to evaluate him as a special case, that’s where you need to look.

  200. In an alternative history, Hillary won the Democratic nomination and presidency in 2008, lost it in 2012 to Romney, and we’re now in the first 7 weeks* of Obama’s first term.
    As it is, I do wonder if it was for the best in the long run that Hillary lost this election. Had she won, I think voters would have thrown here out in 2020, possibly for a “normal” GOPer would could hold the presidency for 8 years. As it is, I’m thinking Trump (or Pence) loses in 2020 pretty easily, and we have 8 years of President Dem, followed hopefully by 8 more. Then I can retire.
    *holy mary mother of teenage baby jesus, it’s only been 7 weeks!! We’re so fnckked.

  201. Like what?
    i think the consequences are baked in. no need for the likes of me to do anything.
    support for the less evil candidate is a choice one makes sort of in passing
    no, it’s not. it’s a choice one makes between available options.
    look, if you don’t like anybody and just don’t want to vote, nobody’s gonna make you. your vote, your choice.
    my vote, my choice.
    want to tell me my vote makes me culpable for whatever crap the government does, that’s fine. your failure to support anyone does the same for you.
    The question is, in my humble opinion, one of effective political action, not “morals”.
    IMO life would be simpler if folks didn’t look for moral purity from the political sphere.
    Again IMO the political sphere is about managing public life. Mostly it’s finding workable compromises between competing rights and interests.
    It can help prevent people from acting in harmful ways, but it’s not going to make them good.

  202. I mean, fer Christ’s sake, I had to endure the foreign policy tantrums of Henry ‘scoop’ Jackson, an otherwise bog standard liberal, for decades.
    Different now. I’ll take American exceptionalism over “I love Putin, Erdogan and Duterte – strong handsome men!”

  203. So, like, this, via our old pal Gary Farber on FB, is both sad and scary.
    Yes, when I was writing my list of goo (as I was leaving to do something else earlier) I thought of this, as I’d read it already. I completely understated my list of goo, and this is one small bit of proof.

  204. One reason that one can tell that “goo” is bad, is that Goo-Gone™ is awesome.

  205. So when people say ‘It can’t be racism’, there seems to be a lack of introspection that you are decrying.
    As mentioned earlier, I had a larger comment that my phone ate. I still don’t feel like trying to cobble it back together, but… “it’s the X, stupid” is normally shorthand for “X was the most important thing in the election” – and I think that’s a pretty far cry from “the US still has a prominent problem with racism”. A stronger case was not made by your presentation of a pat narrative about why 2008 & 2012 definitely meant nothing contra the supremacy of racism in the election – if anything, it presented what appeared (and lacking further elaboration, preferable with sources, appears) to be an unfalsifiable narrative. The tone that I took from your comment was very much “Obama winning in 2008 & 2012 doesn’t contradict the supremacy of racism in determining the 2016 election, it supports it!” – perhaps that was an uncharitable reading, perhaps not… but it’s what I took from it (in blurb paraphrase form).
    Basically, there’s a lot of daylight between a claim that racism was not the primary – let alone only significant – factor leading to support for Trump, and your (and e.g. LGM as demonstrated in Ugh’s link, but it’s not just them even if they’re a particularly cartoonish example) characterization of leftier critiques as assertions that racism had nothing to do with support for Trump. And when you characterize a refusal to uncritically assert that racism (and cf GftNC, misogyny) were the driving factors in the election, you really do look like you’re retreating into a (familiar) fortified bubble of identity politics where ostentatious but frequently symbolic shows of pious demographic solidarity are more important than concrete policy.

  206. Trump seemed to have was words and very little action.
    I responded to this in what my phone ate, and was well on my way to re-responding on my desktop just now when the power went out. Perhaps this response isn’t meant to be. If I’m feeling stubborn perhaps I’ll give it a third try tomorrow…

  211. This notion of a reasonable Republican presidential candidate is at odds with reality. The entire field in the 2012 primaries denied the reality of anthropogenic global warming. The 2008 candidate chose Sarah Palin for VP. Before that we had the fantastically incompetent GW Bush as president. The evidence is that any candidate who gets through the Republican primaries would be an very bad president.
    Yes, Trump reaches a new extreme of turpitude and ignorance. But let’s not lower the bar that far. There are many political questions on which reasonable people can disagree, but the least we should require of people in power is that they should make important decisions on the basis of the best available information, carefully considered, and with due regard for the interests of all citizens. Which Republican candidate this millennium would do that?

  212. but… “it’s the X, stupid” is normally shorthand for “X was the most important thing in the election” – and I think that’s a pretty far cry from “the US still has a prominent problem with racism”.
    I have to note that I was responding to this:
    they didn’t manage to defeat Obama, so crediting/blaming them for the result of this election seems like a real stretch.
    I also didn’t direct my ire at wj, but about the argument (that Obama’s 2 terms indicates the lack of racism), so that shouldn’t be factored in) that I have seen people make.
    This formulation, which seems to say that racism (and sexism?) was not a significant factor in the election seems to diminish the role of racism and sexism. I’d like to think I’d push back if someone said ‘well the only reason Trump won was because of racism’, but I’m sure no one here would offer that opinion, at least so baldly. I also think that there’s a bit of difference between pushing back and asserting initially. Maybe this was all expressed in the post on your phone, but I’m not the NSA.
    Perhaps I (and GftNC) are just retreating into familiar bubbles, but I think that it is a lot harder to confront the embedded racism and sexism in society, so that seems to be more of a pressing problem and a challenge than trying to argue that it is all economics. I could see us sorting out some issues of economic pain for some people and at least make things better without addressing this. That’s essentially what happened with the New Deal, and it seems that whoever follows the Cheeto Jesus is probably going to have to make some FDR like decisions.
    And it seems to me that a lot of the tropes of the Trump administration are essentially racist tropes, and he’s following the fascist game plan of demonizing the other and then trying to extract their wealth (cf current plans for health insurance). They are of a piece with calls to punish the undocumented, but not challenge the employers.
    Is the argument unfalsifiable? Perhaps, but if you have some fact or facts that explain why we have such a resurgence of racism towards the various others, from Mexicans and Asians to Jews and African Americans, that is not somehow connected to this election at this time, I’d love to hear it. Until then, if someone says that one _can’t_ credit/blame racism for Trump’s election, I’ll probably push back.

  213. In another Open Thread wander, I just noticed something.
    One of the constants across my lifetime is commercials in support of the armed forces and veterans by the First Lady (and, often, the Vice President’s wife as well). But I don’t recall those ads ever lasting across administrations. Maybe there are no ads for a while, but the old ones are gone as of the inauguration. And yet tonight, 6 weeks into the new administration, here are Mrs Obama and Mrs Biden speaking up for the troops on my TV.
    I’m not sure where to go with this. Or whether it says anything significant at all. But it seemed . . . odd. (Then again, maybe it’s just memory loss on my part.)

  214. I hope Deep State makes the tourney this year.
    It went off at 4-1 in the 3rd race at Gulfstream Park today, but came in dead last.

  215. the least we should require of people in power is that they should make important decisions on the basis of the best available information, carefully considered, and with due regard for the interests of all citizens.
    i thought of several snarky replies to this but thought better of them.
    suffice it to say that this remains at best an aspirational goal for us here in the US

  218. Another wander, from 538. I’m dubbing this “The Great Sorting.” Catchy, right? I should work in advertising.

  219. Among the 38 trademarks granted by China to Donald trump’s business empire, which he has not divested, are trump-branded massage parlors and escort services in that country.
    I expect Rod Dreher over at the American Conservative will not be predicting a “happy ending” for this development. Although for an extra 5000 yuan you can have the hands-free Benedick Option.
    Job creatIon.
    Brought to you by full of shit America.

  220. Here’s the hard truth: There is a fundamental synergy between Democratic chauvinist exceptionalism, GOP clash-of-civilizations dogma, and Trump’s grotesque strongman antics.
    I don’t buy it, bobbyp. Democratic chauvinist exceptionalism is similar to what it’s been for awhile, post-Vietnam, which is occasional humanitarian or anti-terroist interventionism muted by international diplomacy. And, yes, for good reason, Democrats are p.o.’d at Putin.
    The next words in the article are these “The Democrats may prefer a reboot of Cold War apocalypticism; Trump, for his part, looks eager to tear up global treaties, toss international law aside, and throw American weight around in building a new twenty-first century order of Great Powers. Maybe he will get his way, maybe he won’t. Maybe one of the parties will produce a more telegenic, more reasonable, and more “moderate” leader down the line. Any of these scenarios, though, skirts ever closer to disaster, and all take as unspoken that the essential business of the American state is a fundamental orientation toward war.”
    The author, Patrick Blanchfield, whose expertise is not foreign policy but English and psychiatry is more interested in exposing “the violence of the American soul” than offering a true analysis of policy. He may be right that our soul is violent, but the article really offers nothing substantive to prove the “synergy”.

  221. “… that the essential business of the American state human animal is a fundamental orientation toward war.”
    FTFY.

  227. From today’s NYT, a piece with comment and analysis on the very subjects lj, NV and I were arguing about: what contributed to the swing towards the GOP and Trump and away from the Dems. It seems we were all right:)

  228. it’s odd how both parties are perpetually either in the wilderness or dominating for a generation.
    they can’t just win or lose. it has to be existential.

  229. The last sentence of the NYT piece GFTNC linked:
    The next question is whether the Republican Party will be able to continue to exploit this mix or whether it will boil over in ways that cannot be predicted.
    Like russell writes, good luck to all.

  230. NV should read this from LGM. I, for one, would greatly appreciate his take.
    When it comes to “lesser evilism”, the Loomis post presents a viewpoint that is pretty much where I’m coming from when not on my lips from too much box wine.

  231. I don’t buy it, bobbyp.
    I am not surprised. Better the chin stroking reading another Fallows piece…you know, the Fallows who came out, however reluctantly, for the invasion of Iraq.
    Look, Russia tried to influence our election. This should really not be a big deal. Do we not interfere in other nations elections when we deem it in our interests to do so (Ukraine, which see)? What is the difference?
    Russia has territorial interests. It always has. It traditionally has been pretty brutal about it. There are reasons.
    We ignore, and blow off all of them.
    I hold no brief for a thug like Putin, but our policy of high moral dungeon is not particularly effective in attaining the goals it professes wrt Russia.
    The real crime, for us, is the distinct possibility that organized actors in our country consciously assisted and cooperated with Russia to attain political power.
    This is more commonly called treason.

  232. they can’t just win or lose. it has to be existential.
    Well, most of the time there is a lot at stake.

  233. The real crime, for us, is the distinct possibility that organized actors in our country consciously assisted and cooperated with Russia to attain political power.
    That, of course. But also that some here have made the conscious decision to avoid any investigation of it.

  234. bobbyp: James Fallows on Iraq. And he links to this. It’s worth refreshing your memory.
    He’s wise, honest and thorough. I wish there were more like him, but he’s a treasure.

  235. The real crime, for us, is the distinct possibility that organized actors in our country consciously assisted and cooperated with Russia to attain political power.
    This is more commonly called treason.
    Absolutely.

  238. I’ve been looking here since my comment linking to the James Fallows articles, and (admirably) people are busy doing other stuff.
    Let me say what my take was (as I remember it – hope my memory is correct). I was against the Iraq war, but mostly because I didn’t trust Bush to lead the effort. So, as most people here accuse me of being, my instinct was tribalist. Or maybe not. Maybe I people had earned my trust who had demonstrated the kind of thinking that James Fallows exhibited in his articles.
    The fact is: we’re not all foreign policy experts, not on every aspect of every country in the world. But we do have people in our country (sometimes they are immigrants from important regions) who know what’s happening, and who make judgments. Over and over again, the “establishment” Democrats use the observations of people who have studied, who speak the language, who care. That doesn’t give them superhuman infallibility, but it does, IMO, give them some authority.
    When you read the Fallows articles, you witness that thinking.

  239. Answering Cleek–
    No, foreign policy isn’t my only issue. If it was I would vote third party. The lesser evil issues are domestic politics and the environment. Global warming denial drives me nuts ( though as I said earlier I am in effect a soft denier, not actually acting on what I believe.)
    I rant about foreign policy because it matters and because some of our worst actions receive little attention because both parties are guilty. But I still vote for the Democrats for other reasons. I often just lurk here when other issues are discussed, mostly because I don’t think I have anything to add.
    I read the LGM piece by Loomis. It was pretty good. LGM can carry good posts, but I think they also have some pretty stupid ones– the emotionalism Loomis condemns in the third party left is also on display in the self styled pragmatist types and in some LGM posts. I end up agreeing that third party voting is not the answer, but much of the arguing against it often becomes yet another form of emotional self indulgence. But that particular piece was LGM at its best.

  240. I meant a different LGM post, but I can’t find it. Ugh just linked to another about the disappeared and people who die trying to enter our country which was also very good– I had not thought of it in those chilling terms.

  241. OK, so apparently 2 days ago Mike Flynn registered his consulting company as a foreign agent. Doing work for the Turkish government.
    Registered *retroactively*. As in, he was cashing checks from the Turks while working the Trump campaign.
    “Trump knew nothing”, says Spicer. Or, he doesn’t know that he knew. Or something.
    I’m not even surprised by this crap anymore.
    I don’t really care why people voted for Trump. It’s interesting in a sort of academic way, but it’s sort of a sideshow.
    The real show is that this is a straight-up banana republic money grab. They have billions, but they want every last dime. They have more than they could even spend in ten lifetimes, but they want your stuff, too.
    They want no regulation because they want to get all of the fucking oil out of the ground before political and general world market condiions make it not so valuable. If they poison your water in the process, sucks to be you.
    They want to privatize every public institution they can get their hands on so that they can redirect all of that nice public money into their own pockets. If that leaves you in the cold, sucks to be you.
    They want tax cuts, because they want to keep their fucking money. Too bad for you.
    The Trump administration and the (R) Congress wants to siphon every available dollar into the already more than full pockets of rich folks. Including their own.
    The interesting Russian connection with Trump is not Putin, it’s with all of the little Russian ex-pat mafiosi he’s been doing real estate business with in NY and elsewhere. That, and whatever the hell the deal is with the Ukraine.
    The Trump boys who are running dad’s shop “at arm’s length” are traveling the world selling the enhanced Trump brand for top dollar.
    $200K to join Mar-e-Lago now.
    The politics are interesting, the sociology makes for a good read.
    The reality is that the folks that already have absurd amounts of money aren’t satisfied yet. They want more.
    If you don’t already have some money socked away, you’re fucked. If you work for yourself and need to buy insurance, you’re fucked. If you have any kind of health issue and don’t already have insurance, you’re fucked.
    If you don’t have some kind of white collar professional accreditation or resume, you’re going to scramble to make more than $15/hour. You’re probably not going to get benefits. If you get sick you’re not going to get paid. Depending on how sick you are, maybe you will just freaking die.
    Sucks to be you.
    If you try to sneak in to the country with your kids, they’re going to take your kids away from you. God knows what happens after that.
    Root, hog, or die. It’s always been part of the American character, now it’s going to be our national policy at every level and in every context.
    Watch your wallet, cover your ass, limit your exposure to risk if you can. Batten down the freaking hatches.
    These guys are thieves, and they are pros.
    Be safe out there, and good luck to all.

  244. Sapient,
    I get the feeling that you would have supported the invasion if it had been led by a Democratic president, but water, bridge.
    At the beginning of the widely read article, “The Fifty-First State?”, Fallows wrote, “I began my research sharing the view, prevailing in Washington this year, that forcing “regime change” on Iraq was our era’s grim historical necessity”.
    While fairly balanced, there is no indication that Fallows abjured that view after his talks with policymakers, generals, politicians, professors, etc.
    Wisely, he was worried about the reverberating long term effects of “regime change”. And his judgements about what could go wrong were pretty spot on. But I feel that in the end, he felt it was perhaps, maybe, who knows? kinda’ worth the (very very high) risk, the mendacity of the Bush administration notwithstanding.
    You might check out his “recollections” here.
    He may well have been against the invasion as he kinda’ sorta claims, but certainly not in anything approaching a full throated roar of opposition. And his excuse that you are trapped by the knowledge you have at the time is pretty damned lame, because all that knowledge was there at the time.
    He just missed it. Millions of others did not.

  247. More to feed the Russell beast:
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/house-gop-quietly-advances-key-elements-of-tort-reform/2017/03/09/d52213b2-0414-11e7-b1e9-a05d3c21f7cf_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-more-top-stories_tort-910pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.7ad2053b62ec
    “During House debate Thursday, Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas), who introduced the Lawsuit Abuse Reduction Act, said the effort is intended to rebalance a justice system that has tilted too far in favor of plaintiff’s attorneys and their clients.”
    Yes, those poor corporations always being taken advantage of

  248. Somehow, a Lawsuit Abuse Reduction Act doesn’t seem like something that is likely to get Trump’s support. (But maybe the fine print grants him special treatment….)

  249. LGM can carry good posts, but I think they also have some pretty stupid ones
    Not meaning to rag on Donald here, as I’ve cited LGM and used it as a short hand, but I can’t believe that they are any more organized than we are here, which is to say, not very. Any references I make to the ‘hive mind’ here are done only because it is the exact opposite. This is one reason I really want to see what someone says, a link, so I know (or think I know) that someone actually typed the words that have someone worked up. I realize it is unavoidable, and I realize that people can match tone, but it’s not really good to think that a collective of part time blog writers represent a unitary view. I imagine, if things got so bad, someone would leave or someone would be kicked out, so you could argue that there is a world view encompassed by all the posters that is on display, but I can’t imagine it is something to take as an actual entity. I realize that it is a shorthand that is not going away, but it is good to understand that this doesn’t really portray the reality.

  252. While (obviously) agreeing with russell about most of what he says, I (obviously) disagree about not caring to know why people voted for Trump. Knowledge is power, and if we want to avoid a similar thing happening again, we need to understand why it happened this time. I link to something I found interesting, and some of you may too, although I am unsure what conclusion to draw from it:
    https://www.nyu.edu/about/news-publications/news/2017/march/trump-clinton-debates-gender-reversal.html

  253. I would say that, as a generalization, folks voted for Trump because they did not believe the national government spoke for them and their interests.
    That covers a lot of ground.
    In some cases, I’m sympathetic and think we should do our utmost to give those folks a voice.
    In other cases, my feeling is I’ll see you in hell, boyo.
    It’s kind of a mixed bag.
    In any case, if folks wear their “F*** your feelings” shirt to the conversation, or lead off with “suck it up, buttercup”, we’re not going to get very far. Just saying.
    Alot of folks voted for Trump, more folks voted against him. They had a good election, well done. Hope they don’t let it go to their heads.
    Their guy needs to get off his ass and figure out how to do his job.

  254. At least they decreasing the surplus population.
    Obviously there is something wrong with white culture. Perhaps too many unwed mothers? If we threw a lot more of them in prison, we could solve this problem.
    /sarcasm

  258. i like how the GOP’s replacement to the Affordable Care Act is called the American Health Care Act.
    1. make sure the acronyms are similar, to maximize confusion
    2. replace the “Affordable” with a meaningless reference to “conservatives'” favorite fetish object: America!
    3. profits!

  259. you fucked up, you trusted us!
    the Affordable Care Act becomes the American Health Care Act by chopping off the “Affordable” and tacking on a content-free reference to conservatives’ favorite love object.
    smart.

  261. No, though I just liberated two of your comments from the spam bin (casualties were light).
    Not sure why it seems that your username gets you spam-canned from time to time.

  263. if we want to avoid a similar thing happening again, we need to understand why it happened this time
    i’m not sure how we overcome spite, tribalism and the ability to easily ignore all information that doesn’t confirm what your gut tells you.
    if we can’t agree on facts nor on who to trust for factual information, ‘common ground’ will vanish.
    and i blame this thing right here: the internet.

  266. CNN headline right now: “Trump’s on Track to Deliver 25 Million Jobs in 10 Years”
    Just fncking shoot me. And how long are Presidential terms now?

  267. It started metastasizing with talk radio.
    definitely.
    and then FOX News
    It started, I believe, with Reagan’s abolition of the Fairness Doctrine, but who knows what would have happened with the internet in the event he had not succeeded in abolishing it.

  268. On jobs and Trump, this and this. I really like how, at the first link, he points out that the good jobs numbers were fake when Obama was president, but they’re real now.
    What Trump can say legitimately is that he hasn’t managed to ruin the economy (yet).

  269. It started, I believe, with Reagan’s abolition of the Fairness Doctrine…
    Yes. This is what spawned “conservative” talk radio.

  270. Nope. I blame home schooling. Kids in public schools not only get better socialization, they end up with a common understanding of what facts and reliable sources of information are.
    Of course, that’s the main goal of home schooling: to avoid that common understanding.

  273. Hey, he’s doing the best he can. He inherited the worst recovery in history. So of he continues to do nothing then the job numbets should continue to go up, and finally the participation rates are going up to, so just the idea of Trumpi is not only igniting the markets but the actual economy too. Imagine if he ever did anything. Well, about the economy. So it looks to me like four more years of the Obama agenda. Do mostly nothing and take credit for everything

  274. The worst recovery is better than one of the worst downturns. He’s not tasked with avoiding another Great Depression.
    (I write that suspecting you were being at least party tongue in cheek there, Marty.)

  277. How can you be “on track for X in 10 years” after 2 months?
    I’ll be on track for being in Chicago on time when I drive to the end of my block, but I wouldn’t bet money on it actually happening.

  278. So it looks to me like four more years of the Obama agenda. Do mostly nothing and take credit for everything
    If people’s lives improve, I don’t really give a crap if he takes credit for it or not.
    When you’re POTUS you get the credit and take the blame, regardless of whether it’s your fault or not.

  279. Wait, I thought the view was that Obama was acting as a dictator, now it’s “do nothing.” So confused.

  280. Based on my track record since waking up this morning, I’m not going to sleep for the rest of my life. And I can’t even imagine how much coffee and oatmeal I should consume if I live to a reasonably old age, given my per-hour intake.

  283. Marty, you typed that with one hand, right?
    and the other was holding your MAGA pom-pom.

  284. So it looks to me like four more years of the Obama agenda.
    jobs have increased every month for the past 76 consecutive months.
    bring it on.

  285. So it looks to me like four more years of the Obama agenda. Do mostly nothing and take credit for everything..
    Insofar as Obama prevented the Brownbackalkinazation of our country by the rabid lunatic infested GOP Congress, no, not so much.
    Thank your lucky stars.

  287. A day after the MYT writes a propaganda piece about Russia Today as propaganda they write another propaganda piece about the moral authority we allegedly used to have.
    So before the election, Obama and Democrats were criticized because “truth to power”! Now I wonder what it’s about. And I’m also not really understanding the Russia love.
    I guess an eye roll is the best response.

  291. Drum on the state department.
    To answer your question Kevin – yes he is under orders, likely from Bannon. Negotiating and “diplomatic relationships” are for losers. Military might and bombing the bomb bomb bomb is for the winners of winning, the best. So who needs the state department?

  292. I don’t think this is anything at all about the State Department actually. Bannon’s strategy for “the deconstruction of the administrative state” seems to involve avoiding appointing any of the senior people needed for cabinet departments to do their jobs.
    Defense is probably going to be able to function, thanks to being able to pull in members of the military to, in effect, fill the slots on an “acting” basis. But the rest of the executive branch** is headed for the same kind of chaos that is so evident in the White House.
    ** The legislative branch, under its current leadership (to use the term loosely), appears to be entirely capable of descending into chaos without help from the executive branch. Thus sparing Bannon the need to devote any effort there.

  293. I don’t love Russia, so don’t strain yourself too hard trying to understand a nonexistent phenomenon. The point was more a pot kettle thing, both with respect to US and Russian foreign policies and also with the NYT and RT. The NYT doesn’t bother seeking out people to quote who might say that America’s moral authority was not quite what some Americans thought even before Trump. It’s funny seeing the NYT presume to be an objective judge of what is or isn’t propaganda.

  294. It’s funny seeing the NYT presume to be an objective judge of what is or isn’t propaganda.
    On the other hand, it’s not a state-run newspaper, whose government murders dissenting journalists. At least, not yet.
    Not that I’m a huge fan of some of the things the NYT has done. But sorry. Not same same. And kind of a weird thing to focus on with all that’s going on, but that’s your calling, apparently.

  295. I shall abjure my commitment to left wing obstructionism, and agree with wj above. There is no need to pass legislation to “hollow out” the New Deal state. Simply place people in charge who do not share the agency mission, fire those who you can fire, let attrition take care of more employees at time passes (already baked into the cake-sequester which see)…and pretty soon, what do you have?
    Pure communism! Well, perhaps not. Maybe ChasWT can help us out here.

  296. The NYT is a constant interest of mine because I think they are a source of propaganda in foreign policy. With Trump, some of his critics in both parties and in the press are not people I trust or like when it comes to foreign policy– to use a phrase I think you used once, I don’t have a dog in the fight between Trump and people like Michael Morell. On many other issues such as health care, undocumented people, civil rights in general and global warming, Trump is absolutely terrible. On foreign policy, he is terrible in new uncharted ways, but the idea that we had moral authority to lose is a sick joke.
    And on a completely unrelated and apolitical matter, suitable for an open thread, here is a paper on the possibility we have detected aliens using light sails. It’s the weekend– I don’t want to argue politics too much.
    https://arxiv.org/pdf/1701.01109.pdf#page6

  297. I think you miss part of the story when you consign the NYT to propaganda. An element of propaganda has to be the conscious manipulation of the audience. The reason the NYT does what it does not because they are trying to manipulate the audience, they do it because there is an uncritical acceptance of American and Western mythos that leads to reportage that is horrified that Russia meddled in our election, but ignores that this was a feature of innumerable post WWII interventions. As a historical parallel, headlining ‘Remember the Maine’ is propaganda, writing about Manifest Destiny is not. While it may put you in the same place, you address someone in the former category, they are going to try harder to fool people, in the latter category, they are just not going to understand.

  298. Still on the subject of propaganda, this video keeps appearing on my twitter feed.
    Again, I’ve been angry at the NYTimes for a lot of things, almost to the point of stopping my subscription, but this kind of tactic is a different animal when you’re using the word “propaganda”. The administration has no credibility, and doesn’t even think we deserve a pretense. At some point, a crisis may arise when they’ll be our main source of information. That’s terrifying.

  299. It’s a weekend, it’s an open thread, and by God there should be other preoccupations on the horizon. So I put forward, for anyone who is interested, a conversation I had with a muso friend last weekend in London. He was playing me loads of covers I had never heard of great Leonard Cohen songs, and I said “Wow, he really is higher in the Tower of Song than he estimated”, to which my friend said matter-of-factly “Oh yes, he’s number 2.” I asked him with interest who was number one, and he said, as if it was obvious (actually, it is to me) “Bob Dylan”. And then he said “Bruce Springsteen is number 3”.
    So my question is, to anybody who cares to contribute: “Which songwriters are on, say, the top 10 floors of the Tower of Song?” For the purposes of this game, I think they have to be singer-songwriters who a) wrote both the lyrics and the music (excludes say Carole King), b) are individuals (excludes, to avoid e.g. impassioned advocacy by the Count, Lennon-McCartney) and let’s say are 1960s or later (to exclude people to numerous to mention). Anybody interested?

  303. Also, I was trying to exclude pure, perfect skill with words (e.g. Irving Berlin and say Puttin on the Ritz) to let in songs written, as it were, sincerely from the heart and to engage the heart.

  305. GftNC,
    Two singer-songwriters who meet your all your criteria:
    Tom Lehrer and Georges Brassens.
    Neither of them is a household name, I grant you, although Brassens may well be the Dylan of the Francophone world. But for me personally, their songs encapsulate most of my outlook on politics, philosophy, and everything.
    –TP

  306. Tom Lehrer was wonderful, I grant you, but I think personally that his appeal is mainly intellectual, which to me makes him incomplete when considering the very top floors. Have never heard of Georges Brassens, but will search him out. Perhaps 10 is too many, in any case, the top 3 seems more doable.

  307. Dylan
    Cohen
    Springsteen
    Kristofferson
    Paul Simon
    Jackson Browne
    Randy Newman
    Townes van Zandt
    Tracy Chapman
    A hundred more tied

  308. Hi Marty, thanks for playing. I see you accept my friend’s top three – very interesting. I rate them all very highly too. Hadn’t thought of Kristofferson, although I had a fierce crush on him in my youth. I don’t know many of his songs, with the exception of the wonderful Me and Bobby McGee and Sunday Morning Coming Down. I think I would have put Paul Simon in there somewhere, and Randy Newman is a genius too, of course. I was also pretty sure Ray Davies of the Kinks should be up there, but I don’t know how well known they are in the States (although I bet the Count knows all about them!) Jackson Brown: I know hardly any of his songs, except Running on Empty. Interesting biographical note though: when Leonard Cohen was obsessed with Nico, who would have nothing to do with him sexually (probably the basis of One of Us Cannot be Wrong), she told him she liked pretty boys and was therefore having an affair with Jackson Browne. Tower of Songwise, I also have a soft spot for James Taylor, whose album Sweet Baby James was/is a longtime fave of mine. And I’m guessing many people would put Joni Mitchell very high on the list as well. That’s all I’ve got, but then, as must be obvious, I’m no muso.

  309. In no particular order, ten more:
    Joni Mitchell
    Smokey Robinson
    Pete Townschend
    Chrissie Hynde
    James Brown
    Ray Davies
    Neil Young
    David Bowie
    Brian Wilson (wrote enough of the lyrics to make it)
    George Harrison
    Marvin Gaye. #11
    Some guilty pleasures:
    Laura Nyro
    Jimmy Webb
    Elvis Costello
    Curtis Mayfield
    Paul Westerberg
    Look em up, they still fill up the jukeboxes:
    Bert Bens
    Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil (one for the music and one for the lyrics, but together they were the glue for pop music)
    Chuck Berry for good measure and because Lennon said so

  310. GFNTC:
    Gotcha cross-posting on a couple of those. My mother, somehow, I guess because she said to the record store person at the time “my son likes something called the British Invasion, whatever that is”, left me the Kinks first album under the xmas tree, the most exciting present she ever gave me, outside of maybe the visible brain model several years before that.
    I was 13.
    If she was here, she’d say “THAT was from Santa Claus”
    I still have that piece of worn vinyl.

  311. Its interesting that Ray Davies would have been very high for me, the Kinks were very well known in the circles I ran in and my best friend was a huge fan, but I kind of skipped anyone that was primarily associated with a band. Thus discounting Glenn Frey and Don Henley together AND separately. I love James Taylor, and know most every song he wrote. I felt he wasn’t quite better than Tracy who’s music I don’t know as well but filled a spot in my emotional life. I grew up in the era of the singer/songwriter in a family of them (well friends and family) so I like this game.
    As for the top three, I wasn’t thinking through ranking them but Dylan and Kristofferson are my top two hands down.
    *WARNING: This part was mixed in but OT so if interested I moved it down here
    Then there is Crosby, Stills , Nash, Young and all the people they wrote with, the world was in a constant state of hopeful change, politically and culturally. We saw the future as bright and the music reflected that hope. Both in the words and the integrated musical styles of, say, Paul Simon.
    All of whom were influenced by the beat poets of the 60’s, words were allowed to express things, as the Eagles put it, that we couldn’t say out loud. A tradition that I think struggles today. Since there are no limits on what can be said people don’t seem too rely on music to make these statements. But I am old so I might be missing them.

  312. Neil Young – of course! Pete Townsend, maybe, but not quite in my top 10. Bert Berns: I’d never heard of him, but this is partly why I proposed this game – just looked him up: Twist and Shout! Piece of My Heart! Fab, Count, many thanks.
    Also Van Morrison should be in there somewhere, and maybe Mike Scott of the Waterboys? I came late to the latter, but Fisherman’s Blues is a great album. But maybe to true musos like some of you, these should also be in the guilty pleasures category….

  313. Thanks to anybody who contributed (which doesn’t mean you should stop now!) It’s been a somewhat melancholy day for various reasons, and this game has turned it rather brighter. Marty, I went to see a very early gig of Crosby Stills and Nash at the Albert Hall, they hadn’t long been a band and I seem to remember it as being pre-Young. They were wonderful, but not as good as they became with him. Yes, from memory, the future did seen rather brighter then.
    Good night to all.

  314. my personal favorite songwriter-per-se is probably john prine. next would be cohen, especially from “i’m your man” on – he started to let his sense of humor show, and he is funnt as hell.
    other personal favorites not yet mentioned are becker and fagan, and joe henry, who i don’t think a lot of folks are hip to. more folks should hear him.
    stevie wonder, people will be playing his stuff 100 years from now. jeff tweedy, “jesus etc” is one of my favorite songs ever. on the folkie tip, greg brown, richard shindell, ferron.
    fun topic!

  317. Taylor and Morrison, of course, but after their early stuff, too much repetition of a good thing.
    But you won’t find too many albums like Sweet Baby James and Astral Weeks that captured moments in time and for me, at least, can still conjure them when I’m in the mood.
    Al Green.
    Billy Joel, though I hated his early stuff.
    For a certain kind of solid American pop song …. Tom Petty.

  319. Somehow Mud Slide Slim ended up being my favorite James Taylor album. And yes, over the years the albums became similar and it was a song here and there that captured something special.

  320. Couldn’t resist a further peek. I’ve never heard of Prine, he seems to have a huge discography. could someone please recommend say three of the best or most representative songs (hard to define I know), and I’ll listen tomorrow. Still reeling from Benny Anderson, wj, if you mean the guy from Abba!

  321. I had a crazy crush on Laura Nyro, actually a girl who played Laura Nyro’s songs for me in her dorm room, but they’ve kind of melded in memory. I got to see Nyro in a small outside venue in Boulder, Colorado just a few years before her untimely (aren’t they all) passing.
    She was kind of in Carole King’s shadow back in the day, but she came out of that street corner acapella urban genre of singing the living shite harmony out of stuff, back when black girls were doing it but the white girl got the job at the Brill Building doing it professionally.
    Her voice, almost always against a fully mic-ed (spelling?) piano only, was incredibly erotic to my tin-eared teenaged sensibilities, like a sloe-eyed girl singing from a fourth floor urban fire escape to the lonely boy in the street below.
    Her cover of “Walk On By” kills me.
    Let me put it this way. When I learned decades later that she was a lesbian, I thought, well, if I ever ran into her, I could adjust my hetero male self and get with the program.
    Johnny Cash was never my favorite for his own stuff, but I really like his late in life nearly Biblical covers of others’ songs.
    Anyway, these names we are throwing out are Mt. Rushmore anthemic sources.
    I’d like to hear who some younger folks believe are great song writers of recent vintage.
    I’ll bet cleek and Russell have some hot names not yet mentioned.
    Leon Russell could write a song.

  325. Johnny Cash was never my favorite for his own stuff, but I really like his late in life nearly Biblical covers of others’ songs.
    Off to youtube!

  327. GftNC,
    (John Prine) My Dad loved to play Paradise when we would spend Saturday nights sitting around with guitars and trade songs. His Dad grew up in Appalachia so I think it was special to him, and then me. Spanish Pipedream was one of the first songs that was “our” song with a distant but fond memory. Hello in there is awesome and , of Angel from Montgomery has been covered(Bonnie Raitt did it best) by everyone that didn’t get to sing it with him. And that covers one album or so.
    Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Leon Russell, Jerry Jeff, Guy Clark, Steve Earle, Townes van Zandt and the gang were a distinct breed that told wonderful stories. Maybe cowboy poets is too much but if you get a chance to listen to Guy Clarks Randall Knife then its hard to say they ain’t.

  328. Prine: Blue Embrella, Souveneirs, Christmas In Prison, A Good Time, Far From Me. That last is John Prine’s favorite John Prine song.
    Paradise is one of my favorite songs in the world, a buddy of mine would do that song and I’d sing the high harmony.
    another buddy of mine, very good songwriter in a kind of alt-roots-rock style, somehow snagged a ticket to the new england PEN songwriters award ceremony at the kennedy library here in Boston last year. the honorees were prine and tom waits, who should also be on the list. performers were elvis costello, john mellencamp, and rosanne cash. peter wolf was in the audience. my buddy just turned 50, it was fun to watch him turn into a total teenage fan boy.
    the story goes that prine was the co-writer of city of new orleans, but he gave his share of the rights to steve goodman. because goodman had health problems and needed a hand.
    cowboy poetry :
    IMO that is 100% right on, TX has one of the richest songwriting traditions in the world. to marty’s list i’d add robert earl keen and townes van zandt. van zandt ended up in TN but he was TX born, and he would absolutely be on my short list. pancho and lefty, tecumseh county, and on and on.
    This could go on for days.
    I don’t know all that much popular music after, say, 1990. cleek is your man, I really don’t know too many people with an equally encyclopedic knowledge of what’s out there.
    cleek has really really good taste.

  329. Leon Russell could write a song.
    I love his work. I saw him and Eric Clapton several years ago at the Royal Albert Hall. Part of the excitement was the Royal Albert Hall itself, but it was a mighty good concert.
    I’m glad, Count, that you acknowledged Laura Nyro. She was one of the most important musicians to me in my formative years. Joni Mitchell too. Both represented feminism in a very sensual way, which was not the “look” of feminism generally back then.

  331. Joe Henry, if you don’t already know his stuff.
    Also, too: Warren Zevon. Everybody knows “werewolves”, which is kind of an entertaining party trick, but check out “Indifference Of Heaven” or “My Shits Fucked Up”.

  333. late to this party, i guess …
    Gillian Welch ? i’m not sure how much David Rawlings contributes to the songs they do under her name – which potentially violates the ‘individual’ rule.
    all of my other big names (Young, Simon, Mitchell, Bowie, Costello) have been covered.
    these might be controversial:
    Lucinda Williams
    Robyn Hitchcock
    Sting
    Donovan

  336. though you might not know it if you only know Loser and Devil’s Haircut, Beck can write a hell of a song.
    Tanya Donnely (Breeders, Belly, solo) is a great songwriter. she’s been quietly releasing album after album of her lovely melodic rock, for many years.
    Fiona Apple. she had a couple of hits in the late 90s, and if that’s all you know of her, you’ve missed out of several fantastic albums. she’s a force of nature.
    Liz Phair showed great promise, but kindof fizzled.

  340. Best Fiona Apple album after her first?
    i can’t do it. they’re all equally good, IMO.

  341. i keep trying to say B.O.B. M.A.R.L.E.Y., and FYObWi keeps eating my comment and then blocking the name i used.

  343. Oh, you snooty elitists, I just can’t compete.
    Say Weird Al’s VERY FIRST concert tho. That’s good for some geek cred, isn’t it?

  344. As far as more recent singers are concerned, it’s a bit early to tell, but I’d keep an eye on Sara Bareilles. Anyone who can recast a Type Ia supernova as a love story has a storytelling future.

  345. LJ–I don’t want to nterfere in the music discussion, but maybe tomorrow I will reply on NYT propaganda and also sapient’ s link from a couple days ago about Yemen, which I didn’t see until now.

  347. Leon Russell could write a song.
    He certainly could, A Song for You is absolutely wonderful.
    I’m so delighted by all these nominations, and have already started (Prine: Paradise and Far From Me, Warren Zevon: Indifference of Heaven). Re Zevon: I did only know Werewolves of London (an eerie description of everything my friends and I used to do around London at the time), but found Lawyers Guns and Money because of the site (also from links here) and loved that, partly because of its perfect Hunter S vibe.
    I’m going to keep following up and listening: what a blast.
    In the meantime, re Cowboy poetry, a) you have me revisiting things I haven’t thought of for years (Hobo’s Mandolin), and b) you may be interested to hear I was reading a piece on Scandinavian expressions (the UK is currently experiencing a huge bout of Scandimania), and discovered that a Norwegian word for “crazy” is “Texas”. “Helt Texas” means “total craziness” or peak mayhem, and so on incrementally. The section finishes:
    Indicative, perhaps, of the powerful impact American culture had on those Norwegians who grew up watching westerns.

  348. i have a buddy who occasionally works in a rockabilly band in norway. apparently they love rockabilly.
    another really good songwriter (IMO) who mostly flies under the radar is Aimee Mann. anything from her solo work is good to very good.

  350. I never did comment on russell saying that John Prine is supposed to have co-written The City of New Orleans, that is a wonderful song.

    And the sons of Pullman porters
    And the sons of engineers
    Ride their Daddies’ magic carpet
    Made of steel

    Just wonderful. And so moving:

    Good morning, America, how are you?
    I said don’t you know me –
    I’m your native son.
    I’m the train they call the City of New Orleans,
    I’ll be gone ten thousand miles fore the day is done.

    It’s lyrics like those that, (don’t mock me too much) despite everything, make people love America.

  353. I suppose russell is right, this could go on for a while. I have a ton of Rickie Lee Jones in my playlists. She does write quite a bit with other people but her early stuff Last Chance Texaco, Coolsville, and Danny’s All-Star Joint just touch on what she’s done over the years.

  354. Christ, I’m now listening to things I haven’t heard in about 45 years from one of Tom Rush’s albums in 1963. Oh the pleasure! But just possibly this is going too far…..
    Music, the knife without a hilt.

  355. Thanks Donald, I’ll make a new post tonite (basically “NYT propaganda or not, you decide” with a minimal write up) unless you want to put something on the front page. Get in touch with me by 9 pm Japan thru the kitty.

  356. It doesn’t need a new post unless you want it. I definitely don’t want front page status–I feel like I’d have to work harder on it than I want to.

  357. I’m still stunned that the GOP is advancing a bill through Congress that would let your employer (effectively) demand your DNA, like they own you. Which, I guess, is the goal. FREEDOM!

  358. I have to wonder. Since our elected officials, including the members of Congress, work for us (at least nominally), shouldn’t we be able to demand their DNA? Could be vastly amusing.

  360. Thanks, I’ll put something up now, you’ll see it is a very minimal post. Other regulars, if a front page post seems like too much, if you ask nicely, I’ll can put a similar minimal post for other topics you’d like to talk about.

  363. Well, they are shameless. Why would such behavior stun you?
    But usually there’s some, not particularly subtle, benefit in view. While this invasive and offensive to us, that isn’t usually enough of a motivation in and of itself. So what are they getting out of it? (Which I suppose is the same as asking what I am just too dense to see.)

  364. … members of Congress, work for us (at least nominally), shouldn’t we be able to demand their DNA?

    Now why would I want their DNA? Klingon DNA, now that would be worth something.
    [Sorry, I have been watching Voyager lately.]

  365. wj, I guess the DNA thing is about risk analysis and thus saving money. If a job applicant’s or an employee’s DNA shows increased probability for certain maladies, (s)he will not be hired (or quickly fired resp.) before costs are incurred (costs for the DNA testing would land on the person tested obviously). Biotech companies could also be interested in the DNA sequence itself (since genes can be patented). So, there would be corporate beneficiaries that would ‘invest’ in Congress pushing such a bill. Plus it’s another step back to the ownership society where the boss owns the subordinates. Some of the old communist anti-capitalist propaganda is seen as the ideal to strive for by some capitalists. Wage slavery is so much better than the old literal owning with its cumbersome obligations (moral or otherwise).
    Just one step up from mandatory blood donation.

  367. if the government, at any level, were to require DNA testing for anything, folks would go postal.
    if for-profit corps do it, meh. no biggie.
    sometimes i think the red/blue divide is about which of the two institutions you prefer to be governed by.
    pro tip: government ain’t the only big brother.

  371. BTW, the other plus to having a right-hand-drive car (manual or not), is the ability to put a mannikin in the left hand seat, with a Trump mask on it, just in case you get caught by photo-radar or red light cameras.

  372. Woody Guthrie: in a league of his own.
    Someone has to represent the rockers: rockers always welcome, but what this exercise/game has taught me is that the stuff that really grabs me by the throat and shakes me is folk-y, to a greater or lesser extent. Sorry (a bit) for the sentimentality, y’all.

  374. It’s also harder to find rockers who write both lyrics and music. They tend to be far more band oriented, often with a singer who writes lyrics and a guitarist or some combination of band members putting music to the lyrics (or the other way around – give the singer some music to write lyrics for). What’s also common is that multiple members of a given band write songs, whether producing both lyrics and music or not, whether doing it individually or teaming up in different combinations.
    You have a few people who essentially are the band, like Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age or Paige Hamilton of Helmet, and who more or less write everything – at least lyrics and main melody/guitar parts. Billy Corgan’s another one, from (the) Smashing Pumpkins.
    At any rate, there are very few singer-songwriters meeting the criteria from that scene, so very, very few, if any, who would be likely to be among the best.
    Neil Young is a guy I’d say can stand with one foot on the folksy side and one foot on the rocker side, crazy genius that he is.

  376. ral, The Road is a good song, but it turns out it’s not by Jackson Browne but by someone called Danny O’Keefe. Re Loudon Wainwright III, I used to love his stuff, and saw him in concert a few times. He’s very talented, that’s for sure, but I agree that he’s not anywhere near top 10 category, something to do with the tone of most of his stuff maybe?
    Klingon DNA, now that would be worth something. Agreed!

  377. But consider if we find a couple far right members of Congress with a genetic disease. Which will be inherited by his kids. Which kids will, as adults, be unable to get insurance or even jobs (because of the potential insurance costs) themselves if the DNA thing passes.
    As we saw with the whole discussion around gay marriage, making the issue real by showing it impacting someone who is family is one way to bring around people who you thought would never get on board. Not all of them, of course. But a fair number.

  378. As we saw with the whole discussion around gay marriage, making the issue real by showing it impacting someone who is family is one way to bring around people who you thought would never get on board.
    There’s a diagnosis for people like that I think.

  385. I was thinking narcissist or sociopath. The inability to be empathetic unless something impacts you personally. GOP leaders maybe?

  386. (Sadly, having wandered into the current top thread against my better judgement, I’m inclined to say my link would have been just as relevant there. *sigh*)

  387. re: upper middle class.
    here’s what Pew thinks the ranges are for middle class in the US:
    http://finance.yahoo.com/news/heres-much-earn-considered-middle-174020565.html?icid=ref_fark&utm_source=fark&utm_medium=website&utm_content=link&ICID=ref_fark

    Pew, which defines middle class as adults whose annual household income is two-thirds to double the national median ($55,775 as of 2016), details the national middle-income range for various household sizes.
    Household of one: $24,042 to $72,126
    Household of two: $34,000 to $102,001
    Household of three: $41,641 to $124,925
    Household of four: $48,083 to $144,251
    Household of five: $53,759 to $161,277

  388. oops. wrong thread. doesn’t really matter – same people here as there.
    That’s gonna leave a mark.
    only we’ve returned to the world where facts matter.

  391. Ugh, how delightful to know that it isn’t just evil American manufacturers who secretly collect information from their customers. 😉

  392. I wonder how much difference there really is in non-housing product prices around the US. It can’t be as variable as that chart (although state by state comparison is likely a tad bit misleading and should be more granular for a real analysis).
    And how much nimbyism/opposition to dense development contributes to the high cost of housing, and not just single family homes.
    This is a good blog for those kinds of issues (dense development, public transit, green spaces, etc.) in the DC area:
    https://ggwash.org/

  393. Ugh, how delightful to know that it isn’t just evil American manufacturers who secretly collect information from their customers. 😉
    Exactly!
    Although sometimes I wonder about this data collection thing by big business. It is a horrible invasion of privacy and if used to target specific consumers for blackmail and other nefarious purposes it is criminal, but how much money could such information really be worth (and not just in this, uh, very specific case).
    It’s like businesses all of a sudden think they can make giant profits by purchasing and mining data because….they can target their sales better and/or maybe cross sell? Is it that accurate and profitable?
    I have to guess in a lot of these cases they collect this information because they can and assume they can figure out how to make money off it later.

  395. It’s like businesses all of a sudden think they can make giant profits by purchasing and mining data because….they can target their sales better and/or maybe cross sell? Is it that accurate and profitable?
    My guess is that this kind of data mining has some value. But at the moment it’s mostly just a matter of it being the latest management fad.
    Give it a couple of years, and companies will be doing a little of it. But not at the current massive and invasive level. Instead, it will be on to the next fad.

  397. data mining and targeted digital outreach arguably put trump in the white house, see also cambridge analytica.
    so, there’s that.
    google’s ad business is worth about $60B-with-a-B per year.

  399. So Chuck Barris died. Am I the only one who thought he was already dead?
    Also, too, isn’t it kind of weird that Chuck Berry and Chuck Barris would die within such a short time of each other?

  400. Wow, our open thread shelf needs a bit of refreshing. Hope you don’t mind if I post this hsh.

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