THE 2016 US PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION

Or he'll be like "Hillary lied & the troops died!" and some more emails will leak just when she's making headway and this will continue to be an actual contest 4 some God-4saken reason.

Guys, Trump is just putting nuclear armageddon on the table as an existential threat to all of humanity so that he can negotiate some sick trade deals.

polling shows that more Democrats support "free trade" than Republicans, which might be the single most insane and unexpected policy development of this whole cycle.

I feel like free trade as a point of contention has been vastly overrated this election cycle and so it seems that I'm not the only one who quietly thinks so.

Duff... wrote:I feel like free trade as a point of contention has been vastly overrated this election cycle and so it seems that I'm not the only one who quietly thinks so.

U might be right but it is an interesting point of departure 4 the Republican Party. After Trump's electoral defeat, it will be interesting if the GOP embraces this isolationist, anti-globalization sentiment or just tries to discard it with the rest of Trump.

As 4 criticisms of the TPP, I think the most obvious problem is the 'Investor-State Dispute Settlement' provision, which allows 4 the corporate lawyers of multinational corporations to sue countries 4 loss of profits. This has been used already by cigarette companies to sue countries 4 loss of profits and remove labeling that warns against the harmful medical effects of cigarette smoke. Overall, the criticism is that the TPP would put too much power into the hands of multinational corporations and it would make it difficult, legally, 4 national governments to regulate products and it also would allow 4 corporations to sidestep environmental protection standards pretty easily. Given the political climate and Trump's economic populist messaging, he is going to stress the effects that it would have on American workers whose jobs will be shipped overseas, which is also true.

I think it makes more sense to criticize particular aspects of a particular trade deal than to just issue a blanket rejection of trade deals in general, which 4 the most part benefit both/all countries involved. As 4 the jobs, it's just like with the coal industry: We simply need to find something else 4 these people to do.

As U can probably tell this isn't a subject I'm particularly well-read on.

Duff... wrote:As U can probably tell this isn't a subject I'm particularly well-read on.

But somehow U're right on the money. Trade deals R designed to benefit all the parties on the net. Even though each nation can C a net benefit, there will still be winners and losers at more localized levels. The issue, to me, is that the left hasn't done enough to identify and support the losers of globalization and NAFTA. Whether it's job insurance, lump sum transfers, college/trade school credits, or new job training, the Democrats should be doing something to help individuals who worked in the auto industry, manufacturing, or fossil fuels. To let them stew in their discontent is the wrong policy.

chrondog wrote:

Duff... wrote:As U can probably tell this isn't a subject I'm particularly well-read on.

But somehow U're right on the money. Trade deals R designed to benefit all the parties on the net. Even though each nation can C a net benefit, there will still be winners and losers at more localized levels. The issue, to me, is that the left hasn't done enough to identify and support the losers of globalization and NAFTA. Whether it's job insurance, lump sum transfers, college/trade school credits, or new job training, the Democrats should be doing something to help individuals who worked in the auto industry, manufacturing, or fossil fuels. To let them stew in their discontent is the wrong policy.

Yeah, I think that's going to be especially important 4 any future Progressive movement to grapple with. I'm not sure what realistic solutions actually R. How feasible is new job training 4 coal miners, 4 example? I do think that a nationalistic candidate like Trump can make use of these same critiques 4 really dangerous political ends (i.e. Brexit), which is kind of scary as well.

Duff, I really liked your last post in the SOMB thread, especially the last paragraph. I'm eagerly awaiting Fender's response.

Ҩ wrote:How feasible is new job training 4 coal miners, 4 example?

more feasible than telling them "get fucked"

Ҩ wrote:
Yeah, I think that's going to be especially important 4 any future Progressive movement to grapple with. I'm not sure what realistic solutions actually R. How feasible is new job training 4 coal miners, 4 example? I do think that a nationalistic candidate like Trump can make use of these same critiques 4 really dangerous political ends (i.e. Brexit), which is kind of scary as well.

I'm short on specifics, but these people do want to work and R willing to do very dangerous and health-wrecking labor. Old customs die hard but I think many of these workers would be receptive to safer, more stable work if we could arrange it.

Ҩ wrote:
Duff, I really liked your last post in the SOMB thread, especially the last paragraph. I'm eagerly awaiting Fender's response.

Kinda used Fender as a punching bag 4 all general pro-Trump issues I've been confronted with all year, and it was probably too much. But thanks.

I didn't mean to suggest that it would be workers unwillingness that would throw a wrench in job training programs. The question is what would we be training these workers to do. How realistic is it to imagine training large sectors of the working class to find new work that isn't extremely monotonous, tedious, and ultimately degrading?

Ҩ wrote:
Duff, I really liked your last post in the SOMB thread, especially the last paragraph. I'm eagerly awaiting Fender's response.

i was glad i went to read this. U created content that drove traffic!

Maybe one day I'll make something like that 4 my own website.

I can't believe his response.

Fender replies to Duff
U won't believe his response!

Ҩ wrote:I can't believe his response.

Seriously flailing.

I can't get over the Human Rights Campaign's endorsement of Mark Kirk over Duckworth. What a fucking joke that is.

Forgot about that. Idiots.

wait what

As I recall, HRC (not the former secretary of state) graded Duckworth higher on LGBT issues than Kirk, but went ahead and endorsed Kirk anyway because he isn't completely awful on that issue (as opposed to, say, foreign policy) and they think this will encourage similarly "moderate" republicans to be not completely awful on this issue. Which is so fucking stupid of HRC.

Goddamn, I'm so glad Warren is in the Senate 4 things like this.

If Warren had run, I think she would have beat Clinton. The race against Trump would be a landslide in her favor.

I'm not convinced. The hyperpartisanship of this century almost ensures there won't be any landslides, and it's hard to imagine republicans and swing voters breaking more 4 a liberal candidate.

Remember when the biggest anti-progressive/status quo force in our society was Evangelical Christians and it felt like an unmovable hurdle that we were all but resigned to having to helplessly wait out a few decades before we'd ever be able to make any meaningful government reforms and positive, meaningful changes to our society? Like, when it all just came down to abortion and that was terrible but it was also okay because U'd drive by the clinics and C how old all the protesters sitting in their lawn chairs were and U could almost put together a timetable about how long it was going to take 4 us to get universal healthcare and reform our justice system.

Just as millennials have completely forgotten exactly what happened between 2001 and 2009 and how the exact same lax and smug above-it-all attitude they have right now was completely responsible 4 all of that, maybe I'm starting to gloss over just how genuinely shitty so many of those values voters were even though I spent years practically stewing in their shit and pretending to like it. But at least they weren't proud racists and didn't know how to use the Internet and were mostly decent human beings, which I can now accept but I'm nowhere close to being able to deal with what's taken their place.

At least if I'm still barely employed in November I won't have to leave the house the morning after because there's no way I'm repeating the same scene from 12 years ago when I clocked in and then went off on this pathetic rant to a coworker who was just taking his coat off about how I just couldn't believe that this had happened and how could people not C what was going, etc. It was really sad but I guess it was kind of cute how naive I was. Maybe nothing's changed.

How do U think U guys would feel if Trump was assassinated?