The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age

    Trump's right.

    By Flavius on Sun, 02/19/2017 - 11:46pm |

    We shouldn't import anything .

    Not if we can make it here.

    The things that we can make but don't,  we should  resume making here.

    This obscenely rich country shouldn't  have 50,000 homeless in NYC tonight. In 2018 that should be

    5,000.  And 45,000 people should be making replacements for the Toyotas we won't be buying.

    That is the only way we can make America a country that is great for the working class. We can't Globalize our way to full employment. We have to import- replace our way there.

    We will never re distribute wealth. Because we don't want to. Some countries do. We don't. Those 45,000 newly re-employed New Yorkers will have wealth distributed (not re) to them in their paychecks. And the money we save by not having to care for them and the government revenues that they will generate can be used in ways that don't just create employment in 2019 but keep on doing it. Maybe infrastructure. Maybe lower taxes on job creators so they are motivated to create more jobs.

    Or we could hope for the goose to lay a golden egg. Could happen.I wouldn't hold my breath.

    Won't automation put those rehoused homeless out of work again? Sure . That's why we need the job creators to create jobs,

    I'm not going to include the ever popular denunciation of the President. If he happens to be saying the same things as me just maybe it's true anyway. If you're into hating there are plenty of other things to hate him for. Not when he says that Americans ought to be making the things that other Americans want to buy. 

     

     

    Comments

    Never going to happen. Many or even most of the homeless in NYC don't want jobs, couldn't handle full time jobs or are mentally ill. They need a good social safety net like most other western nations have, funded by wealth redistribution, there is no other option.

    Toyota makes vehicles in Alabama, and BMW makes them in South Carolina. The SC BMW plant exports more vehicles from the US than any other US automobile manufacturer. Trade isolation or trade wars are not practical or beneficial, which is why no nation engages in them.

    Frankly stop the nonsense. Trump is not right about anything and not sane.

    The reason the Republicans are so intent and focused on their ultimate dream of slashing taxes on the rich is they know this may be their last chance to do so, thereby eviscerating the safety net. Democrats must oppose Trump not legitimize his delusions.


    by NCD on Mon, 02/20/2017 - 1:22am

    Trump receives criticism because he is a pathological liar. He lies when he says that he will bring coal mining jobs back to coal country. Although, given your concern about the environment, you should note that he is allowing mining companies to dump waste into waterways after removing restrictions placed by Obama. How many mining jobs do you think will be created because he is allowing pollution?

    http://www.vox.com/2017/2/2/14488448/stream-protection-rule

    Trump is a liar already exposed as taking credit for jobs he had nothing to do with creating

    http://www.factcheck.org/2017/01/trump-jobs-returning-because-of-me/

    Here is an analysis from Forbes noting that the outcome of bringing iPhone manufacturing back to the US would be minimal even if it were feasible 

    http://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2016/11/17/trump-cant-make-apple...

    ​A similar article from MIT Technology Review 

    https://www.technologyreview.com/s/602869/manufacturing-jobs-arent-comin...

    ​Here is an article from WaPo pointing out that manufacturing in the U.S. has increased but needs fewer  workers. Trump is running a con.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2016/11/29/beware-of-d...

    ​You previously suggested that Trump would be more friendly to the environment after he was in the White House than he was during the campaign. You were wrong. Now you are buying into Trump's jobs con. Trump is a liar not to be trusted.

     


    by rmrd0000 on Mon, 02/20/2017 - 1:16am

    I agree that Trump is a pathological liar and his environmental policies  are a disaster. And that I suggested that his daughter (and son in law) might talk sense to him about global warming- on which the jury is still out.

     Forbes and the WAPO  have their positions  which happen to coincide with the views of their customers.. At the basic level at which  I'm thinking I'll stick with  Keynes' "All goods should be home -spun". ..and  that if  the rest of the world disappeared we could enjoy a satisfactory economy with neither imports or exports.There's even a model: World War  II.

     

     

     

     


    by Flavius on Mon, 02/20/2017 - 10:13am

    He is dumping mining waste and restarting the Dakota pipeline. Keep waiting for him to see the light. He is governed by right wingers media. He is 70 years old and following a chronic pattern.

    Flavius, Trump is a fabulist. His words are meaningless 

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-russia-falsehoods_us_58a9c2bde...?

    Manufacturing has changed since World War II

    We will see if he can get it together regarding infrastructure. Because he is a pathological liar, this may not happen.

    http://www.businessinsider.com/how-will-trumps-infrastructure-plan-be-pa...


    by rmrd0000 on Mon, 02/20/2017 - 10:37am

    Put simply:Trump is a bad person.He also wrong about the environment, abortion ,policing ,Putin and almost every thing. 

    One exception is fixing the 300 interstate bridges that are about to fall down.

    Another is  Globalization. He's right about that... Clearly if we can import  widgets from a country where workers get fifty cents an hour we'll  stop making widget's in Tennessee.

    And that  we can't provide Joan Lunchpail with a living wage and European level health services; pay for  AIG rain makers'  private jets to Steamboat,  keep the Pentagon brass polished , get the homeless into jobs, and also import those widgets from Myanamar,

     

     


    by Flavius on Mon, 02/20/2017 - 11:32am

    Tariffs will increase what your Lunchpail people have to pay for goods. Tariffs take money out of their pockets. Trump does not realize this simple fact. 


    by rmrd0000 on Mon, 02/20/2017 - 12:42pm

    Yeah , they do. The price of  consuming things made by our neighbors is that they cost more than if they were made  by exploited  strangers a long way off.

    The benefit is what I'm going on and on about here.Again.

    Keynes comment, actually testimony to a Commons' Committee ,was "The thing about tariffs is ,they do the trick".

    More fully , with tariffs we  solve one problem :unemployment and create a different one : inflation. Which is essentially a tax ,maybe the only one the top 1% can't avoid. Of course the 1% also benefit  parri passu because their domestic assets go up in value (if they intend to spend the money here, a big if.)

    If we lived in a country that believed that the poor are entitled  to an income sufficient that there wouldn't be 50,000 of them homeless every night  in our major metropolis, I would not support Trump's I'm sure not -thought- through policy.

    But we don't.

    Without being brave enough to say it aloud  except late at night in the Club , or at Mars Al Largo among their "peers"  we think that the poor-most of them-deserve to be homeless.  There was  a Herblock cartoon  showing Barry Goldwater snarling at a pan handler "Why didn't your  father give you a department store?"

    For all the little good it does them , to some extent the blacks are-partially- exempt  from this heartless implied criticism because  FWIW there is grudging awareness that it ain't a level playing field.( No way!).

    But the non minority poor don't even get that benefit of the doubt since  it's believed-though though not spoken- that their distress is their own fault.  Or maybe just the cost of " freedom". 

    Give me a break.

    There's a phrase something like "Most people are the unknowing victims of some dead economist." I could look it up. I will.

    Our poor are the victims of a malign combination of Globalization and scorn.

     

     

     

     


    by Flavius on Mon, 02/20/2017 - 5:14pm

    "Slaves of some defunct economist:"

    Keynes of course.


    by Flavius on Mon, 02/20/2017 - 5:17pm

    Couldn't stop myself so here's the full quote.

    The ideas of economists and political philosophers, both when they are right and when they are wrong, are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed the world is ruled by little else. Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. 

    Stop me before I quote more!

     


    by Flavius on Mon, 02/20/2017 - 10:01pm

    Amen!!! Thank you for laying it out straight.  It needs to be said. 


    by trkingmomoe on Tue, 02/21/2017 - 7:07am

    By Jove I think you've got it Flav. You seem to have the basic idea of what needs to happen but are a bit muddy on the details.

    We need what Trump has been working on, high skilled high paying jobs that can be kept here first and then other US company production can be returned from abroad. There isn't much to be gained by bring back the production of the cheap consumer junk the Chinese produce for us at a price we couldn't produce them  for. We don't want those jobs leave them in China.

    Triditional tarrifs are not needed  because the markets for these products we can build here are already mature and all the producers have to do is set up shop and deliver. Trump's team is working on changes to our port tax sceme raising it on imports and eliminationg it on exports but that's another discussion.

    Not forgetting the homeless you mention who may be the lowest skilled and most difficult to place in jobs. If enough high paying skilled jobs are returned and the infrastructure projects are set in motion then the millions of jobs needed will be produced. These new jobs and the wealth they generate will drive demand for the service jobs that the less skilled can fill. Even the job creators you mention need this new wealth/demand from the working class. They may get money from the wealthy but they depend on customers to pay those loans back.


    by Peter (not verified) on Mon, 02/20/2017 - 11:50pm

    Infrastructure is all about $2 trillion to pass around to friends - certainly not to spend wisely and prudently. Look at the old Trump friends he's already put at the teat for $1 billion or more.


    by PeraclesPlease on Mon, 02/20/2017 - 5:27pm

    Yeah. 

         Sigh


    by Flavius on Mon, 02/20/2017 - 9:45pm

    The other consideration about bringing jobs back is that a process like fracking  creates some jobs but impacts the environment. Would you advise Democrats to vote for jobs involving fracking to bring jobs for the Lunchpails at the expense of the environment? Votes against fracking will be labeled as voting against jobs.


    by rmrd0000 on Mon, 02/20/2017 - 9:52pm

    My guess is that fracking creates such environmental damage  it shouldn't be permitted.. If that's true  I wouldn't. From my religious childhood I remember "What doth it profit a man if he gains the whole world and suffers the loss of his soul?". A "Faustian bargain."

    But since my fracking knowledge is superficial , maybe I'm wrong. Facts matter. Unless you're Kelly Anne Conway.

    Possibly  you  meant  would I approve anything that creates jobs? (Which you didn't ask .) Answer: "of course not".

    Or perhaps:  "so how much damage to something important- an object, a position, whatever, would I tolerate as the trade off for more jobs ?".

    Answer: '  mostly- it's a  matter of degree.'  How many jobs? How much damage?

    Not always. There are absolutes. .I recall Joe Bailey  working  endlessly to make  us  realize that macho industrial relations are self defeating. Then came the case of the mine guard -up late with a sick baby- who fell asleep and failed to prevent a crew from going down a shaft towards a planned explosion.By luck no one was hurt. So what then?

    Fire him.


    by Flavius on Mon, 02/20/2017 - 10:58pm

     Fracking is used now for 60% of our oil & gas production. I tried to make this clear last year when it was "only" 50% - the cows have left that barn. There is minus 300% chance that we would find the political will to take on the huge costs of doing without fracking, especially as would kill our competitiveness globally. I mean, sure, if we could show that thousands of people are dying (like with with guns and 10x that with cigarettes), we *might* (not) find the will.

    "Two years ago, global oil prices crashed after the world started pumping out far more crude than anyone needed. That plunge, from $100 per barrel down to $40, upended the global economy — and cost oil producers like Saudi Arabia billions in lost revenue."

    Who's going to willingly pay that extra $60 per barrel?

    Yes, we might regulate it to prevent the worst contamination, but I really wish Dems would get more focused on doable policies and strategies than to continually get off in the weeds over something futile.

    [and no, global warming scare won't kill fracking - fracking just bought us some time to not worry about Russia or the Middle East. We just have to get on with finding & deploying non-fossile alternatives real real quick. Aside from the well-known growth of wind & solar, other options are getting interesting very quickly:

    http://thorconpower.com/

    https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/molten-salt-reactors-iaea-to-establ...

    ]


    by PeraclesPlease on Tue, 02/21/2017 - 4:14am

    Even socks? If so, we'll be darning them again due to the cost of replacement? (unpaid labor?!) I don't have as many decades as you, but I am old enough to recall what it was like when there was no such thing as a discount store and lots of people bought winter and school clothes on 'layaway" because they were a major purchase and there were no personal credit cards either,

    Partly because: my mother was often ready to kill my brothers when they tore the knees out of their pants, yes she got so angry and upset, punishment did get physical. Iron-on patches had just become available at like, Woolworth's, but they were poor quality of few colors and didn't stick that well, owing to lack of competition, and I suspect pants makers with well-paid union workers didn't want you to have such things, they wanted you to buy your kids new pants. (To go in reverse to historic markets rather than the improvements of competition, the propensity to tear pants is why earlier generations of boys didn't wear long pants until of a certain age. What does that say economically?)

    Not to mention:primary care docs were not paid by insurance cos (as most of the latter covered only hospitalization) but by their patients on informal installment plans....but that's a whole nother thing: still, professional services are labor....

    I been bad commenting at length as I should be sleeping, can't help it, you inspired me. Don't feel you have to respond, just take it as provoking thought.


    by artappraiser on Mon, 02/20/2017 - 11:55pm

    I still have my wooden darning bulb.  My Aunt Mary very patiently taught me how to hand patch my brother's pants. To this day I am grateful to her for that skill. I have passed it down to others who have kids. I think it is cruel for school systems to force parents to buy school uniforms in poor districts for the reason you said. I have spent time showing and helping my neighbors salvage their kids school uniform pants.

    Sock knitting has come back in fashion. Many mid twentieth century household skills have had a resurgence out of necessity. This includes saving money in a coffee can for something that is needed.   


    by trkingmomoe on Tue, 02/21/2017 - 8:03am