Clothahump, the only effect your posts have is to show what a total fucking moron and tool you are. Most environmental problems transcend state lines. (And the EPA was established by a Republican president, Nixon, in any case.)
People need to learn how to filter this shyt. I get the impression alot of posters on this site hear, see or read something in the media or wherever and just immediately apply their label to it and off they go, spouting ridiculous bullshit at every turn.
It’s not hard to understand how so many were duped by Billary.
Trump is supposed to be a new Hitler, a Russian puppet, and a man baby who’s going to start WWIII over a tweet. Appointing business executives to regulatory agencies doesn’t quite clear the bar. Maybe the BBQ needs an omnibus thread for capitalist RO stories.
Seems that we need to convince about 112,000 of the working people in the rust belt next time; very doable considering that more than 2 million all over the country did prefer the flawed Clinton rather than the incompetent in chief.
Plait’s hopeful optimism is inspiring rhetoric, but the reality is that without governmental regulation, support for technologies that reduce atmospheric carbon emissions, and most vital, the Earth surveillance work largely done by satellite observations is all critical to assessing the state of the climate and taking effective action to mitigate further damage. This is a problem that is larger than individuals, or private groups or single agencies. It is really an issue that requires the execution of cohesive long term plan to address the problems in multiple aspects (reduction of carbon emissions, integration of new technologies and the coping with the economics of phasing out existing low cost but high pollution technologies, planning for unavoidable climate effects) that is beyond the scope of anything short of a governmental body. And without the United States taking the lead, and with the European Union seemingly coming undone there is the very real question of whether any nation is going to make a substantive effort to address the issue in the foreseeable future. This goes beyond even a single term Trump administration; if he shuts down NASA and NOAA programs doing Earth surveillance and fails to fund followups, just recovering from that is the work of a decade or more.
Plait is no doubt trying to put on a positive spin and assure people that they can and should still care to take what action they can, but realistically without legislative and executive support we will see a regression in effective action to mitigate climate change. And that, along with the potential of a catastrophic asteroid impact or global pandemic illness, are the biggest threats we face that we could and should be doing what is practicable to prevent or prepare for.
I am still personally confused why the white working class abandoned the democratic party. Esp white men. White men w/o a college degree preferred Trump 3-1 over Clinton, roughly 75-25. Those kinds of ratios of 3-1 is the same margin LBGTers give the democrats. However LGBTs are oppressed, and the GOP persecutes them while democrats push legislation friendly towards them. I don’t see the dems persecuting white men with a high school education. Yet they voted as partisan as historically persecuted groups like LGBTs.
I assume it was a mix of culture and economics. Culturally they feel the dems only care about minorities, and economically Trump’s stance on China, NAFTA, TPP, etc. appealed to them.
But at the same time, it is obvious that even before taking office Trump is going to run a very anti-worker administration while Hillary had actual plans. So the economic argument doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me.
He did direct research on what they wanted to hear, he did it like a stand-up comic does, or a budding demagogue. He stood in front of them and started running his mouth, jumping from subject to subject like a flea. Keeping his antennae tuned to their frequencies, he knew which topics they wanted to be stroked on, and which bored them. “Build the wall” got them cheering, “Lock her up” sent them into orgasmic spasms.
They crawled into Santa’s lap and screamed what they wanted for Christmas, and he promised to bring them. Nothing wrong with what they want, for the most part, human type stuff. But that they don’t have them is not so scary as who they blame for it. That part’s scary.
There is certainly some amount of pushback to the recent cultural shifts of marriage equality, transgender rights, tacit and sometimes legislative acceptance of illegal immigration, and so forth–none of which speaks to the concerns or interests of that demographic–but there is also the manufactured story about how bad the economy is, how little “Washington” does for the middle third of the country, and some legitimate grief over how trade agreements like NAFTA, while being an overall benefit to the economy, have hurt employment in key manufacturing sectors. (That those jobs are largely going away due to increasing automation, just as they have in Europe and Asia, is neglected, but when you see your job going south of the border to someone making a fraction of your wages it’s not prone to making people think in terms of logic.)
Trump campaigned on rhetoric, not reason or policy (what ‘policy’ statements his campaign provided were risible in their utter lack of detail or implementation), and that rhetoric was largely, “Burn it down and dig through the ashes for the silver.” Which, if you’re angry, fearful, or just feeling marginalized compared to the attention being given to minority interests, is a really appealing message. That it is completely nonsensical in terms of actually governing the nation or supporting the economy was overshadowed by buffoonery, largely manufactured scandals of the day, and divisions within the opposing party about how much the party favorite was entrenched with the banking interests who had a big hand in the economical collapse. And there was Trump, with a red trucker cap, promising to “Make America Great Again!” (a slogan stolen from a previous popular president, by the way), and unapologetically acting like a douchy high school sophomore driving around his his gold Trans-Am with a T-top roof and three cheerleaders. Never mind that Trump is about as working class as a hot pink Maserati; his “brand” of expensive tackiness is exactly what appeals to every guy punching a time clock at some shitty job and dreaming of winning the lottery.
We don’t need to worry about Democrats electing the next Democrat. donald trump will elect the next Democrat. (Assuming that free elections are still a thing in four years.)
It was that kind of obtuse thinking that had the Democrats selecting a candidate with historically low popularity and assuming they couldn’t lose regardless. They need the be conscious of selecting a candidate with broader appeal beyond their own party leadership.
Thursday, Dec 8, 2016 04:37 AM PST
Donald Trump attacks Carrier union leader, blames employees for being laid off
Donald Trump picked a fight with yet another person who stood up to him, and blamed the victims for being laid off
“If United Steelworkers 1999 was any good, they would have kept those jobs in Indiana. Spend more time working-less time talking. Reduce dues”
This is the “Champion of the Rust Belt”, the guy who will save your jobs and find you jobs.
Not even IN the White House yet and he’s already selling you out. It WILL get worse.