Trump will clean house

[kevin kiernan]

Crooked politicians must be held accountable for the crimes they have done. Trump is the only one who will do it. To elect a POTUS who will not prioritize fixing our criminal political system will not be good enough for me.We will not get another one like Trump ,who will bitch slap the evil out of Washington politics..No one can deny that Trump is crazy enough to do it. But he needs us to want it fixed. He can not stand alone..This is that time in history. The time that many have hoped. Turn your back on this opportunity,and we are done. THAT IS THE TRUTH OF IT.

[kevin kiernan]

The world of robot workers will happen regardless of the wages. 

[M]

Kevin, Fritz Lang thought and warned about that back in March 13, 1927 with the movie Metropolis. Everything we talk about today was expressed in that silent film including the fears that went with robot workers enslaved to corporations.

[SILENCE IN THE FACE OF TYRANNY I]

Very impressive, a true and very genuine American success story Virginia!

"Silence in the face of tyranny, is your consent to that tyranny"

[kevin kiernan]

It is not kids applying for those jobs now. It is people trying to survive and feed their families...I myself do not go to fast food joints. Very seldom...I go to none franchise businesses to eat if possible. Love the mom and pop diners/deli`s.

[Thomas Vincent Coffey]

Of course corporate greed is real but the antidote is market competition not more crony capitalism.

During the 1912 election, the GOP rejected TR and his Bull Moosers, who wanted to realign the GOP w/non-socialist labor, a fateful decision. But Taft, another R buffoon in the Bush mold, was bought and paid for by 'big business' and wouldn't hear of it; so a transformational opportunity was lost.

Why are the Chamber of Commerce, the Business Round-table and all the rest of these corporate hustlers embedded in DC??? Because that's where the power to control markets lies, as Adam Smith shrewdly understood.

When a capitalist is earning an above market return by paying artificially low wages, he invites competitors and then his advantage evaporates.That is unless he has secured an economic advantage through the purchase of legislation which is precisely what goes on daily in DC.

From 1865 till the imposition of the Income Tax in 1913, the entire Government was funded by Tariffs imposed by Republicans. And precisely what was the argument made by those Apostles of Free Trade?  Er......... we need Tariffs to protect our "infant industries". Cold reality is simple.They were imposed to keep out superior goods from Britain and particularly from Germany after unification in 1870. So much for the GOP and its endless litany of bullshit! Politicians never have answers but free markets do.

[M]

Thomas, 

 

Your points are valid but need expanding on in my opinion. Lets take them in order with my opinions on them and see if you agree with me.

 

 

"Of course corporate greed is real but the antidote is market competition not more crony capitalism.

During the 1912 election, the GOP rejected TR and his Bull Moosers, who wanted to realign the GOP w/non-socialist labor, a fateful decision. But Taft, another R buffoon in the Bush mold, was bought and paid for by 'big business' and wouldn't hear of it; so a transformational opportunity was lost."

 

I believe that Free Trade and honest market competition would be the solution to the world's economic woes. However show me where there is no Crony Capitalism or where there is open market competition. Both the GOP and the Democrats are culpable for using it. In fact I don't know of a political party or Political philosophy world wide that does not use it to one extent or another. It is rampant in all Capitalist, Socialist, Communist, and Fascist Countries, and that includes the Third World dictatorships.

 

Why are the Chamber of Commerce, the Business Round-table and all the rest of these corporate hustlers embedded in DC??? Because that's where the power to control markets lies, as Adam Smith shrewdly understood.

When a capitalist is earning an above market return by paying artificially low wages, he invites competitors and then his advantage evaporates.That is unless he has secured an economic advantage through the purchase of legislation which is precisely what goes on daily in DC.

 

I believe it's current iteration is what was left over from WWII. That tontine of modern Corporate excesses supplanted or maybe just modified the group known as the "Robber Barons" from the 1880's. I feel the breech and resultant chaos ensued from the scramble to fill the power vacuum left by so many of the "Robber Barons" perishing in the Titanic disaster. That instance opened a small window of opportunity to start the formation of what Eisenhower called the "Terrible Military-Industrial Complex" that seems to be in control right now in the US but is seriously being compromised by it's Foreign Counterparts.

 

From 1865 till the imposition of the Income Tax in 1913, the entire Government was funded by Tariffs imposed by Republicans. And precisely what was the argument made by those Apostles of Free Trade?  Er......... we need Tariffs to protect our "infant industries". Cold reality is simple.They were imposed to keep out superior goods from Britain and particularly from Germany after unification in 1870. So much for the GOP and its endless litany of bullshit! Politicians never have answers but free markets do.

 

 

First off, are you speaking of the original Tariffs the Fledgling United States designed it's customs policy around and was embedded in US diplomatic policy from the beginning. The one that John Quincy Adams championed to protect the United States from European Imperialism and indicated the direction of US Foreign policy on any given nation or Bloc? That one lasted mostly unchanged until the end of the Civil War?

 

Or, are you speaking of the Tariffs imposed right after the Civil War, transitioning after WWI into expansionist Big Power Diplomacy different in kind from the original attachment to diplomacy up to that point, including a protectionist Congress trying to restrain these efforts at that time?

 

Or, are you speaking of the depression initiated inter war period that brought the more assertive types of a more free trade to a halt culminating in the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930? 

 

Or even the renewed freer trade policy adopted by the US and eventually by the western powers after WWII to combat Communism by successive administrations promoting lower tariffs to boost western prosperity up until Circa 1970 when non-tariff barriers became significant where tariffs changed from being protectionist of National Survival into one of International Integration foreshadowing the NWO concept?

 

I can't make an intelligent commentary on your post until I know which one you are citing, or if you mean all of them.

[Thomas Vincent Coffey]

* As I said, protectionist Tariffs were imposed from 1865 till Smoot-Hawley in 1930. My point being that the GOP were never Free Traders. NEVER!!!

* Similarly, the SC Justices who eviscerated States Rights were appointed by the GOP during their post Civil War political ascendancy. My point was that the GOP were never Strict Constructionists. NEVER!!!

Wonder how many centuries it will take the voters to wise up????

[M]

Thomas,

The United States started off with "Protectionist Tariffs" right from day one. They started long before either the Democratic-Republican Party came into existence, and before the GOP split off from it. So it's not just the GOP but the very first Congresses. Factually; The tariff has been a central issue throughout American history. Its importance evolved over the decades, involving politics, economics, diplomacy, and ideology.

Here is a timeline graph that shows the Tariff Structure from 1786 to present;

as you can see at one point it was over 95%. It was massive before the GOP existed and dropped by approximately 70% in 1856 when the GOP did exist. It spiked during the Robber Baron years by a little over 30% higher than the 1856 level, then continued on a descending curve to what we have today.

It is my contention that we sorely need to reduce taxation on American Manufacturing in the US, and possibly but not positively, although it's distasteful, and contrary to our beliefs in a free trade environment, I think we need to bring back a 4-8 year moderately high tariff. Say 20% to 40% targeted specifically to what the Foreign countries impose on American goods sent to them, and that tariff to be levied on all the goods manufactured in those specific Foreign Countries. Conceivably it could remain until the american businesses that fled to foreign countries because of the taxation and loss of profit concerns, return to the US with the jobs that left with them. I believe this would work because it would then be cheaper and more profitable to do their manufacturing in the US.  I am no economist, but that is my opinion on that issue.

[Thomas Vincent Coffey]

Virginia,

Experience was the first teacher.

[M]

Thomas,

Unfortunately the low information, the subsidized, and lemming like voters do not learn from experience. They just keep letting other people do their thinking for them. If they did not, they would have found and fully vetted candidates for every position up for grabs and then did the leg work to get those people forced no the ballot over the objections of the Establishment Leadership in the political parties.

Had we been a cohesive and united group like we were in 2010, we could have gotten some really good candidates for office. However we are now faced with picking the best among the ones the leadership have given us to vote for in Congress, State Legislatures, and Local Offices. We can't think of it as holding our noses, but instead thinking of it as removing the worst incumbents from their cherished positions. If we form a compact to do this for all the coming elections, the problems will eventually be fixed. If we do not, we will lose crushingly.

[Thomas Vincent Coffey]

Reflections on a Sunday concerning the "conservative intelligentsia":

Neo-conservative is made up blather. as Principled Conservatism is ageless wisdom, hardly a 'new' fad.

The current  neo-cons are the spawn of pre-WW2 Jewish radicals at CUNY; among them, Irving Kristol, an ardent supporter of Trotsky and Norman Podhoretz, a Socialist. They were hard leftists who wrote for Commentary and their apples fell right next to the tree. As such, the Weekly Standard's antipathy to Trump could have been predicted generations ago.

As for National Review, Bill Buckley surrounded himself w/strong willed minds and gifted writers, among them, Russell Kirk, James Burnham, William Rusher, Willmore Kendall, Brent Bozell, among others. In contrast, Lowery leads a gaggle of effeminate nobodies whose obvious mission is to kiss the rear end of the DC establishment, in order to stay in the spotlight.

Bringing up the rear is Commentary, same old rag trumpeting faddish lefty nostrums masquerading as 'conservatism'. Their cast includes the likes of Max Boot, who chronically reminds us of the wonders of Bush's War in Iraq, Krauthammer, Peter Wehner, Mike Gerson, remember him?; among other jerks.

Hm...................wonder if Pericles, Aristotle, Sophocles, Cicero, Virgil, Aquinas, Ockham, Scotus, Erasmus, Descartes, Locke, Hume, Burke; among many hundreds of wise men, ever thought of themselves as members of the intelligentsia???

Just a thought.

[charles royer]

History shines a bright light!No wonder they always rewrite it!