MESSAGE
| DATE | 2016-12-15 |
| FROM | Rick Moen
|
| SUBJECT | Re: [Hangout-NYLXS] Michael Kingsley and the Fascist in Office
|
I wrote:
> Quoting Ruben Safir (ruben-at-mrbrklyn.com):
>
> > This is hysterically funny. This man accuses Trump of being a fascist
> > while his latest columns complain that majority rule fails Britain...
>
> The
> https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/donald-trump-is-actually-a-fascist/2016/12/09/e193a2b6-bd77-11e6-94ac-3d324840106c_story.html
> column reminds people what 'fascist' means other than just as a vague
> slur -- corporate statism.
>
> Kingsley's point is that Trump's professed actions so far are exactly
> corporate statism, which is radically different from actual
> conservatism, which would never approve of buying off United
> Technologies / Carrier with $7 million in government tax incentives to
> _allegedly_ keep jobs in Indiana. As it turns out, it's not at all
> clear how many jobs got 'saved', for how long, or even at what expense:
> https://www.conservativereview.com/commentary/2016/12/carrier-is-still-moving-jobs-to-mexico-so-what-did-trump-accomplish
This just in
(http://www.npr.org/2016/12/15/505630205/6-questions-we-would-have-asked-donald-trump-at-his-canceled-press-conference):
The Carrier company is using the $16.5 million investment in the
Indiana plant to automate it, which will lead to more layoffs in the
future.
Way to go, GOP! Well done with the 'saving jobs' bit!
Authority for the assertion is, in this case, a statement straight from
the horse's mouth, the CEO of Cerrier corporate parent United Technologies,
one Greg Hayes, speaking to Jim Cramer of CNBC's business reporting
(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7q6v0yd9eRE):
We're going to make a $16 million investment in that factory in
Indianapolis to automate to drive the cost down so that we can continue
to be competitive. Now, is it as cheap as moving to Mexico with lower
cost of labor? No. But we will make that plant competitive just because
we'll make the capital investments there. What that ultimately means is
there will be fewer jobs.
Where did that investment come from? From Trump's tax deal for Carrier,
which was a deal to keep 730 union, production line jobs as well as 70
salaried positions in Indianapolis in exchange for millions in tax
incentives.
Point of the cited article is that it lists the questions several reporters
_would_ have asked Trump at the press conference he was going to have,
but then cancelled because he doesn't want to permit anyone to ask him
questions until after the Electoral College has voted on Monday -- as
there are _way_ too many awkward ones that would be posed.
I do think that 'fascist' captures the spirit of the incoming
administration less well than 'Putin-backed, incompetent kleptocrats'.
So far, with rare exceptions such as retired Gen. James 'Mad Dog'
Mattis, who could end up being outstanding as SecDef despite his lack of
staff experience, Trump's appointees so far have been people
monumentally incompetent and unsuitable for their jobs -- generally
people dead-set against the Federal departments or agencies he wants
them to run.
Today's poster-child, picking an example somewhat at random from a
target-rich environment, will be Texas's leading mouth-breather, Rick
Perry, Trump's appointee for Secretary of Energy:
Perry failed college chemistry at Texas A&M University, had a transcript
riddled with Cs and Ds, eventually struggled his way to a B.S. in Animal
Science, has no graduate degrees, is renowned _even_ in Texas politics
as being about as sharp as the leading edge of a billiard ball, and is
famous for saying that, if he became President, he would disband the
Department of Energy. Actually, technically he _tried_ to say that
during one of the debates, but couldn't remember the name of that
department.
By contrast:
Obama's first Secretary of Energy was Steven Chu, a _Nobel Prize-winning_
physicist who is now Professor of Physics and Professor of Molecular and
Cellular Physiology at Stanford. Chu has a B.A. in Mathematics, B.S. in
Physics, and Ph.D in Physics from UC Berkeley.
Chu's successor was Ernest Moniz, Ph.D in theoretical physics from
Stanford, who has now left to join the MIT faculty, and also has become
head of MIT's Physics Department and co-chair of the MIT Research
Council.
Two brilliant, eminently qualified men -- whose successor is the Texas
state-champion village idiot.
We're in for four years of thieves and idiots -- giving away public tax
monies to enrich already super-rich corporations the way Trump did with
Carrier, and then lie about the results (as with Carrier). But at least
Putin is happy!
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