"If you’re in favor of tariffs when you know you don’t have the votes but against them once they’re actually in effect, you’re just a politician with no balls."
The socialists? Try to keep up—the extreme capitalists were the ones enabling the loss of millions of jobs. Of both parties, or as some say, the UniParty.
A lot of capitalists were building things and making stuff and developing products, employing people and investing in the US economy. They got crushed by cheap labor and IP theft as did their employees and investors. The capitalists that went to the right business schools and do finance and have no contact with a physical product got dirty stinkin rich. Some of the money went to elected officials. And shame on us for falling for all this.
Why do we always end up with this idea that socialists LIVING IN A FULLY LATE-CAPITALIST WORLD are supposed to be poor? Marx never said "Give it all away." That was Jesus.
Of course not. That sleight of tongue was (part of) Marx's con. Create a series of de facto intranational armies (not parties) based on supposedly irreconcilable differences between segments of society, let their officers (aka vanguards) lead the charge. Then have those officers divvy up the spoils after they win, while saying the proles will get the spoils after the capitalist pigs are eradicated ... someday. The whole thing is a Trojan horse for totalitarian concentrated power, not democratic leftism, from start to finish, which is exactly how it always played out from 1917 on, communist or not. Marx was NOT a leftist, he was a long-con man. With the New Left from the 1950s, the malleable class-division was substituted with rigid identity-division, to pave way better boundaries for dividing-and-conquering.
There is no elevation of the powerless in a society without noblesse oblige. Healthy societies cannot perpetually have civil war, but that is precisely what has been orchestrated in the US (and West), in stages, between the 1950s and today.
The real problem is intelligent psychopathy, not capitalism or socialism. Hence the societal toxic rot that results from iron law of oligarchy. Trust me, we'll cease debating our traditional ideologies as AI sinks its claws deep.
And I suppose Marx never said "Love thy neighbor" and "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" either. Similarly, neither have the LATE-CAPITALISTS. THAT is the problem! When the motto of your life is "Screw the little guy and the other guy", you are leading your fellow capitalists into a ditch. Your ways will not prosper for long. You're sins WILL find you out, and as it turns out, Donald Trump is the grim reaper. Prepare to die! (Or as Taibbi said, burn it all down! The globalists and their infrastructure, that is.)
Nothing crazy about RFK Jr. he just knows more than you do and he's not afraid to share his ideas in an effort to help people live better. It doesn't take any guts to believe the "approved narrative" and mock people who think for themselves.
Here’s a list of some fascinating historical figures whose ideas were initially mocked, suppressed, or dismissed—and though their work was later proven correct, many of them never lived to see full vindication. ---
No doubt you will not ever make a list like this....but RFK Jr. will:
1. **Ignaz Semmelweis – Handwashing in Medicine**
- **Idea:** Doctors should wash their hands before assisting in childbirth to prevent childbed fever.
- **Reaction:** He was ridiculed, rejected by the medical establishment, and eventually committed to an asylum.
- **Outcome:** After his death, germ theory proved him right. Handwashing became a medical standard.
- **Vindication:** Posthumous, but never personally vindicated or honored in his time.
---
2. **Nikola Tesla – Wireless Energy & Inventions Beyond His Era**
- **Idea:** Free wireless energy, wireless communication, and other radical innovations.
- **Reaction:** Labeled eccentric, undermined by competitors like Edison and JP Morgan, died penniless.
- **Outcome:** Many of his ideas laid the foundation for modern technologies (radio, remote control, wireless).
- **Vindication:** Pop culture reveres him now, but he died largely unrecognized for his contributions.
---
3. **Giordano Bruno – Infinite Universe & Multiple Worlds**
- **Idea:** The universe is infinite and contains many worlds with life.
- **Reaction:** Burned at the stake for heresy in 1600 by the Inquisition.
- **Outcome:** Modern astronomy supports the notion of countless galaxies and potentially habitable planets.
- **Vindication:** Celebrated centuries later, but brutally punished in his lifetime.
---
4. **Barry Marshall – Bacteria Cause Stomach Ulcers**
- **Idea:** *Helicobacter pylori* causes peptic ulcers, not stress or spicy food.
- **Reaction:** Laughed out of conferences, rejected by medical authorities.
- **Outcome:** Proved it by drinking the bacteria himself and developing gastritis; eventually won the Nobel Prize.
- **Vindication:** He was vindicated in his lifetime, but only after intense resistance and self-experimentation.
---
5. **John Snow – Cholera is Waterborne**
- **Idea:** Cholera spreads through contaminated water.
- **Reaction:** Medical community rejected germ theory; he was ignored.
- **Outcome:** His mapping of a cholera outbreak eventually influenced modern epidemiology.
- **Vindication:** Credited later, but dismissed during the 1854 outbreak when he could’ve saved more lives.
- **Reaction:** Widely ridiculed by geologists; lacked mechanism for movement.
- **Outcome:** Plate tectonics later proved him right.
- **Vindication:** Only decades after his death in 1930.
---
7. **Rachel Carson – Environmental Hazards of Pesticides**
- **Idea:** Pesticides like DDT were destroying ecosystems and harming human health.
- **Reaction:** Attacked as hysterical and anti-progress by chemical industry and media.
- **Outcome:** Her work sparked the environmental movement and led to bans on DDT.
- **Vindication:** Recognized eventually, but faced extreme backlash in her time.
---
8. **Alan Turing – Foundations of Modern Computing**
- **Idea:** Theoretical basis for computers and artificial intelligence.
- **Reaction:** Despite wartime contributions, he was prosecuted for homosexuality and chemically castrated.
- **Outcome:** His work underpins all modern computers and AI.
- **Vindication:** Received posthumous royal pardon in 2013; died tragically in 1954.
The Truth is more complicated than the sound bite lie (that you feed on). The sound bite lie makes it around the world 3x before the Truth gets out of bed.
RFK Jr. is a quack. He wants to ban phones in schools not because they’re anathema to learning but because he thinks radio waves fry your brain. It’s a shame that Matt’s comments are full of right wing lunatics, but 95% of the populace are now lunatics of some variety so I guess it’s unavoidable
It's 2025 Lanny and if you don't know that EMFs from cell phones/towers have some type of affect on human brains and CNS (thanks to the poor little rats that came before us) well then you are an Ostrich.
It's really easy these days to disprove nay sayers who love to parrot the "official narrative".
You call people who think for themselves lunatics and free thinkers call people like you who parrot the "official narrative" NPCs that are slow to the ever changing times.
You can't dismiss someone as a quack when there is scientific evidence to prove what they say is true. That is ignoring and gaslighting - very troll like behaviors.
Here are several key scientific studies that have investigated the potential negative impacts of electromagnetic fields (EMFs) emitted by cell phones on the human body and brain:
1. Increased Brain Glucose Metabolism
Study: A study published in JAMA found that 50-minute exposure to cell phone RF-EMFs increased glucose metabolism in brain regions closest to the antenna.
Implication: This suggests that cell phone radiation can affect brain activity, although the clinical significance remains unclear.
2. Blood-Brain Barrier Disruption in Rats
Study: Research led by neurosurgeon Leif Salford demonstrated that GSM cell phone radiation caused albumin leakage through the blood-brain barrier in rats, leading to neuronal damage.
WIRED
Implication: These findings raise concerns about potential long-term effects of cell phone radiation on human brain health.
3. Systematic Review of Adverse Health Effects
Study: A systematic review in the Indian Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine reported that cell phone radiation exposure could lead to various health issues, including oxidative stress, DNA fragmentation, and hormonal changes.
Implication: The review highlights the need for further research into the biological effects of EMF exposure.
4. Genotoxic Effects and Brain Tumor Risk
Study: An article in Environmental Research discussed studies indicating that long-term cell phone use might be associated with an increased risk of brain tumors, such as glioblastoma.
Then there is the whole mental health aspect that RFK Jr. mentions and that is to be concerned about as well.
In The Anxious Generation, Jonathan Haidt explores how smartphones and social media have contributed to a mental health crisis among Generation Z. He identifies four primary harms associated with smartphone use:
CASSY+3WSJ+3New York Post+3
The Human Journey
Social Deprivation: Reduced face-to-face interactions leading to weakened social bonds.
Sleep Deprivation: Disrupted sleep patterns due to screen time, especially before bedtime.
Sherwood News+2CASSY+2The Human Journey+2
Attention Fragmentation: Constant notifications and multitasking impairing the ability to focus.
Addiction: Design features of apps fostering compulsive usage patterns.
Haidt cites studies indicating that adolescent girls spending over five hours daily on social media are significantly more likely to experience depression. He also references research showing that the introduction of platforms like Facebook correlated with increased anxiety and depression among college students.
New York Post+5CASSY+5The Guardian+5
Critics of Haidt's work argue that the evidence linking smartphone use to mental health issues is correlational rather than causal. Some researchers suggest that the observed associations might be influenced by other factors, such as socioeconomic status or pre-existing mental health conditions.
Sherwood News
Despite the debate, Haidt advocates for measures like delaying smartphone and social media use until later adolescence, promoting phone-free schools, and encouraging real-world social interactions to mitigate potential harms.
Because they know their jobs are dependent on how he votes. The same goes for the aerospace industry, the teachers unions, the autoworkers, etc. The employers run campaigns in-house to influence politicians who vote to approve or disapprove what the corporation needs for the bottom line and the employee needs to keep his paycheck coming - the next big contract, the next rule-change that gives the company an edge. Apparently, pharmaceutical companies are good at this.
That's called bundling and it's due to campaign donation laws that put limits on individual donations.
Instead the corporations encourage (?) their workers to write checks and they make sure the recipients know where that money came from. Some even collect them and hand them in a "bundle" (not always legal but who's checking) to the targeted politician with a key vote so no imagination or speculation is needed as to the source.
A majority of his fundraising comes from small-dollar donations, and Senate races get more money spent on them than House races do. He’s probably in the top 5 Congresspeople for most industries.
Some other people in the thread say those ActBlue contributions are faked, that they come from big institutions misusing their employees’ names. I’ve never heard of such an accusation but it seems preposterous to me, particularly when applied to a self-proclaimed socialist.
The latter site also alleges much higher donations from pharma, but unclear of the evidence or time frame involved (or the reliability of motivation of that site).
ActBlue is about to be blown up. You can't serve as a money laundering operation by not requiring CVV #'s off credit cards while taking in hundreds of millions of credit card donations, many from offshore bundlers and governments trying to hid their political influence on our elections.
Thanks for this link. The site's information can end a lot of misinformed arguments. For example, it lists Sanders' major funding as coming from "Small Individual Contributions (< $200) $22,732,498."
How he amassed his personal fortune is another matter, and I couldn't care less. He's useless as a politician.
They got busted? Kennedy made the misrepresentation that Bernie took pharma money but provided no substantive evidence to back it up. Which seems to be sorta his thing. If you produce receipts, have at it. But you can’t just claim truth because you think something may be the case.
Typically off target criticism when there are far bigger fish to fry.
Thst 'mansions' BS was a Hilary/DNC sophistry-talking point, proud of yourself?
Look into the actual mechanisms there and there is nothing off kilter (or do you have an ethical problem with someone dying and leaving you something, or profiting from a wildly popular book? Think better.) The BIG deal is Bernie caving to the dem establishment: Ask people who always LIKED him where he failed. Not people who were always looking for excuses to shoot holes in him... If you're already using socialist as a pejorative, no one's gonna listen to you about Bernie LOL.
He’s an old white guy who talks a lot but has done nothing. What’s the attraction? Plus if you spout socialism, which has never worked anywhere it’s been tried, and have three houses, regardless of how you got them you’re a hypocrite.
Considering you need at least 2 if you're a long time Senator, and he inherited the third, & made what money he has from his (ex)-fans buying a book he wrote, kinda means you're completely full of...well, I guess I'll just point out that you and Hillary are in total complete agreement, & she considers your parroting her custom-crafted reality-aversive nonsense brainless talking points--that any lucid fourth grader could kick to splinters--money very well spent. You represent a proud hilary accomplishment...which is the worst thing I could say about anyone.😂😂🫣🫣
Last time I checked, Bernie had three houses (dachas, is what I think they called them in the Soviet Union)... That's two more than any self-professed socialist should have, LOL.
Well, if we look at the homes of various leaders of socialist utopias over the years, we see that Bernie is not very good at socialism. I really wish he had not caved to the party establishment.
And last I read, Bernie the purist had collected at least several million from big pharma prior to belittling and waiving onsies at RFK during confirmation hearings
Basically this. It's humorous to pick on the rich Socialist, but the big problem with Bernie is that... he has ZERO balls, and everything he claims to stand for he only does so when he's at advantage, and has no risk of losing his place in the power order.
He's a massive hypocrite on literally every topic or belief he stands for. This is why I stopped voting for and supporting him years ago. He's a completely empty suit, and one of the best script actors in DC.
Democratic socialism. Where capital serves people, not the other way around.
If you’re a senator working in two different states, you’d probably need a residence in each. Bernie does and neither are mansions.
If you then wrote a best-selling book - something people actually were excited about and chose to buy - and used the earnings to buy a whopping $500,000 family lake house, I’d hardly see it as all that outrageous.
Instead, I’d say democratic socialism probably isn’t as scary as the bad-faith attacks make it out to be.
There’s no such thing as Democratic Socialism. By dint of its definition socialism can only be applied by force, you take from one and give to another who didn’t earn it. You have no idea of human nature if you think that will work without force. And it’s equally foolish to imagine, ah, but I’ll do it better than all those other millions who tried it. That’s magical thinking not grounded in reality.
If socialism is the ownership and control of the means of production by the workers or the local community, which is how it was defined back when people still could form sentences in English, then there are plenty of working versions of socialism, generally called "cooperatives", or something like that. It's just not that big of a deal. The main problem is most working people like to complain about the boss, but it's much harder to do that when you _are_ the boss. In any case, it's not going to be Utopia. You still have to get up in the morning. As for the use of force, that's what the state is, whether it's capitalist, socialist, fascist, or cloud-cookoo-land. But you're free to make up fables about it -- just avoid reading anything about political structure and other such tedious details.
Well, we’ve seen evidence of successful socialist programs here via public schools, Medicare, Social Security, libraries, etc.
Still not enough? There’s Norway, Sweden, and Finland to consider, who all have a high quality of life and seem to be much happier than both you and I while reading each others comments.
Every one of those countries you list runs on capitalism, by their own admission. By the way, are you aware of the decline of these countries due to their immigration policies and their socialist support of that horror?
And please, if you’re going to hold up public schools or social security, etc., as a socialist success, you need to do a little more research. Most are going broke or an abject failure.
Market with guard rails is what Bernie is pushing for. Very similar model. And I’m sort of betting you know this.
As for our own social benefits, you say let them go. I’d argue to manage and fund them. You’re pretty much getting your way in this current admin, so we’ll see how it shakes out for people….
Wrong. Norway, Sweden, and Finland (and Denmark) are wrongly labeled as socialist by dummies on the left and right. They have market economies more open and free than the US in some ways. And they have very generous social welfare programs funded by very high taxes--on everybody.
I always gotta groan when Scandanavia is mentioned as an example of successful socialism. The Scandanavian countries you mention still have relatively homogenous populations and many citizens that still possess a strong work ethic and they are also still basically capitalistic. And none of these countries his highly popluated. For example, all of Norway with its 1300+ mile coastline has a population of less than 6 million. Noway also has great oil revenue they put in a fund for all citizens. Further, they don't seem to suffer the bureaucratic mark-up and high overhead costs that plague our government "do good social programs" (salaries and number of bureacrats and meetings needed to screw in a light bulb). Also interesting is the fact that Sweden made a determined effort about 10? years ago to reduce the relative size of its bureaucracy because its economy was terrible. The one difficulty they face now are immigrants that don't integrate culturally. Its helpful though that language classes are held and mandatory for new immigrants. Also noteworthy: they don't provide the expensive "translator on demand" that we have obligated ourself to provide for (often free) medical services.
Sweden has also figured out that it's cheaper to pay people to go back to their country of origin vs. trying to keep asking them to assimilate. Sweden is actually in some trouble right now, and the answer... Kindly ask people to self deport..... I am curious how long it will be until they stop asking....
So I guess I have badmouthed Apple not knowing they announced they will invest $500 billion in the US over next 4 years and the phones still are levied a 20% tariff. I think billionaire foundations just make me crabby.
Norway, Sweden, and Finland. Yes... Amazingly non-diverse nations that share a very common culture, and grew to be wonderful. Let's check back on this in say 5 years. Sweden in particular is starting to fall down hard because EVERYTHING that made them able to be the darlings of the "guardrails" crowd is no longer present, and they are collapsing under the weight of a massive leech society that they let into their country that take with no desire to contribute or give back.
Like placing something democratic in the name makes a difference, only fools fall for that . Tell me the Democratic People's Republic of Korea is a paridise for the poor people living that nightmare . Wake up.
I mean, there is a difference if you care about being correct. Kind of like using an “i” where there should be an “a”. It might look similar, maybe even get lumped together by some people not interested in the details, but on a fundamental level it’s just not the same.
Keep dreaming, every socialist experiment that's since failed spectacularly started with the same stars you have in your eyes. The problem isn't in the details it's in human nature
Unless you're a natural-law freak, property is a set of social relations defined by (human-made) law and traditions. Or, you can just make stuff up, I suppose.
I’ve never understood the attraction of that man. He’s a grifter, just like most politicians and their parasites like Farrakhan. Sanders has talked but never walked. And he likes it that way.
If Bernie Sanders once had balls (which he may have), he cut them off himself under the scrutiny of millions when he zealously endorsed Hillary Clinton on prime time television. And once removed, never recoverable.
Perhaps the zeal was for the promises of book deals worth lots of bucks as recompense for Clinton and the DNC slandering his character to sabotage his own campaign. At the time he entered the 2016 race, he had a net worth of something like $300K, now he's a multi-millionaire. I guess he didn't come all that cheap, but he didn't come all that dear, either.
Nancy Pelosi, too, used to be concerned in public about the trade imbalance, especially with respect to China.
But now, of course, they are Trump's tariffs, Trump's attempt to redress the trade imbalance, and therefore evil, dangerous, and to be vigorously opposed. Because Orange Man Bad, or something, and anything he does is wrong, even when they wanted it themselves BT.
Ellen, it’s not about Bernie vs Trump or Pelosi vs Musk.
It’s American corporations (enabled by government) who killed the middle class, by shipping good jobs elsewhere and replacing them with shit jobs like Uber and Door Dash.
You gotta get over the distractions they want you focused on, like Democrats vs Republican. Keep your eye on the target—globalization, which has been long loved by leaders of both parties.
The Dems and the Republicans enabled the corporations to kill the American middle class. They couldn't have done it without the willing acquiescence of the two parties. So they do bear responsibility for this outrage.
Wrong. The Trump Republican Party is not the same as the Bush/Globalist Republican Party. Entirely different party with (almost) entirely different principles. The RINOs who helped to create this mess are mostly gone (looking at you, Mitch McConnell).
The Republican Party is still the Republican Party. It is still one of only two in this country that can guarantee ballot access, for one thing. It happens to have a very different politician running it now, different from most Rs or Ds.
And Matt and we are talking about the past few decades, not what Trump is doing now.
Republicans and Democrats are both responsible. If you guys want to argue whether it's 55-45 or 48-52 is inconsequential.
The UniParty is not liking any of this that's happening to them...dramatically changing the status quo and altering the Bureaucracy.
For it's worth noting the very nature of a Bureaucracy is Self-preservation.
MAGA is a amalgamation of We the People types who are tired of the Elites and Establishment lording over us at every moment of our day and serving themselves vs. the people they were elected/chosen to serve.
Then off to the corner you have the DSA and their Marxist/Anarchist wing who just wants to destroy America and remake it in the eyes of Karl Marx, which 99% of MAGA wants no part of, even lifelong Democrats disillusioned by Democrats today.
Choose carefully Pacificus...you're either with the UniParty, MAGA or the Marxists.
The negative effects of "free" trade had been visibly apparent for over a quarter century by the 1994 NAFTA debates. Our gold supply was in crisis debated in the Senate by 1968, going off the gold standard with the 'Nixon shock' of August 15, 1971. The entire decade of the 1970's was one of industrial decline.
You are 100% correct. And let's throw in the consultants and attorneys and accountants who pushed or facilitated all of this and the educational complex that brainwashed kids into identifying themselves as global citizens.
Look, though Tim Walz organized, orchestrated and led over 32 different missions of students from MN to China where he fascinated them with stories about how great it is when Communism means everyone is equal..it has nothing to do with Minnesota young people marching in the streets for Equity.
It's merely a coincidence...along with that very expensive shotgun Walz has that he seems unfamiliar with. I wonder if it came with instructions in Chinese.
And it's mere coincidence that Walz has pushed hard for the Confucius Institute Scholars being inserted into the University of Minnesota where some of the most advanced medica device technology is developed.
The Uni-party British politicians were certainly globalist. The Conservatives simply pretended to be otherwise, but it was a poor pretense in the end.
However, too many Brits did not catch on. They thought the Conservative Party had to be taught a lesson for its failures......and so they voted in large numbers for the opposition - Labour.
Bingo! That was the Uni-party plan all along -- to get Labour in power (with a majority). The British voters were like sheep being led over a cliff.
In capitalism (as we usually know it) globalization is inevitable. What's happening now is deciding who gets to cut the pie. If you're worried about it, might as well not -- you know what George Carlin said.
I take your point, but socialism is antithetical to living and working hard in a Republic where freedom is king. Bernie took his wrong turn when he backed so-called security for the worker over freedom for the people and fealty to a foreign power/philosophy over his own great country. (I mean who in their right mind believes any socialist regime ever is better in any way than the United States of America including in the way of late-capitalism.) And now he's dissolved into being a contradictory shill who has repudiated his own views, saying the opposite of what he once said. When the avowed socialist drinks the kool-aid of the evil, money-grubbing Hilary and crew from the DLC, you know his values are long gone and it's time to leave the party. Lights out.
We dodged a bullet with Bernie, and I say this as someone who supported him the first time 'round. He has proved himself either blackmail bait or spineless at this point. But I would have loved a NYC beatdown between Trump and Bernie. That is epicness that was stolen by sourpuss Hillary...
Bernie has always been a fake. Bernie plays Bernie on TV…the central casting token socialist created for public consumption; and has been rewarded handsomely, hence the multiple handsome properties.
And he’s family involvement in schools and charities. But Again they all do it. Write a few books and then blame the large increase in net worth as that. Something really worth watching, better than any day time soap opera. Audit every dam one of them. Start with McConnell, Pelosi and Schumer.
I was initially praying for a Sanders-Paul matchup back in 2015, as I thought that would for once give us a choice between two decent and honest men.
Now I am hoping Paul runs in 2028, and have nothing but contempt left for Sanders.
But, as a born NYC girl (small town Maine, now, quite contentedly), I would have to agree that showdown would have been worthy of many buckets of popcorn.
My second husband was from NYC. I met him on the west coast working in a NY style deli that employed mostly people from NYC and New Jersey. They taught me to love the 'no shits given'/'heart of gold' personality of that region.
Ralph Nader stood firm against the Democrats. He was marginalized and rendered ineffective by said party. I’m sure the lesson was not lost on Bernie when the Democrats threatened to do the same to him. He really didn’t have any good choices. He chose to keep his voice and some power over the political process rather than become a martyr. Try a little understanding before criticizing him from afar.
Ralph Nader I respect. Bernie Sanders, I did once, but, seriously, I understand quite well what (sucking Hillary Clinton's ass out for the nation to see, and becoming a pet lapdog, including lately shilling for the Chinese to keep us robbed, thereafter) and why (to save his career, get millions in payback, and retain some tiny bit of influence - not any real power). I do not think any of it, or him any longer, worthy of one iota of my respect.
Now, Rand Paul deserves plenty. But he's still willing to buck his party for what he thinks is right.
I don't think selling the country out to what you believe is wrong is anything but contemptible.
It's amazing to watch these podcasts and see in real-time Matt's struggle with his long held beliefs while being a distanced journalist. He has been a man weighing the options of his heart. I think he had an epiphany in Thursday's podcast (with his compatriot Walt and maybe mentor, gently being his wingman to safe and solid ground) and today's article, and he's mad as hell! His Pulitzer should be in the mail for dismantling globalism's destruction of America! Walt was much less a Republican and more an anti-globalist in that podcast. I noticed his restraint and his affection for the American worker, both an effect of and an encouragement of Matt's struggle. Remarkable podcast! I cannot overstate how instructive it was to me.
Everyone needs to experience the epiphany Matt has had about how "The System is Rigged and we're all getting F'ed."
Thankfully he's in the US where his free speech rights have not yet been rescinded, but then again...the FBI did pay him a visit to see what he's been up to on social media pages just a couple years ago under Biden.
Biden is back...and Andy McCabe and others are waiting in the wings to seize power...and when they do....poor Matt Taibbi is going to end up in Gitmo for crimes against the State.
We can't let that happen to Matt.
I for one will stand to defend his right to offend anyone...including me.
And that...my friends...is what makes America Great.
Speaking of "balls", if Matt had anything left down there dangling in the nutsack he would focus the anger he seems to direct toward China "stealing" little diddums' Merkin jobs toward the American capitalism that pisses all over American workers daily.
But when you are all lubed up to take MAGA dick so far up ya your voice cracks? Can't say the thing that is real.
I have been saying all along. Americans voted for big pay. Safety. And benefits. Then took their dollars to countries that use slave,slave like labor and no benefits and no safety.
I didn't know all the international stuff. But I saw clearly for years we got poorer the more money we made.
Govt is too expensive. Along with globalist ideology we need to strip govt much more than has happened yet. I was really hoping for a Twitter lean workforce.
Bringing mfg, farming,bavk home is critical. I'm in Healthcare and it was obvious during covid that we have lost our medical mfg. Wearing disposable ppe for a week when it's safe onky for thar 1 use....loud and clear. '22-'23 years when chemo, antibiotics and IV saline shortages called it out again
Depending on enemies for food, medical, and energy waa obviously self destructive and some of us have known for a decade or more.
But congress is full of compromised people. Both sides. Trump is only one i trust in this. He loves America. And Americans. For me. That's been enough. Someone on our side. Fighting for us. Yes he can run off at the mouth. But really. Sweet grandfather Biden is better?
And that is exactly it. I have commented before. Wall Street needs ever increasing numbers to run up the stock price and the value of their options to cash in. I saw it firsthand in the early to mid 2000s. And to build on your point, all the people that write about Wall Street or make money off it, and their politician friends are not the ones who lost their jobs. They are the ones getting rich off the changes they foisted upon everyone. The second kick in the teeth is the importation of cheap or cheaper (think H1bs) labor to compete with those who still had jobs or trades. I worked residential construction in the late 80s and early 90s with my stepdad even while in college and law school because it paid comparatively well. Everyone spoke English well, even Hispanics. Everyone was from here. By the late 90s, that was changing rapidly. Now we are told Americans won't do those jobs. I think they would if the pay and benefits kept up with American standards.
The awards for globalist corporations are many, including cheap labor and a free pass to avoid the cost and harrassment of safety and environmental regulations--you know, those laws that apply to "the common people". They can just look the other way on horrific human rights violations. Global corporations based in the US get all kinds of special privileges and treats such as subsidies, tax breaks, and special allowances to bring in trained foreign cheaper workforce, while basking in the comfort of property protections and due process guaranteed to US citizens. And with all their profits, heads of these globalist empires get to set up charitable foundations that allow them to further dodge US income and taxes, freeing them to amass billions which they then use to influence control and determine political outcomes. For example, Apple just put up enough pressure to get tariffs waived for the smart phones they contract to manufacture in China. Why? Because Apple's profit margin of 37% and stock holder shouldn't be affected because they are so special. So shout out for the globalists who showed up for the Trump inauguration but heavily fund the Democrats. MAGA is a pesky threat that they will work around. Why should anything change? Its all just hunky dorry for these folks whom our trade polices allowed to become masters (monsters?) of the universe who get to develop and then fly their private jets to their own private-bomb sheltered islands. All as these supra-national royals deserve, right?
Matt loved the perspective of this article and yours and Walter's ATW. It occurred to me on a long drive this AM is an active war of the globalist elites on the deplorable (or whatever they're calling Americans these days). This is a reverse revolution to me exemplified by the teachers unions who want to lock kids into failing schools. This seems so different than other historical revolutions. I would love to hear you and Walter's perspective on this notion.
Methinks you flatter yourself. Hard for you to see that the two are the flip side of each other but one and the same. Socialist being the cleaned up one welcomed to all the best parties while the Communist arrives with the blackjack smelling of sweat and unclean clothes who drags the ritzy party-goers off to the gulag. You're deluding yourself, but I can see why.
Initially, because I had no idea who he was until his campaign in 2015 caught fire, I thought he was hilarious.
I loved the way he punctured the conventions around political campaigning in the US. I liked his nicknames for the other ghouls in the race.
And I liked him because he apparently provoked fear and disgust in the rank assholes of US elite media and academia.
After he won I liked him because, as I wrote in a blog post at the time, he was like a mirror of American reality that almost no American wanted to look into: a crude, fundamentally ignorant, aggressive narcissist with no capacity to recognize the real existence of other people. In short, the perfect representative of America.
And now I like him because he is going to burn it all down and America is not going to be running the world any longer. Americans are going to be poorer and it is going to be increasingly difficult for their narcissism and stupidity to continue to maintain the false image they have of themselves.
I like him because the way his supporters defend him reveals the depth of ignorance and delusion that is the outstanding characteristic of Americans across the spectrum.
And I like him for legislating biological reality in spite of the fact that Americans ultimately can't handle even that portion of reality and so will revert to whatever ideological tap-dance the capitalist medical industry orchestrates in order to be empowered to carve up human bodies for profit in the future.
"I had no idea who he was until his campaign in 2015 caught fire, I thought he was hilarious."
So, the most salient thing that jumped out early on was that he's a master showman? Nothing POV/policy-related stuck out?
"I liked him because ... he was like a mirror of American reality that almost no American wanted to look into"
So, you then liked him because some 70-80 million people -- that is, about half the voters of the U.S. -- could, in an case of mass projection of "crude, fundamentally ignorant, aggressive narcissis[m] with no capacity to recognize the real existence of other people", shift their own manifest ugliness onto him without admitting it themselves?
"And now I like him because he is going to burn it all down and America is not going to be running the world any longer"
So, you'd rather the U.S. suffer immensely than that it learn fix its problems first?
"I like him because the way his supporters defend him reveals the depth of ignorance and delusion that is the outstanding characteristic of Americans across the spectrum."
How many "across the spectrum" do you know quite well personally? Serious question. Say, 5 or more unrelated people in each decile of wealth? Population-representative numbers of each (major) racial/ethnic group? geographic, age, LGBT, education, intelligence, etc. etc. Do you listen carefully to all, even those you disagree with? Do you find it hard to respect any who haven't (roughly) followed your path?
FWIW, I don't think you understand very well the vast majority of people who voted for him. (I didn't vote for him; I'm a Leftist.)
What *is* your preferred future? For the U.S. (if you're American)? For the world?
I’m not a socialist, and not particularly an anti-capitalist. I am however against companies that evade labor laws by regulator-shopping. It wouldn’t make sense to attack “capitalism” in this piece because that’s not really the issue with US-China imbalances - the issue is opening “free trade” agreements with nonmarket countries that artificially suppress their currency, abuse workers, pollute, etc. Is that capitalism, communism, neither, both, a bastardization of all those systems? Without question I’m placing blame at the feet of American business leaders who beginning in the eighties cooperated with China (and Indonesia and other countries) to evade regulatory headaches and up their share prices at the expense of American workers. You’d have to be nuts to read this as jingoistic.
Along this line, I would love to listen/read your impression of the most recent All In podcast where the guests were Larry Summers and Ezra Klein. Your take would be interesting, to say the least.
Matt, I agree with your comment. I just don’t agree with the bombastic tone of your article. And I don’t think your criticism of Bernie is fair comment. Concerning those who agree with you , you might want to comment on how critical commentary doesn’t include cursing and swearing and general potty mouthing it. It does not speak well of your audience when they do this, and I hope you will discourage it. I’m sure the oligarchs like to see us fighting like cats and dogs and using all sorts of profanity against each other. They can continue to oppress us while we fight against each other.
yes. Especially to the detriment of mature business. However, they were fairly applied across the US. Going overseas allowed businesses to evade them completely. The original case of labor savings on low skill labor intensive industries had some weight but when management saw the regulation burden fall they went all in.
I agree with a lot of what this article says but there were people on the other side of this argument making valid points. As I said above, mature industries were getting their ass kicked by foreign competition for a variety of reason, labor costs, outdated equipment, regulations, bad management. Trade liberalization addressed a lot of those issues for the benefit of many but opened up a different cans of worms.
Capitalism in its contemporary form emphasizes "shareholder value".
Corporations have a "fiduciary obligation" to maximize profit. ie increase shareholder value.
The factories you say "China stole" were sent outside of the USA to cheap labor destinations to do what capitalism does, ie increase shareholder value by maximizing profit.
Most of the valuable things you've written over the years are forensic examinations of the workings of capitalism and the money-obsessed culture that it gives birth to inevitably.
But you're a jingoistic American so you can't bring yourself to actually see what it is you are looking at.
Because America is about "freedom" and that includes the "freedom" to fuck over your communities and your nation if it "maximizes shareholder value".
Corporate execs and business leaders are going to do capitalism as much as they and their shareholders can benefit from it. I would put greater blame on the people representing the American people for allowing the business sector to proceed on the backs of the American worker. But then this brings us right back to laws and regulations that are written to be broken. How do you fix corrupt politicians? You get a Pole to screw in a lightbulb.
One basic thing is to make sure that "free trade" no matter the trading partner is "fair trade" I think a lot of Matt's frustration is that this was obvious to anyone paying attention to how communist regimes work, CCP being the worst, and screwed American workers -- and the capitalists that make things -- anyway. There is no room for competition with the CCP. They lie, cheat, steal and game every system. How much IP has to be stolen, domestic companies crushed before Washington notices that this is not fair trade. It's an abuse that benefits the very few at the expense of all of us. And it's like we're just now catching on?
Don't you suppose it,s because our representatives are themselves so heavily invested in the corporations they regulate? Congress does well when business does well.
"The whole piece attacks the American capitalism that pursued globalization. Did you read the same words we did?"
As a bit of a stickler for grammar, I have to point out that your use of the restrictive relative in the phrase "the American capitalism that..." (deliberately?) suggests that there is more than one American capitalism.
There really isn't. And anyone criticizing "globalism" (the right's term of art for avoiding critique of capitalism) by naming "China" 15 times and "capitalism" none is a cuck.
I used to defend Matt (as recently as within the past 24 hours) when liberals cosplaying leftist attacked him with "he used to be _____ but now". But the fact is he's refused to recognize a genocide taking place and his jingoism, which is stupid but understandable, has mutated into outright MAGA buffoonery.
"Translation: a serial trade and human rights violator that with the help of decades of corrupt politicians from both parties polluted, price-dumped, and stole its way to a generation of American jobs and revenue, now owns so much of our debt that we must put up with its shit indefinitely. That’s the point of view of our own federal news agency. We have officially cucked ourselves past the point of no return."
"China" occurs 15 times in the article. No mention of capital or capitalism.
When Matt writes things like "It was an asset-stripping scheme, designed to help CEOs boost their share prices by cutting costs of American parts, labor, and regulatory compliance from their bottom lines", and your complaint is that he didn't explicitly use the words "capital" or "capitalism", you're not giving serious responses here.
When Matt writes things like that he is harping on about the trees and the result is the forest disappears.
Capitalism demands that CEOs "boost share price". It's not as if CEOs could have chosen to support America and American workers once the legal, military and infrastructural frameworks were in place to make it more profitable to make t-shirts in Bangladesh.
As Matt says above, he has no problem with capitalism. I suppose he actually believes that if a better class of person started taking over as CEOs these bad things just wouldn't happen.
The 30 year period that followed WWII, during which capital was hamstrung by the regulatory frameworks established in the wake of the Great Depression and as part of the war effort, was the result of FDR's program to save capitalism from itself.
When Bernie rants on about "billionaires" or Matt pillories "CEOs" we are just witnessing the left-liberal version of the right blaming "immigrants", "the Chinese" or "socialist feminazi trannies".
Talk about anything but the structures and institutions that necessitate that things run the way they do- capitalism and its insistence on increasing profit aka "shareholder value" as the be-all and end-all of everything.
Help!! The sh't has hit the fan Sir. Clowns to the the left of me. Jokers to the right. And I'm stuck in the middle with the rest of We the People. Money always helps but when lawyers and guns are the fall back the only alternative is a golden parachute and the parachute packers union has become totally unreliable. It ain't happening to me so it isn't happening is poor political policy and it doesn't matter who shot the sheriff when the darkness is lying through its teeth and the shadows are running on empty (running wild). But "C'est la vie" say the old folks, a wink is as good as a nod to a blind horse and a numbered account guarantees the harbor lights of St. Barts will always shine for thee. If I could only get some sleeves for my records and some laces for my shoes. But don't worry. Be happy.
(RACKET/Taibbi and the gypsy scribbler Kirn rule. Likewise--my opinion-Matt Stoller and N.S. Lyons. I can't read everybody.)
The recent quickly becoming controversial D.Murray/D.Smith Rogan podcast is interesting because Murray almost put his finger on the actual reality of the disease undermining our national conversation. Electronic media is pathogenic. It distorts reality and, despite their best intentions, the viewpoints of those dependent on it for their livelihood. If J.Haidt is correct about the addictive nature and harmful effects of electronic media on American youth it is also crazy making for adults. Manipulation of the American psyche is an industry. RACKET/truth speakers absolutely. But continuing to embrace an electronic sewer as the lens through which We the People view the world is not the solution. (And I know you're not saying it is.) Truth matters and subscription journalism is a two way street. The only path forward is creation of a truth/fact based national conversation that will create a solutions oriented truth/fact based American reality. Can we get there from here? There is the Republic, the Constitution and the free citizen. Everything else is psyop. Depart the psyop and live.
One Mike to another, what should have been the new Library at Alexandria became a weapon of surveillance, psyop lies and life cancellation. The potential is still there. Why manipulation and "algorithms" at all? Nothing is inevitable. For myself I've come to believe that I need to make a conscious reconsideration and realignment of my relationship to electronic media. Subscription journalism is in its infancy and the potential for the creation of the healthy solutions oriented truth/fact based national conversation that will heal what I see has a shattered and manipulated American national reality is growing daily. "It's getting better all the time..."
"Subscription journalism", like most manifestations of capitalist reason, will inevitably create "castes" to run in conjunction with "silos".
The more free cash you have, the more New Right posters on Substack you can shore up your prejudices with. Those unfortunate enough not to be able to afford to read widely will be left at the mercy of whatever agit-prop is freely available.
"Why manipulation and "algorithms" at all?"
Because when the investment bankers and VC vultures demand to know where the profits will come from, the answer is in the algorithms and the surveillance. On top of that fundamental, there is the state with its interest.
So... "inevitable"? Not in any hard determinist sense but in the world of capitalist relations? Relatively inevitable.
And just BTW... NS Lyons' "history" is about as "truth/fact based" as the 1619 Project.
"Translation: a serial trade and human rights violator that with the help of decades of corrupt politicians from both parties polluted, price-dumped, and stole its way to a generation of American jobs and revenue, now owns so much of our debt that we must put up with its shit indefinitely. That’s the point of view of our own federal news agency. We have officially cucked ourselves past the point of no return."
"China" occurs 15 times in the article. No mention of capital or capitalism.
As a bit of a stickler for grammar, I have to point out that your use of the restrictive relative in the phrase "the American capitalism that..." (deliberately?) suggests that there is more than one American capitalism.
There really isn't. And anyone criticizing "globalism" (the right's term of art for avoiding critique of capitalism) by naming "China" 15 times and "capitalism" none is a cuck.
I used to defend Matt (as recently as within the past 24 hours) when liberals cosplaying leftist attacked him with "he used to be _____ but now". But the fact is he's refused to recognize a genocide taking place and his jingoism, which is stupid but understandable, has mutated into outright MAGA buffoonery.
WAH! Matt hasn't covered your pet peeve topics, poor you.
Is every journalist expected to cover everything? Do you bitch about Hannity and Rachel Maddow not spending enough time commenting on how seamlessly Luka has fit in with the Lakers?
I don't know anything about Hannity and Rachel. That's the kind of "substance" American media consumers need to wrestle with.
The topic here is "globalism" aka "free trade" and how Matt sees it as a "bad thing" for America that "needs to go".
In my reading of Matt's celebration of Trump's tariffs, Matt concentrates, as does the Orange Man, on China, which he says "stole its way to a generation of American jobs and revenue" as one among 15 total mentions of China.
So Matt covers the topic we are talking about but he covers it with all the insight of a retarded MAGAss.
The responsible parties for all those American jobs and revenue is American capitalism writ large. China didn't steal them. Apple and Foxconn did. (Rhetorical)
No one forced your fat opioid-slurpers to buy Chinese-manufactured flat screen TVs. Some fatty could have gone to Japan and learned how to make them in bumfuck Ohio, set up a factory and a range of services for opioid addicts, and made them in the US.
And no doubt 7 or 8 patriotic fatasses would have paid the 500% premium to buy the low quality crap and a few thousand "victims" would have thanked them for their service.
But it didn't happen. Cuz you folks do one thing well. Whine and blame furriners.
But there are other things "we folks" do well. Ever heard of the Super Bowl, the World Series, SpaceX, white-tailed deer, Silicon Valley, Dow Jones, Lewis and Clark, Bob Dylan, the Lockheed-Martin F-35, firing squads in Idaho, the "moon walk" (Michael Jackson's and Neil Armstrong's), WWII, Ted Turner's Montana Grill and his Superstation, Orville and Wilbur Wright, or the Grateful Dead? (EDIT, to add:) The Masters!
I agree we are pretty worthless these days, but "American capitalism" isn't and hasn't been all bad. Even an avowed socialist can find something to love here, like Hollywood and the Democratic party for two examples.
Who is going to loan the money to build a factory when you can't demonstrate the ability to be profitable? Setting up a factory to produce electronics goods costs a bit more than the spare change in the back of your couch. How exactly is this magical strawman of yours actually supposed to work?
You seem to have an unhealthy hunger for fat, fatty fatasses, especially those hailing from Bumfuck, Ohio. BBW must be your go-to on adult sites. (Bumfuck is actually a well-known place in Iowa, not Ohio, but you can have a pass on this. Bumblefuck, Iowa is not too far from Bumfuck.))
You're missing the point. Journalists have a beat. Sam Donaldson used to have the White House. Bill Simmons has the NBA. Matt's beat has been, in the past, presidential politics, financial crimes, and now he has been focusing on free speech for a while. I don't disagree with you that Israel is doing terrible things in Gaza, and I suspect Matt doesn't disagree either. But it's not his responsibility to cover and comment on every story out there. Even if you call him names when he doesn't.
There also appears to be an unhealthy bone up your ass about the United States. Did we do something mean to you? Or your country? What is your country? Is your wife really fat? Are you, and are you projecting? You're projecting on a lot of stuff, but specifically here I'm talking about whether you're fat and therefore say mean things about fat people.
Had to look up jingoism. That was NOT in Matt's article! Is that your MO, take your latest pet insult and then construct a false argument around it?
"The right's term of art for avoiding critique of capitalism"? Capitalism needs no critique. It can stand on its own based on 250+ years of success. It's the corrupt participants that deserve severe critique (as Matt was giving), be they CEOs, bought-and-paid-for politicians, greedy union bosses who abuse and sell out their members or the mad billionaire puppeteers like Rockefeller and Soros, all are evil, selfish destroyers. The ones to blame are the individual perpetrators within the system not the system, but then that's what socialists do, right? Create bitterness and revolt by maligning the system, so they'll sign up for slavery? And your ugly meanness is showing. Matt did not deserve your hateful critique.
This is all cover for impending absolute capitulation on tariff fallacy. Trump fucked around and your 401k found out. But we’re going to blame Bernie? The fuck outta here. But at the church of stupid pastor Taibi is god.
You may well be right. However, what we've been doing for the past 35-40 years continues to make things worse. When billionaires and rich people whine about market losses, it might be a sign that something good is happening. I lost a shit-ton of money in the past few weeks, but I have to be ok with it if I want to stick to my beliefs about what is good and what is not for working Americans.
Would someone else try to radically fix things if it weren't for Trump? I don't know. Some would argue that Bernie would have had he not been sabotaged by his own party and then did nothing about being shivved. Twice. There's no one out there that would have either the beliefs or the balls to do this.
My concern is what happens when Trump leaves office. Will his successor continue with the attempt at reshaping the economy with working people in mind vs. the ownership class? Something that took decades to fuck up won't be cleaned up in just a few years.
Sure, I'm concerned about what could go wrong. But when the alternative is guaranteed wrong, I'm willing to roll the dice.
You can tell I don’t have much to do this Sunday afternoon. I got a knee replacement and I spend my time sitting around or exercising so I’m waiting you back.
You’re a braver man than I am ( or more foolish). I’d be more swayed if he at least had been consistent, rather than undoing everything he did within three days much to the benefit of his oligarch friends. Then there’s his background which other than the rhetoric doesn’t show a heck of a lot of concern for the common man. I guess we’re gonna find out what’s gonna happen and who owns the dubius right of “I told you so.” I’m arguing the probabilities based on the available evidence right now are with me.
Sorry about your knee, and good luck with the recovery. Be as religious as you can with the P/T exercises.
I don't know about brave, but it may turn out I'm more foolish. Here's the thing--the current (pre-Trump tariffs) economic model worked great for me. Executive with two large publicly traded companies, getting rich from share price growth fueled at least partly by better margins earned by replacing expensive workers and ditching regulated America to find cheap labor that can be abused elsewhere. All companies did the same, as it was not illegal, and the crowds cheered globalization.
But I've always known that it's rigged against working people. And no one--no Democrat or Republican President has done shit about it for decades. Well, that's actually not true. Democrat and Republican Presidents have both made the problem worse. Shit, and remember Hillary trying to sell us on the TPP trade agreement when she was running? Would have been NAFTA cubed.
If the current system works great for me, and I STILL want change, I can only imagine the folks for whom it's not working. Maybe everyone will be disappointed. But to quote Lloyd Christmas: "So you're telling me there's a chance." Maybe it is only one in a million. But with any other candidate who was running (save RFKj) it would be a continuing zero in a million chance.
I didn't vote for Trump. I joined 1.2% of my fellow state citizens in supporting "None of the above candidates." But if he's successful in improving things for working people, and scaling back the influence of pharma companies and insurance companies on health care (maybe turning today's "sick care" into actual "health care," I will regret not pulling that lever.
I can't see that it attacks capitalism. It definitely attacks unscrupulous capitalists. There is a difference, you know. The system is good. The human corruption is not. Same old same old. Time for another flood - oh, but wait, God promised no more floods. Matt is right. It will be burned down.
Like any other belief system, capitalism has clear goals: the maximization of profit and growth. Except for maybe Ben & Jerry's, capitalism is not benevolent. And even Ben & Jerry's sold out to Unilever.
This is why capitalism is regulated. Getting the right balance of regulation is the important question.
Capitalism is the best system, but calling it good is a different story.
Capitalism is not a belief system. It's an organizational model for every facet of life in societies dominated by capitalist organization.
Liberalism is the belief system that interacts with capitalism in a never-ending chicken-and-egg shimmy.
And liberalism is why Americans cannot imagine a world without capitalism. Reality needs to impinge on the mind for actual thinking to be birthed into the world.
And liberalism is the most effective condom ever invented.
What? Capitalism is not just numbers on a P&L statement. Capitalism is the opportunity in a free society to end up better off than you started. And if not better off, then you were at least free to find your own way with your own skills and sweat in order to live the life God gave you on this earth. I know you want to boil it down to economics but it is chiefly people. And yes, people can be slaves to the almighty buck but that's nowhere near to what socialism enslaves the people.
Why don’t you refute his claims? Because you can’t. Matt was carefully explaining that you’re not a pos for shopping at Walmart and this Micheal fella ruined it by rubbing your nose in your mess. And now you want the mean man to go away.
I'm really tired of the caustic insults by commenters who style themselves as the next Taibbis or Hunter Thompsons, of which Michael's and many others here, pro and con his position, seem to feel expresses their post-modern literary brilliance.
Is there a real person and argument here, or has AI just been learning how to swear?
The "thing that is real" is not so much capitalism, it is the intelligent psychopathy that corrupts the iron law of oligarchy no matter what the system. We barely know how to recognize that problem, much less fix it. (I'm confident that's by design.) But fixing it is the only way out.
You can't have unions without strong businesses and you can't have strong businesses with "free" trade. How'd all the strikes in Britian in the 1970's work?
Eventually too many Brits wanted to be spanked on the botty by stern Margaret.
At least I got to confiscate money raised by our football team's Homecoming Event and send it to support the miners' wives and kids.
Solidarity across the globe more or less died somewhere in the 90s and the "left" capitulated to liberal identity politics in its embrace of capitalist values.
No other option but burn it down. I feel queasy when I hear politicians like Schumer want to call for meetings and committees and democrats to get in the discussions where nothing gets done but talk.
Trump has managed to get the world talking about the failure of the globalists. Before they completely rob us and feed us bugs.
Wall Street has very little to do with the working class and they don’t care either.
Other ironies include suddenly becoming concerned with human rights and other liberal niceties when the political wind changes with regard to one's official opinions about China's state policies and practices. How long will hate-China week be promoted this time around?
Hope everyone will enjoy paying $2500 for an iPhone from now on because that’s what Trump‘s 140% tariff on Chinese goods is going to do to America. Moreover, everything in your automobile and all of your prescription drugs come from China. Hope you got enough money to pay for them. I don’t like to say swear words, but “when the shit hits the fan“ a lot of people are gonna be changing their tune.
The 140% tariff on China is what they call a regressive tax. It means the increase cost of goods through tariffs will be paid disproportionately by ordinary Americans— not the rich. Chinese manufacturers will pay the tariff and that money will go into the treasury, but then it will be passed along to us in higher prices. Thuss, we pay that tax.
The added money into our federal treasury will then be used to offset the trillion dollar tax cuts Trump will give to the rich. The tariffs to be effective will have to last years and will not be effective if the Trump administration and Congress does not pass statues that assist domestic industry in rebuilding. Moreover, the rebuilt factories will be run by robots, not people so don’t expect the Working Man to benefit all that much.
So do you see where all of this is going? Don’t you think this should be brought up by a skeptical independent journalist like Matt Taibbi before he says “burn everything down?” Don’t you think we the public should be questioning Matt when he doesn’t rather than cursing and swearing everyone that disagrees with him?
Full disclosure: I am not a Democrat. I’m not a Republican. I vote independently based upon the best critical analysis I can make of the situation. I am for tariffs and other measures designed and actually capable of rebuilding America’s industry and employing people that are now hopeless. I do not agree with Mr. Sanders on many issues. I just don’t see enough evidence that Trump‘s true motive is to help the Working Man. I see nothing is background to support such a conclusion. People should be allowed to question his motives without being cursed and sworn at.
People have gotten so used to buying cheap shit off the backs of people in other countries who do not enjoy the same human right's protections, labour laws, or standard of living. I suspect most people don't think about that, and more importantly, don't want to think about that. Maybe it's good if "why is stuff from other countries so much cheaper?" becomes a mainstream topic again.
Heck no! I hate corporations! I’m from a broken down factory town. I saw what they did to my mom and dad and my friends. I became a lawyer because of it and I’ve been suing corporations every chance I get when I see them take advantage of people.
You got me mixed up with a Democrat. I don’t belong to either political party. Gives me an independent mind, don’t you know.
I’ll bet you and I and a lot of other people that I make critical comments to have a lot in common. I just believe in the constitution and critical thinking rather than flying off the handle with my gut reaction.
Your response to me shows the first step in critical thinking: Asking questions. Good on you.
These people pulled a Sopranos style bust-out for years. But they say a creditor who holds an extremely large debt is actually vulnerable to the debtor. Trump knows a lot about negotiating and restructuring debt. The MSM doesn’t have a clue - there is probably no one better to steer us through this storm. Fingers crossed anyway 🤞
Trump has been in business doing deals all over the world and developing multi million dollar properties since 1968. He has knocked it out of the park in business, in entertainment, and in politics. So I don’t know about genius but for sure he has more international business experience than any modern president.
None of those were personal bankruptcies. Trump organizes his real estate holdings in a number of separate limited liability companies, usually one per property. Several of those properties connected to his Atlantic City foray and one or two others failed to attract the tenants and the businesses he’d planned and he consequently took them through bankruptcy. It’s standard practice in commercial real estate.
Given the number of real estate ventures he’s been involved with, he’s got maybe a 5% failure rate. Some investors would regard that as quite successful if Trump were publicly traded. Ever notice how many properties REITs write off?
The only difference between his corporate Chapter 11 filings (and maybe even a Chapter 7 filing) and the ongoing bankruptcy of our federal government is that his companies never had the power to print their own currency when the debt got out of control. I would suggest that it is those bankruptcies COMBINED with his successful track record that make him the most qualified leader to unwind our global trade debacle, as well as the institutional corruption that created it.
Trump never filed for personal bankruptcy. He had four bankruptcy - Chapter 11, which is used for corporations trying to reorganize. They were in the casino mess for the most part. You might try to at least add he’s many, many successful businesses.
Try to keep up. Diana commented that Trump has been successful in business, entertainment, and politics. I pointed out that there have been a few business failures. This is an observable fact.
Why do I need to restate what she already stated, that he has had success in business, entertainment, and politics? Is there insufficient waxing of his schwanz occurring for your taste?
You folks who think the man can do and has never done anything remotely wrong are as bad as the TDS people. Flip sides of the same tarnished coin.
If you review the history of all casinos in Atlantic City it’s not a healthy picture. They are barely surviving, surrounding area crime ridden, politics played a huge part. There’s more to the story of Atlantic City than orange man bad, but he’s just such a juicy target.
Not really a concern in his current position. If he managed to keep *some* of his companies solvent then he's a better executive than any other recent President. Consider the company he's keeping: When is the last time Congress balanced a budget?
He didn't have any bankruptcies himself. He had interests in 100+ companies, some were under water, a handful were reorganized and unloaded. Have you ever heard of William Zeckendorf?
You guys ought to be getting paid as members of Trump's PR team. What an overreaction. Someone says he's conquered business, entertainment, and politics. I make a slight comment on some well-known bankruptcies, and it's overreaction city.
Calm down. I support what Trump is trying to do. I hope things change for the better.
Used properly, bankruptcy is a financial tool, not a sign of failure. Many very successful businesses have been bankrupt and recovered, some more than once.
To be clear neither Trump or the Trump organization ever went bankruptcy. Specific entities that owned real estate they were managing or developing did. The bankruptcy system was designed to encourage risk taking. Trump tried to fix some bad properties and failed. It you never fail, you haven't assumed much risk, particularly in real estate. Henry Ford, Walt Disney and Abraham Lincoln also went bankrupt, Ford twice.
Clinton and LBJ have similar reputations. I actually think there is a public and private Trump, and many have observed this. And I don’t have a problem with either.
As I said elsewhere, I would prefer to have someone else doing what Trump is doing - but no one else was offering to do anything but extend the status quo.
A weird Goldilocks Syndrome has broken out in DC: yes, I wanted that policy, but just not in that precise way!
The only person who could do any of this would have to be an anti-politician not beholden to any Party apparatus and not worried about what names the MSM called him.
How about that. What did everyone think would happen to someone who actually played all the face up cards that were on the table for decades that the rest admired and talked about, but never picked up.
Excellent point. Unfortunately, the problem exists in both parties. No one wants to focus on the issue, just want to focus on the him vs her. The D vs R. But both D and R are responsible for enabling the gutting of our economy.
Case in point: Matt writes that globalization needs some nihilism, and a bunch of our fellow commenters decide it’s the time to attack Bernie or fucking Pelosi.
Bernie is a naive Socialist with Utopian views surpassed only by the ideological fantasies of young AOC.
Pelosi knows precisely what she's doing.
1) She feeds intel to her husband all the time on investments, which is why several years ago I invested in the ETF named NANC...which mirrors her stock trades. My momma didn't raise no dummies.
2) She ain't leaving DC. She's an addict to the power and knows what happens if she loses all her security protections Jeffries provides for her.
Imagine that. And he was turned into the definition of a-hole by those who got us where we are today and profit immensely from the way things are. Funny how that works.
Trump was an ass before he was President. He was also astute, seeing the clown-show that was the '16 Republican nominee-wannabes. He's also been smart enough to not repeat his mistakes for the most part from his first administration - that is better than I expected.
HIS mistakes?! He was a DC newbie, who got there without DC blessing, and who trusted advice given to him by DC, I’ll wager. DC screwed him at every turn. He may be a jerk, but no one offered to help, but in fact worked to —- Resist!
Some of his "mistakes" were in not sticking to his instincts and instead being swayed (by those swamp-dwellers), at least that's my opinion. He doesn't appear to be doing that this time, which doesn't mean everything will be fine, but at least it won't be the same old shit.
I"m not a Trump fan at all..was a long time NeverTrumper...but came to realize that if we were ever going to restore the balance of power between those who govern and We the People they govern...we'd need someone with cajones the size of Texas to do it.
MAGA parade was already under way from 2010 on...Trump was savvy enough media-wise to jump in front of the parade and appoint himself Parade Marshall.
Truth is...he's a useful tool for us who've demanded these changes for 2-3 decades but never had the political tools to do it on our own.
Now we have what is..in essence.. a downfield blocker for us to get some first downs.
We're a long way from the endzone, but momentum is on our side.
Do you mean upend the rule of law by defying court orders? Or do you mean that you want someone else to tank global markets to the tune of trillions within days (the US hurts, too, when this happens, btw)? Or do you want someone else to...ah forget it. At the end of Trump's second term, just as at the end of Trump's first term, the status quo will be fully preserved and a lot of billionaires will be billions richer. That's what the Repugs do--make their clients richer. That's their raison d'etre. Of course, the same is true of the Dems.
Well Harry C, if you’ve watched politics for decades like I have, and like many Racket readers, name me one politician that could accomplish what Trump is doing. Just one. Get rid of waste, fraud & abuse through DOGE? ✅ Fire crooked grifter bureaucrats and defund CIA fronts like USAID?✅ Deport gangsters running fentanyl into the country?✅ stopping child trafficking from Mexico & South America?✅ Establishing tariffs to make other countries pay & saving US taxpayers billions?✅ Lots and lots more. Only Trump has even considered doing anything to help Main Street. And you think he’s an asshole?
Those are nice green checkmarks there. Too bad not a single one of them has any basis in reality.
But just like some people can say "fiery but mostly peaceful" with a straight face, others will look at empty shelves and tripled prices for whatever's left and claim that they are "winning bigly."
Eggs had a very Soviet-looking "no more than 3 cartons per customer" signs on them. Toilet paper could be next. (Hmmm, where does a lot of raw materials for it come from?...)
Don't you have a bidet at home? Water's still local.
Yes there was a planned egg shortage manufactured by the previous administration who culled the egg producing chickens because of a bird flu plandemic, lol.
One problem with your analysis: other countries do not pay tariffs, Americans who use imported goods pay them, if businesses pass them on as part of the cost of acquiring the goods to process or sell, or American businesses pay them if they absorb them as a cost, rather than pass them on to consumers, and some goods must be imported (e.g. tropical crops we cannot grow in adequate supply to meet demand, like coffee, cacao, bananas, or rubber).
Americans have been paying for foreign tariffs for 80 years, since WW2. If countries don’t want their market share to tank, they will absorb the cost of the tariffs. If they don’t, they won’t sell product. Many companies (like my MIL’s in Mexico) will absorb some of the hit and the retailers will absorb some & buyers the rest. It’s time for a reset. Europe et al have been coasting on our money for decades. No more.
I've often heard the argument that other countries don't pay tariffs; we do. At one level, I agree with that analysis, but on another I wonder why it should matter then to the countries being tariffed?
Just this morning I was on a UK substack and the Brits were surmising that Starmer would be subsidizing Jaguar so it would not lose money when Americans could no longer afford their cars. That is how the UK absorbs the tariffs charged on UK products coming to the US .
I should add, the article was written in support of Trump's tariffs and 90% of the commenters agreed. They want their government to man up and quit with the globalist agenda.
Why? Supply and demand: a tariff increases the price to the buyer (and without generating more revenue for the seller per unit sold), demand decreases with respect to the increased cost to the buyer. If the goods being hit with the tariff have highly elastic demand, the country exporting them will drastically loose revenue.
Right. Several movements may come into play here. 1. Consumers pay a higher price for the foreign product, or for a domestic replacement, or do without. 2. The foreign company loses market share, and hence revenue. 3. Domestic companies who can replace the product are shielded and gain some of that market share, which provides profit and jobs domestically. 4. The nation evolves to become more self-sufficient, united, and perhaps resilient to external hostilities or control.
The anti-tariff side would emphasize the first two factors; the pro-tariff side would be concerned with the latter two. I think it's worth keeping them all in mind when we argue the issue.
Right. Surprising to see the braindead parroting of that lie regarding *who* pays tariffs, even here, on Matt's substack. Tariffs are a consumption tax.
To your point about US consumers paying for tariffs. People like Bernie rail against tariffs and in the next breath demand corporations pay more income tax, he thinks we are stupid and don't realize that higher income taxes are passed on to the consumer as higher prices.
This country was built by ass-hole con men. It is just that the history books were written to make everyone think most of our leaders were some pias Mother Teresa's who never swore or cheated on their wives. We now know the truth. Guess what they did!
And those in charge currently. Probably 90+% of CEOs are assholes too. Speaks to what one has to do and be to get the top jobs in industry or government.
What nonsense. The constitution they wrote is a fantastic document. You are the ahole who has benefited from their genius. Otherwise you’d be the one doing menial labor.
Yet he was elected to the highest office (in the world) twice. What is the highest public service office you have held Harry? Are you successful in business ?
Don Surber (sarcasm): "Yes, the billionaire doesn’t understand economics but the fellow [referring to a NY Times reporter dissing Trump's tariff tactics] paying $2,000 a month for a one-bedroom apartment with a view of the next building does."
Essentially correct, but NYC apartment rental prices have soared. Change to: "Yes, the billionaire doesn’t understand economics but the fellow paying $4,000 a month for a one-bedroom apartment with a view of the bricks in the next building does."
2K a month is getting to be the norm in fly-over towns much smaller and less glamorous (though cleaner and more racially tolerant) than NYC. Do any elites understand the state of country these days?
04/11/25: Since they're the ones setting the prices, yes, that's a reasonable assumption as far as the economics go. The moral rot that they've curated in their ideological petri dishes please them as much as their profits. Blind to the ultimate end results, they're the pashas sitting on fetid lotus blossums, smoking the hookahs that fog all and obscured eveything until the thunder crack of 2024-25 broke. Now they're scared. Too bad. May they drown in their own volcanic bile.
04/11/25: I just finished reading (for the second time in 50 or so years) Nevil Shute's 1957 novel, "On The Beach." Quite appropriate for the situation we find ourselves in now.
You're welcome! I'm not naive. For the following to be produced by a Hollywood saturated with casting couches, the insiders must have laughed all the way to the bank. But I didn't know that then. From my book notes:
Of course, I had to see On The Beach with the unforgettable Gregory Peck.
Heady stuff for a ten-year old.
Somehow, I don't see this getting into Easy Rider (1969):
Dwight Towers: "I'd rather go fishing... there's just one thing, honey. I wouldn't want to go if it was going to mean that you'd get hurt."
Moira Davidson: "I shan't get hurt... Not in the way you mean."
Dwight: "I'm going home quite soon ... It's nearly over now ... I've got a wife at home I love and I've played it straight with her the two years that I've been away. I wouldn't want to spoil that now, these few last days."
Moira: "I know ... I've known that all the time ... I wouldn't want to start a smutty love affair when I'm dying in a week or ten days time. I've got some standards, too --- now, anyway."
"He smiled at her. We could try out Junior's rod ..."
It's 1957.
Here comes Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky, sooner than you think.
Imagine if Tony Soprano and his “glorified crew” as Phil called them, held a bunch of John Gotti’s debt. Gotti is not worried about Tony. It’s the other way around. How the hell am I ever going to get John to pay me back?
I've often said exactly that. With the US facing bankruptcy, who better to negotiate with our creditors than the man who once famously said: "If you owe the bank million dollars, the bank owns you. If you owe them a billion dollars, you own them."
Sure, right…more like Trump knows a lot about what it’s like to declare bankruptcy, and instead of swindling all his low wage workers out of their earnings, he’ll just do the same to Americans
Yesterday I got into it with an economics professor from my alma mater on this topic. He claimed to thoroughly debunk my argument for tariffs on Chinese goods by citing Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations. According to him running a massive National Account deficit is a good thing because China is massively investing in our country by buying our debt.
That makes sense to me so long as 1) the creditor isn’t our enemy 2) the creditor doesn’t have too much leverage over us (the debt isn’t too large and 3) the creditor isn’t stealing American IP / flooding our country with fentanyl.
To the globalist I was arguing with, those concerns were silly.
What am I missing? Am I on crazy pills or is it just all the “experts?”
Oelwein, Iowa. Not sure what the Zip code is. I’m reading Methland by Nick Redding, about how closing businesses and their meth replacements nearly destroyed a nice town.
If they’re getting a factory that pays more than minimum wage, I’ll submit your name for nomination for POTUS.
All I can say is that I grew up in a 'rust belt' factory town. I went to a very good high school (we had 2, one public, which I attended, one catholic). I went to that school with kids from all backgrounds whose parents worked in those 4 factories- one was a Watkins flavoring plant, another made knitting, sewing supplies for Boye, a Honeywell factory and a Tire Plant. Many other parents commuted to a larger city 30 minutes away where there was even more industry. There might have been more. The huge majority of my friends and fellow students lived in houses their parents owned. Those parents also had campers, boats and the money to contribute to the community in terms of both supporting small business and local boosterism. We had great public parks which we kids spent hours navigating. I graduated in '81 to a landscape in which those jobs were being sucked away. I had to move across the country to find real work in what became my trade. I have not gone back to my hometown, last I knew, it was a shell with the downtown completely closed down and emptied and most people who were left getting by on Kmart jobs.
There's a lot of people out there who say the work isn't coming back and if it was, Americans wouldn't do it. These are the people willing to sell us out to the lowest common denominator for sheer profit. I'm not going to forget that.
PS: The schools I went to were so good that I coasted through my college requirements without even having to buy the textbooks. They not only killed the economic base, they killed the economic base that was funding real education.
I love Matt because of how fiercely independent he is, and his willingness to call BS (usually in a way that makes me laugh rather than my blood boil) on all deserving targets regardless of party or status. I hope Matt never identifies as (or is thought of as) MAGA. No disrespect at all for the MAGA movement, but I won’t fence Matt in with that kind of label. He needs the free range.
I can't like your comment enough. It's people who want to pin labels on him that have a problem accepting Matt's commitment to the truth. If he happens to side more with the right these days than with the left, it's because the mainstream left has abandoned principles and sanity.
I have long respected Matt for that fierce independence.
But it is gone.
Whether the attacks from gormless Dems, the IRS and the faux-left in online spaces have driven him to abandon reason and go whole MAGA hogbrain or whether it is just the money he'd lose if he pissed off enough of his mouthbreathers, it doesn't matter.
Congrats, your not only ignorant but vulgar too. Try a few sentences without the disgusting references. Dictionaries are free and they're full of useful words!
lol... The Overton window in American "politics" is the windshield of that stretch limo that Robert Pattison lives in in Cosmopolis.
And it only looks in.
The current iteration of the American right is cloaked in the faux-populism that allows once-genuine critics like Matt to gabble on about the evils of "capitalism" as long as no one mentions capitalism and there is a strong flavor of bad chinks and bad gubmint sellouts.
That way, the gormless fatties that make up the MAGA hordes can fulminate against the chinks and the gubmint while capital fucks them in their fat asses.
"The gormless fatties that make up the MAGA hordes can fulminate against the chinks and the gubmint while capital fucks them in their fat asses." as opposed to the blue haired, infinity pierced, triple gender, violent pyschpaths, and the limo liberals of the left?
Well, let's face it: He's MAGA. He's been supporting anything Trumpian for so long (with minor hedges here and there) that they can adopt him as one of their own.
I wouldn’t characterize Matt as having entered MAGA world. He did write a book about Trump called Insane Clown President.
And don’t give any more ammo to the Democrats who used to be liberal until they decided to support forever war, censorship, and spying on our own citizens. And killing some of them with robot planes. They loved Matt when he was making fun of Bush (as was appropriate), and now call him a traitor, often in these pages. Dumbasses. He hasn’t changed. They have.
It's weird how in the past our government treated the country like it had to be more or less self-sufficient. (A good proxy for this is the past government wanting you to be healthy, while the current one doesn't.) Then the globalists come along and (rightly) point out that countries that trade basically never go to war. So we offload our manufacturing of important industries to our political enemies......for some reason thinking they won't take advantage of the situation?
We can't trade pieces of paper for actual goods and services forever.
We can't rely on foreign nations doing our bidding forever.
SOMETHING'S gotta give. The world isn't going to keep slaving away to feed the fat American forever.
"(rightly) point out that countries that trade basically never go to war"
The ironic thing is, it was exactly this argument that said WWI would not happen - because it was too economically costly to the general prosperity of Europe. Norman Angell's The Great Illusion (which would later be alluded to by The Grande Illusion).
It's like the nugget of truth that makes you believe the whole lie. Trade is good for both nations, and DOES decrease the chances of war. But that doesn't mean you act like an idiot an outsource your ability to produce what you need to wage war. (Real or economic)
Thank you; don't know where they got that idea from. Almost all wars throughout history have been about trade (I want it but not at your price). It was the entire basis of colonization.
If I recall, that was the underlying cause of the rebellion in Star Wars too. ;)
Surely we can just zap up trillions of dollars every year and the people who need those dollars to buy things won't be upset by the cratering value of the currency!
Our labor. Our entertainment value. Our innovation. Our crops. All made possible by our stability. We are not unique human beings. We are just more free than most.
What's weirder is the way Trump and his clownclones frame the global trading system developed by and for American capital as "bad furriners rippin' us off".
The Chinese didn't destroy American unions. And it wasn't German corporations that shoved all that Oxy up the fat asses of whiners who lost their jobs.
So the first step "back" to American self-sufficiency would be to let go of all the "we is victims" whining and get off the couch.
Where I live it's 9:50am and I am enjoying a leisurely coffee and bread and cheese brekkie before heading out into the oppressive heat and tropical humidity.
I'm in an "office chair" and my daughter is doing laundry out front as I type.
My "mom", who died about 15 years ago and from whom I was totally alienated, didn't actually have a basement.
Bowling shoes, though. She had bowling shoes to the bitter end.
God bless you! Every fat fuck that kept Walmart in business can shut their whiny little mouths. The cope among this comment section is straight out of a country music song. Home of the brave?😅😅😅
I've long wondered the REAL reason he dropped out of the race that summer. For some reason, almost no one remembers that and NO ONE talks about it.
But in June he was LEADING both Bush & Clinton in the polls. But he suddenly dropped out in July, claiming some vague threat against his daughter. Everyone laughed at his paranoia and weirdness, but with the benefit of 33 years hindsight, doesn't sound at all implausible.
Anyhow, once he came back, the momentum was gone, though he did manage to siphon away some of HW's support.
Ross was spot on. The biggest issue is that there is never a post-mortem on NAFTA or the WTO with China. Opinions are expressed, then people move on, and no one ever examines what really happened. Individuals like Tom Friedman flip their position without admitting ignorance or mistakes. Blow it up now!
Yet they are the oddest of streetwalkers, as they also imagine themselves qualified to deliver every Sunday sermon. Journalists are somehow amoral moralists.
Starts with The Good Thief, we’ve found our way back to the Holy Prostitutes of Baal’s Temple in Carthage (true story). They too provided revenue for the state.
It's so funny how many things we can pile up that the "Left" has entirely flip flopped on. Watching Bernie pander for Capitalism, Tim Walz on a Wild Western Fistfighting tour.... They are for basically anything assinine, or bad for the world.
I for one, lost my rural upbringing and am sick as hell of crappy Chinese goods. Even if American manufacturing doesn't come back (I sincerely hope it does) I am fine with empty Walmarts and no more shitty garbage.
How is Walmart the problem? Yes, they sell a lot of made-in-China stuff, but who doesn't? Taking the snooty I-would-NEVER-shop-their attitude of hipsters doesn't do anything but telegraph your desire to be in the "right" social class, and Trump's populist presidency shows that people care less and less about that.
I didn't say Walmart was a problem. I just don't buy the cheap crap from China that they sell. Trust me, I'm in nobody's "right" social class. I just am not seduced by price if the product is crap. I'm a woodworker and am able to supply my tool and material needs by American, German and Japanese products. Yep, they cost more but also do more and last longer.
Do you shop at Walmart? Cheap crap? A lot of what they sell is the same as anywhere else: food, toys, etc. Some is more than good enough. Is a Walmart-sourced cooler "cheap crap" compared to a much more expensive Yeti one? Even their clothing is, I think, pretty decent; and I would like some to go step-by-step how, say, the stitching is worse than things available elsewhere.
As to American, German, and Japanese products. How exactly do they "do" more? And last longer? Sure, a Toyota will, but a German car? And are we back on American cars being good? And having been raised in the US, lived in Japan, and travelled in Germany, I don't think something being sourced there makes it "better". And I am old enough to remember when older generations called Japanese stuff "crap." Things change.
But going back to Walmart, they--like any business--are going to source stuff based on cost and value. China largely offers that. No, furniture sold there is not solid wood, but is much stuff made in or on offer in Japan and Germany either? And basing an argument around tariffs on "crap" is not going to win you support, especially if you focus Walmart--a clear favorite of the masses.
I buy Purina dog food at Walmart. I'll check and see if it comes from China.
I drive a Toyota pickup, made in Texas. As for everything else, I decide on a per item basis. Unless I'm going to use a tool once and throw it away, I don't buy Chinese. I guess I'm not one of the masses
No, I don’t shop at Walmart. But Walmart already reaches into my pocket for tax dollars to keep their underpaid workers fed, housed, and medically cared for.
Walmart has been particularly bad because it used its market dominance to force suppliers to adopt terrible labor practices and to offshore production. It was such a big purchaser that its practices affected the entire landscape. Its leading position has now been taken by Amazon, which controls our access to information about the market.
It’s synonymous with Chinese products. And now a lot of whiny garbage people can’t connect the dots. It’s synonymous with exploitation of people in china America and pretty much everywhere and is the largest employer in the country. Because Americans are self serving morons that kiss ass and spend their money at a place where employees are subsidized by welfare to keep prices low. Don’t worry. No one else I know is smart enough to do that math either. But you can always blame Trump or Bernie or China. Because you are EXCEPTIONAL!!
We have to be honest that there is a strong possibility that some of these jobs will be AI or automated. Entrenched wealth has never wanted to pay workers as Matt so accurately showed us with the history of labor. There will have to be effort made to keep that at a minimum. We have to focus effort next on limiting that number but unlike before we will have a fighting chance to do so. We will either way be more secure as a nation by not being dependent on the rest of the world to provide everything for us. I also feel better knowing that forced labor isn't being used. When we add a more fair trade environment we are better off now than we have been for decades. Trump deserves credit for having the balls to buck the status quo. The shit this administration has exposed to the citizens has felt enlightening. Under decades of politicians in both parties (as Walters photo showed us.) there was a push for a one world order that benefits only the vulgarly wealthy (Remember, you will own nothing and you will be happy? WTAF?) and that effort seemed clear to me and interrupting and hopefully, stopping that was so important. (we have to always be mindful as evil is relentless.) I think about the administrations we have had in just my lifetime who have chipped away at our rights and democracy by gutting our jobs, privacy rights, classifying everything and keeping us in the dark, making deals with international entities or corporate tribunals... all of which fell outside or superseded our own courts or ability to vote our way out of the situation. All of that made me think that it was bull shit and they shouldn't be able to get away with it. The absolute line in the sand for me was the massive effort to shut us up about what they were doing and simultaneously blasting us with propaganda telling us how to feel and that we were radical crazies if we didn't fall in line. That stuff should have raised hairs on the back of the necks of any sane person. Those efforts removed any doubt I may have ever had as to their goals. Can we get all of what they took back? We certainly should put in the effort to try. A fighting chance is better than we have had for a long time.
I get how people could delude themselves about the benefits of free trade, in the 1980s. But I will never understand how that delusion continued after Tien an Men Square in 1989, and our experience of Chinese IP theft and non-tariff barriers even at that early stage.
I recall in the mid-1990s the US govt approved the Chinese buying a major stake in Loral, a big maker of satellites with enormous strategically valuable IP. My thought on hearing that was a vision in 20 years of my son, born 1984, in a slit trench on Guam, awaiting the Chinese assault.
I was and am no genius. I therefore believe that our leadership class knew full well what they were doing and sold us out for the last 35 years.
To say I am angry at them, and fully support what Trump is trying to do even as I wonder if he could do it better, is an understatement. I am furious at our elites, and more MAGA than I ever could have imagined a few years ago.
There wasn’t blood and prison sentences after 2008. This time there should be.
"I was and am no genius. I therefore believe that our leadership class knew full well what they were doing and sold us out for the last 35 years." +1. How else could the "civil servant class" afford all these lovely homes in prime spots? I can't help but wonder how much the cartels have enriched our "representatives" (see also $20 million to the Biden family).
The “leadership class” will take money from ANYONE. They will also betray our country for ANYONE. All it takes is driving through the Ivy Leagues waving fists full of dollar bills.
There are benefits to free and fair trade. However, there are diminishing returns as the trade area gets larger. Free and *fair* trade just within one nation as large as the US, gives you 90% of the benefits of trading with the whole world. For small nations - like Hungary as just one example - they would be *much* poorer without trading with other nations. That is one reason US was such a juggernaut in the past.
The transition will be hard - and more disruptive than many appreciate. But it must be done. I would prefer it to be done gradually, starting with critical industries like steel, shipbuilding, pharmaceuticals, electronics, etc. And we may find out that we really cannot bring back critical industries with just tariffs - we will likely need more direct subsidies. I personally would not be against federal government contracting out critical antibiotics, insulin, etc. Some of these things are so cheap to make, there is no profit, so no one makes them, forcing doctors to prescribe things that are more expensive.
I also think the possible benefits of "MAHA" may be huge. Health care (actually sick care) is consuming ever growing percent of GDP. if that cost curve is bent down, the benefits are huge financially as well as in terms of health. And reducing big pharma and big ag's control of our government would be a game changer.
My favorite slam of Friedman from Matt was on the stupid metaphors. I may be paraphrasing, but it was something like 3a + b = Swedish girls like chocolate.
I asked earlier, still curious... what was the date of the last year the Dems weren't screwing workers over while demanding we vote for them to save us from those evil Republicans? And same question but substitute "minorities" for "workers".
You mean the party of slavery, the Civil War, jim crow, kkk, tammany hall, boss tweed, both world wars, korea, vietnam, george wallace dixiecrats, welfare fraud, medicare fraud, medicaid fraud, election fraud, stolen elections, actblue and usaid and illegal immigration and lawfare and social security fraud and castration and sterilization and organized political violence? That party?
I pointed out to a friend of mine completely going off the deep end about Trump (everything he does is bad, and if she agrees with it, it's bad because Trump is doing it -- that pretty much sums up the mentality.) Anyway, I mentioned to her that it wouldn't matter what Republican had won, she'd feel exactly the same. She denied it. I said, how about DeSantis, I really like him, and she spent 500 words telling me how awful he is. I rested my case. Trump isn't liberal or conservative. I know they all want to say he's a right-wing fascist, but he doesn't support many traditional conservative values.
I’ve been with Matt here within days of him starting TK, which became the Racket. I’ve been a conservative since HS. (Matt is a year younger than me). I have always strived to learn more, think for myself, and support classical liberal principles. I don’t always succeed but I see the flaws in both parties. I got so mad at Republicans for a time (over the Patriot Act) that I re-registered Libertarian for a few years. But I don’t align with their philosophy about drugs and immigration, so went back to the GOP in 2019.
Everyone agrees we now have a big fucking problem. Been around for years and no one has done a damn thing about it. Now that Trump has articulated and exposed the magnitude of our greedy politicians at the expense of the rest of us and stepped up to address it, only now do the cowards decide to participate. Not with anything constructive, only infantile I know betters. These people that got us into this dilemma have no business sticking their noses in it now. Go Fuck yourselves.
I love it that they say Trump and Musk and are doing whatever to make more $.
Reminds me of the scene in “The Fugitive” film where Gerard asks the Chicago detectives what the motive was for Kimball killing his wife. “He did it for the money.” Gerard points out, “But he was a doctor, he was already rich.” Detectives: “But she was more rich.” It doesn’t have to make sense.
Finally!!! Someone unapologetically says exactly what I'm thinking and saying to anyone who will listen. Do you see what China is doing right now??? They were ALWAYS going to do this. Pushing it down the road just allows them even more leverage. Are people happy??? Are the younger generations happy? No. And, yes we are being called to think of people we haven't even met yet. Future Americans. Present Americans. It doesn't matter. If this is the sacrifice we are being called to make, rather than fighting a hot war, can we not sacrifice anything for this nation and citizens??? Really? The buck has to stop somewhere. I worry about giving the crazies power again, but I'm more worried about killing generations of people's ability to live an American dream. We were sold out. Globalization has to die. Now. All at once.
It's not really globalization that is the problem. That is the nationalist diversion. It's capitalism. The US has always been a terrible place to live for most people, but it got a bit less terrible for a few decades around the middle of last century. Then, it went back to standard operating procedure. Capitalists have always moved production to make a few more bucks. You can go all the way back to the putting-out system for easy examples.
If "the US has always been a terrible place to live for most people," then how come so many people historically wanted to come here?
Capitalism has lifted more people out of poverty than any other system in history.
What we have now is not capitalism; it's corporatism. It's corporate power wedded to government power, which is fascism.
Capitalism is a guy starting a business out of his garage, and gradually expanding it, hiring employees, and leasing commercial space. Entrepreneurs are doing a beautiful thing. Stop trying to demonize it.
You overestimate the number of people who actually chose to come here willingly. It is true that there were some selfish people who abandoned their communities back home and came here willingly. However, the vast majority of people were stolen from their homes, pushed here by persecution (only to find more persecution here) or were dragged here by patriarchal decisions. Most migrants do not willingly leave their homes. You believe in a fairy tale that hides the real nature of the society in which you live.
Capitalism has also created more poverty than any other system ever. Not only that, but it has led to the destruction of civilization by the profligate use of natural resources.
Capitalism is, by definition, the creation of private governments by public governments in favor of the lazy. Public governments invent the right of some people to own properties and make certain types of laws about how other people may act on those properties. For example, the US government cannot make laws that deprive people of the right of free speech. Private property, however, is withdrawn (privatus in Latin means free from or deprived of) from the prohibitions of public government in this respect. The legal fiction here is that rights are reified and may thus be willingly bargained away -- a concept one can trace to the Romans. So, the owner of a private property may deprive someone (an employee) of free speech via a contract enforced by the public government's goons. Private property was initially created by actions of the state -- in western Europe, the Roman empire stole land from indigenous inhabitants and then kept it as the Roman fisc or gave it to private citizens. The Roman fisc then became the royal fisc. In the US, the British government and the US government stole land and gave it to private citizens, keeping some as public land. The key right that the public government gives to private property owners is the right to make laws to steal wealth from those who have created it. Although capitalists often invent complex terminology and esoteric schemes to pretend that they do work, there is no requirement for an owner to do any work to take the portion of the wealth created known as profits. Owners can sit on fat asses all day and the police will still take wealth from employees if the employees resist. There is no difference between corporatism and capitalism except that a corporation is an undying fiction organized as a plutocracy, while a privately held business is an aristocracy perpetuated by blood inheritance.
We're at the point where we need the global market reset. It's time to even the playing field and bring manufacturing back home. Short term pain will be real, but it'll be worth it. I do worry about applying tarrifs only to China - manufacturing will simply move to the next authoritarian country with lax labor laws.
The industry I am currently working in shifted much of it's manufacturing to Vietnam, Malaysia and India, but there is also more US product than before- and that is the result of Covid. The foreign localities have their faults but they are not as squarely based in forced labor as the Chinese. We are already moving out of China and have been for about 4 years now, this is the temper tantrum and of no real consequence.
My favorite line of the article:
"If you’re in favor of tariffs when you know you don’t have the votes but against them once they’re actually in effect, you’re just a politician with no balls."
Bernie Sanders, the American socialist with no balls and three mansions.
Yes, isn't that funny how all the big socialists are wealthy? Son of a gun.....
The socialists? Try to keep up—the extreme capitalists were the ones enabling the loss of millions of jobs. Of both parties, or as some say, the UniParty.
A lot of capitalists were building things and making stuff and developing products, employing people and investing in the US economy. They got crushed by cheap labor and IP theft as did their employees and investors. The capitalists that went to the right business schools and do finance and have no contact with a physical product got dirty stinkin rich. Some of the money went to elected officials. And shame on us for falling for all this.
My term for the phenomenon is totalitarianism, which is very specific. I can't direct what other people use.
Why do we always end up with this idea that socialists LIVING IN A FULLY LATE-CAPITALIST WORLD are supposed to be poor? Marx never said "Give it all away." That was Jesus.
It's called living according to the values that you presume to profess. "Late capitalism" (somebody went to grad school!) has nothing to do with it.
"Late capitalism" (somebody went to grad school!)
🤣🤣🤣
"Marx never said 'Give it all away.'"
Of course not. That sleight of tongue was (part of) Marx's con. Create a series of de facto intranational armies (not parties) based on supposedly irreconcilable differences between segments of society, let their officers (aka vanguards) lead the charge. Then have those officers divvy up the spoils after they win, while saying the proles will get the spoils after the capitalist pigs are eradicated ... someday. The whole thing is a Trojan horse for totalitarian concentrated power, not democratic leftism, from start to finish, which is exactly how it always played out from 1917 on, communist or not. Marx was NOT a leftist, he was a long-con man. With the New Left from the 1950s, the malleable class-division was substituted with rigid identity-division, to pave way better boundaries for dividing-and-conquering.
There is no elevation of the powerless in a society without noblesse oblige. Healthy societies cannot perpetually have civil war, but that is precisely what has been orchestrated in the US (and West), in stages, between the 1950s and today.
The real problem is intelligent psychopathy, not capitalism or socialism. Hence the societal toxic rot that results from iron law of oligarchy. Trust me, we'll cease debating our traditional ideologies as AI sinks its claws deep.
And I suppose Marx never said "Love thy neighbor" and "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" either. Similarly, neither have the LATE-CAPITALISTS. THAT is the problem! When the motto of your life is "Screw the little guy and the other guy", you are leading your fellow capitalists into a ditch. Your ways will not prosper for long. You're sins WILL find you out, and as it turns out, Donald Trump is the grim reaper. Prepare to die! (Or as Taibbi said, burn it all down! The globalists and their infrastructure, that is.)
Who takes the most (?) or close to the most pharmaceutical money…
In small-dollar donations from rank and file employees, not from CEOs or lobbyists. Bernie is a weakling but this point is invalid
It's Act Blue. A lot of those small donors don't know that their name is being used to spread out the con.
Exactly. Probably the biggest money-laundering scheme for political donations ever.
Ya, if you don't count Trump and a few thousand others...
RFKjr disagrees with you and said so to Bernie's face in his nomination hearing. Now THAT was balls and I have to think RFKjr has the goods on Bernie!
Or maybe RFK Jr is just still batshit crazy...
Nothing crazy about RFK Jr. he just knows more than you do and he's not afraid to share his ideas in an effort to help people live better. It doesn't take any guts to believe the "approved narrative" and mock people who think for themselves.
Here’s a list of some fascinating historical figures whose ideas were initially mocked, suppressed, or dismissed—and though their work was later proven correct, many of them never lived to see full vindication. ---
No doubt you will not ever make a list like this....but RFK Jr. will:
1. **Ignaz Semmelweis – Handwashing in Medicine**
- **Idea:** Doctors should wash their hands before assisting in childbirth to prevent childbed fever.
- **Reaction:** He was ridiculed, rejected by the medical establishment, and eventually committed to an asylum.
- **Outcome:** After his death, germ theory proved him right. Handwashing became a medical standard.
- **Vindication:** Posthumous, but never personally vindicated or honored in his time.
---
2. **Nikola Tesla – Wireless Energy & Inventions Beyond His Era**
- **Idea:** Free wireless energy, wireless communication, and other radical innovations.
- **Reaction:** Labeled eccentric, undermined by competitors like Edison and JP Morgan, died penniless.
- **Outcome:** Many of his ideas laid the foundation for modern technologies (radio, remote control, wireless).
- **Vindication:** Pop culture reveres him now, but he died largely unrecognized for his contributions.
---
3. **Giordano Bruno – Infinite Universe & Multiple Worlds**
- **Idea:** The universe is infinite and contains many worlds with life.
- **Reaction:** Burned at the stake for heresy in 1600 by the Inquisition.
- **Outcome:** Modern astronomy supports the notion of countless galaxies and potentially habitable planets.
- **Vindication:** Celebrated centuries later, but brutally punished in his lifetime.
---
4. **Barry Marshall – Bacteria Cause Stomach Ulcers**
- **Idea:** *Helicobacter pylori* causes peptic ulcers, not stress or spicy food.
- **Reaction:** Laughed out of conferences, rejected by medical authorities.
- **Outcome:** Proved it by drinking the bacteria himself and developing gastritis; eventually won the Nobel Prize.
- **Vindication:** He was vindicated in his lifetime, but only after intense resistance and self-experimentation.
---
5. **John Snow – Cholera is Waterborne**
- **Idea:** Cholera spreads through contaminated water.
- **Reaction:** Medical community rejected germ theory; he was ignored.
- **Outcome:** His mapping of a cholera outbreak eventually influenced modern epidemiology.
- **Vindication:** Credited later, but dismissed during the 1854 outbreak when he could’ve saved more lives.
---
6. **Alfred Wegener – Continental Drift**
- **Idea:** Continents move (continental drift theory).
- **Reaction:** Widely ridiculed by geologists; lacked mechanism for movement.
- **Outcome:** Plate tectonics later proved him right.
- **Vindication:** Only decades after his death in 1930.
---
7. **Rachel Carson – Environmental Hazards of Pesticides**
- **Idea:** Pesticides like DDT were destroying ecosystems and harming human health.
- **Reaction:** Attacked as hysterical and anti-progress by chemical industry and media.
- **Outcome:** Her work sparked the environmental movement and led to bans on DDT.
- **Vindication:** Recognized eventually, but faced extreme backlash in her time.
---
8. **Alan Turing – Foundations of Modern Computing**
- **Idea:** Theoretical basis for computers and artificial intelligence.
- **Reaction:** Despite wartime contributions, he was prosecuted for homosexuality and chemically castrated.
- **Outcome:** His work underpins all modern computers and AI.
- **Vindication:** Received posthumous royal pardon in 2013; died tragically in 1954.
The Truth is more complicated than the sound bite lie (that you feed on). The sound bite lie makes it around the world 3x before the Truth gets out of bed.
RFK Jr. is a quack. He wants to ban phones in schools not because they’re anathema to learning but because he thinks radio waves fry your brain. It’s a shame that Matt’s comments are full of right wing lunatics, but 95% of the populace are now lunatics of some variety so I guess it’s unavoidable
Everyone is crazy but you, right? 🤔
So you think those waves are good for brains?
It's 2025 Lanny and if you don't know that EMFs from cell phones/towers have some type of affect on human brains and CNS (thanks to the poor little rats that came before us) well then you are an Ostrich.
It's really easy these days to disprove nay sayers who love to parrot the "official narrative".
You call people who think for themselves lunatics and free thinkers call people like you who parrot the "official narrative" NPCs that are slow to the ever changing times.
You can't dismiss someone as a quack when there is scientific evidence to prove what they say is true. That is ignoring and gaslighting - very troll like behaviors.
Here are several key scientific studies that have investigated the potential negative impacts of electromagnetic fields (EMFs) emitted by cell phones on the human body and brain:
1. Increased Brain Glucose Metabolism
Study: A study published in JAMA found that 50-minute exposure to cell phone RF-EMFs increased glucose metabolism in brain regions closest to the antenna.
JAMA Network+1PubMed+1 https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/645813?utm_source=chatgpt.com - https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/28426166/
Implication: This suggests that cell phone radiation can affect brain activity, although the clinical significance remains unclear.
2. Blood-Brain Barrier Disruption in Rats
Study: Research led by neurosurgeon Leif Salford demonstrated that GSM cell phone radiation caused albumin leakage through the blood-brain barrier in rats, leading to neuronal damage.
WIRED
Implication: These findings raise concerns about potential long-term effects of cell phone radiation on human brain health.
3. Systematic Review of Adverse Health Effects
Study: A systematic review in the Indian Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine reported that cell phone radiation exposure could lead to various health issues, including oxidative stress, DNA fragmentation, and hormonal changes.
PubMed https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38783888/
Implication: The review highlights the need for further research into the biological effects of EMF exposure.
4. Genotoxic Effects and Brain Tumor Risk
Study: An article in Environmental Research discussed studies indicating that long-term cell phone use might be associated with an increased risk of brain tumors, such as glioblastoma.
ScienceDirect
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S001393512200648X?utm_source=chatgpt.com
Implication: While findings are mixed, some studies suggest a potential link between prolonged EMF exposure and cancer risk.
Different methods for evaluating the effects of microwave radiation exposure on the nervous system
Source: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0891061815000939?via%3Dihub#sec0035
Then there is the whole mental health aspect that RFK Jr. mentions and that is to be concerned about as well.
In The Anxious Generation, Jonathan Haidt explores how smartphones and social media have contributed to a mental health crisis among Generation Z. He identifies four primary harms associated with smartphone use:
CASSY+3WSJ+3New York Post+3
The Human Journey
Social Deprivation: Reduced face-to-face interactions leading to weakened social bonds.
Sleep Deprivation: Disrupted sleep patterns due to screen time, especially before bedtime.
Sherwood News+2CASSY+2The Human Journey+2
Attention Fragmentation: Constant notifications and multitasking impairing the ability to focus.
Addiction: Design features of apps fostering compulsive usage patterns.
People.com+3CASSY+3The Human Journey+3
Haidt cites studies indicating that adolescent girls spending over five hours daily on social media are significantly more likely to experience depression. He also references research showing that the introduction of platforms like Facebook correlated with increased anxiety and depression among college students.
New York Post+5CASSY+5The Guardian+5
Critics of Haidt's work argue that the evidence linking smartphone use to mental health issues is correlational rather than causal. Some researchers suggest that the observed associations might be influenced by other factors, such as socioeconomic status or pre-existing mental health conditions.
Sherwood News
Despite the debate, Haidt advocates for measures like delaying smartphone and social media use until later adolescence, promoting phone-free schools, and encouraging real-world social interactions to mitigate potential harms.
New York Post
Welcome to America!
Why is it that Bernie gets so much money from rank and file employees of pharma companies?
Because they know their jobs are dependent on how he votes. The same goes for the aerospace industry, the teachers unions, the autoworkers, etc. The employers run campaigns in-house to influence politicians who vote to approve or disapprove what the corporation needs for the bottom line and the employee needs to keep his paycheck coming - the next big contract, the next rule-change that gives the company an edge. Apparently, pharmaceutical companies are good at this.
That's called bundling and it's due to campaign donation laws that put limits on individual donations.
Instead the corporations encourage (?) their workers to write checks and they make sure the recipients know where that money came from. Some even collect them and hand them in a "bundle" (not always legal but who's checking) to the targeted politician with a key vote so no imagination or speculation is needed as to the source.
He doesn't.
A majority of his fundraising comes from small-dollar donations, and Senate races get more money spent on them than House races do. He’s probably in the top 5 Congresspeople for most industries.
Some other people in the thread say those ActBlue contributions are faked, that they come from big institutions misusing their employees’ names. I’ve never heard of such an accusation but it seems preposterous to me, particularly when applied to a self-proclaimed socialist.
If it's true that "a majority of his fundraising comes from small-dollar donations," it's also true that there's a sucker born every minute.
I'd like to see evidence to back up allegations of ActBlue abuse.
Estimates of Bernie's wealth range from $3m to $15m (https://publicistpaper.com/bernie-sanders-net-worth-in-2025-a-look-at-the-financial-life-of-americas-progressive-senator/). If he's getting most of this from book royalties, fair enough I suppose, but at the high end this is a bit extreme for an author and self proclaimed socialist.
The latter site also alleges much higher donations from pharma, but unclear of the evidence or time frame involved (or the reliability of motivation of that site).
ActBlue is about to be blown up. You can't serve as a money laundering operation by not requiring CVV #'s off credit cards while taking in hundreds of millions of credit card donations, many from offshore bundlers and governments trying to hid their political influence on our elections.
There must be a list of pols who take $ from pharma.
opensecrets.org
Thanks for this link. The site's information can end a lot of misinformed arguments. For example, it lists Sanders' major funding as coming from "Small Individual Contributions (< $200) $22,732,498."
How he amassed his personal fortune is another matter, and I couldn't care less. He's useless as a politician.
I care. His vote, or lack of vote swings markets and stocks. Something they regularly use to generate wealth.
Who?
Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren?
Oh, thank you MG!
wow…..Conflict of interest. Should be banned.
$$ corrupts our politics.
I’m sure there are more, but those two got busted during a congressional hearing. Both sides are in it
They got busted? Kennedy made the misrepresentation that Bernie took pharma money but provided no substantive evidence to back it up. Which seems to be sorta his thing. If you produce receipts, have at it. But you can’t just claim truth because you think something may be the case.
Typically off target criticism when there are far bigger fish to fry.
Thst 'mansions' BS was a Hilary/DNC sophistry-talking point, proud of yourself?
Look into the actual mechanisms there and there is nothing off kilter (or do you have an ethical problem with someone dying and leaving you something, or profiting from a wildly popular book? Think better.) The BIG deal is Bernie caving to the dem establishment: Ask people who always LIKED him where he failed. Not people who were always looking for excuses to shoot holes in him... If you're already using socialist as a pejorative, no one's gonna listen to you about Bernie LOL.
He’s an old white guy who talks a lot but has done nothing. What’s the attraction? Plus if you spout socialism, which has never worked anywhere it’s been tried, and have three houses, regardless of how you got them you’re a hypocrite.
Considering you need at least 2 if you're a long time Senator, and he inherited the third, & made what money he has from his (ex)-fans buying a book he wrote, kinda means you're completely full of...well, I guess I'll just point out that you and Hillary are in total complete agreement, & she considers your parroting her custom-crafted reality-aversive nonsense brainless talking points--that any lucid fourth grader could kick to splinters--money very well spent. You represent a proud hilary accomplishment...which is the worst thing I could say about anyone.😂😂🫣🫣
Who rattled your cage. What a little grump. Laughed out loud at your Hillary comments though, hahaha!
Who rattled my cage? Gawrsh, appears to be an imbecile unable to digest English. Very sad.
Last time I checked, Bernie had three houses (dachas, is what I think they called them in the Soviet Union)... That's two more than any self-professed socialist should have, LOL.
Well, if we look at the homes of various leaders of socialist utopias over the years, we see that Bernie is not very good at socialism. I really wish he had not caved to the party establishment.
Another commenter hat does not bother to or cannot read English at all.
And last I read, Bernie the purist had collected at least several million from big pharma prior to belittling and waiving onsies at RFK during confirmation hearings
Can you actually literally not read English?
Basically this. It's humorous to pick on the rich Socialist, but the big problem with Bernie is that... he has ZERO balls, and everything he claims to stand for he only does so when he's at advantage, and has no risk of losing his place in the power order.
He's a massive hypocrite on literally every topic or belief he stands for. This is why I stopped voting for and supporting him years ago. He's a completely empty suit, and one of the best script actors in DC.
"The BIG deal is Bernie caving to the dem establishment."
Absolutely.
Yes, I use socialist as a pejorative and I couldn't care less what other people think of socialists.
You show all the makings of a fine Democrat🤣🤣🤣 bwahahahaha!!
Ok Bernie bro moron
Democratic socialism. Where capital serves people, not the other way around.
If you’re a senator working in two different states, you’d probably need a residence in each. Bernie does and neither are mansions.
If you then wrote a best-selling book - something people actually were excited about and chose to buy - and used the earnings to buy a whopping $500,000 family lake house, I’d hardly see it as all that outrageous.
Instead, I’d say democratic socialism probably isn’t as scary as the bad-faith attacks make it out to be.
Am I the only person who gets itchy when the phrase “democratic socialism” is being thrown around?
Nope 🙂↔️!!
No. Think Summer Lee of PA and lotsa other clowns.
There’s no such thing as Democratic Socialism. By dint of its definition socialism can only be applied by force, you take from one and give to another who didn’t earn it. You have no idea of human nature if you think that will work without force. And it’s equally foolish to imagine, ah, but I’ll do it better than all those other millions who tried it. That’s magical thinking not grounded in reality.
If socialism is the ownership and control of the means of production by the workers or the local community, which is how it was defined back when people still could form sentences in English, then there are plenty of working versions of socialism, generally called "cooperatives", or something like that. It's just not that big of a deal. The main problem is most working people like to complain about the boss, but it's much harder to do that when you _are_ the boss. In any case, it's not going to be Utopia. You still have to get up in the morning. As for the use of force, that's what the state is, whether it's capitalist, socialist, fascist, or cloud-cookoo-land. But you're free to make up fables about it -- just avoid reading anything about political structure and other such tedious details.
Thankths for da lethon, I wouldn’t know anyfing at awl were it not for enliten folkths like you, huh huh huh.
Glad to be of service.
Well, we’ve seen evidence of successful socialist programs here via public schools, Medicare, Social Security, libraries, etc.
Still not enough? There’s Norway, Sweden, and Finland to consider, who all have a high quality of life and seem to be much happier than both you and I while reading each others comments.
Every one of those countries you list runs on capitalism, by their own admission. By the way, are you aware of the decline of these countries due to their immigration policies and their socialist support of that horror?
And please, if you’re going to hold up public schools or social security, etc., as a socialist success, you need to do a little more research. Most are going broke or an abject failure.
Correct on all points.
Market with guard rails is what Bernie is pushing for. Very similar model. And I’m sort of betting you know this.
As for our own social benefits, you say let them go. I’d argue to manage and fund them. You’re pretty much getting your way in this current admin, so we’ll see how it shakes out for people….
Wrong. Norway, Sweden, and Finland (and Denmark) are wrongly labeled as socialist by dummies on the left and right. They have market economies more open and free than the US in some ways. And they have very generous social welfare programs funded by very high taxes--on everybody.
Nope. I'm happier than anybody in Norway, Finland, or Sweden, and I live in Texas.
I always gotta groan when Scandanavia is mentioned as an example of successful socialism. The Scandanavian countries you mention still have relatively homogenous populations and many citizens that still possess a strong work ethic and they are also still basically capitalistic. And none of these countries his highly popluated. For example, all of Norway with its 1300+ mile coastline has a population of less than 6 million. Noway also has great oil revenue they put in a fund for all citizens. Further, they don't seem to suffer the bureaucratic mark-up and high overhead costs that plague our government "do good social programs" (salaries and number of bureacrats and meetings needed to screw in a light bulb). Also interesting is the fact that Sweden made a determined effort about 10? years ago to reduce the relative size of its bureaucracy because its economy was terrible. The one difficulty they face now are immigrants that don't integrate culturally. Its helpful though that language classes are held and mandatory for new immigrants. Also noteworthy: they don't provide the expensive "translator on demand" that we have obligated ourself to provide for (often free) medical services.
Sweden has also figured out that it's cheaper to pay people to go back to their country of origin vs. trying to keep asking them to assimilate. Sweden is actually in some trouble right now, and the answer... Kindly ask people to self deport..... I am curious how long it will be until they stop asking....
So I guess I have badmouthed Apple not knowing they announced they will invest $500 billion in the US over next 4 years and the phones still are levied a 20% tariff. I think billionaire foundations just make me crabby.
Those countries dumped socialism decades ago. As to public schools, you sure you want to tout them?
They were never fully socialist (always had capitalist economies), nor is that what Bernie is fighting for
Norway, Sweden, and Finland. Yes... Amazingly non-diverse nations that share a very common culture, and grew to be wonderful. Let's check back on this in say 5 years. Sweden in particular is starting to fall down hard because EVERYTHING that made them able to be the darlings of the "guardrails" crowd is no longer present, and they are collapsing under the weight of a massive leech society that they let into their country that take with no desire to contribute or give back.
Like placing something democratic in the name makes a difference, only fools fall for that . Tell me the Democratic People's Republic of Korea is a paridise for the poor people living that nightmare . Wake up.
I mean, there is a difference if you care about being correct. Kind of like using an “i” where there should be an “a”. It might look similar, maybe even get lumped together by some people not interested in the details, but on a fundamental level it’s just not the same.
Keep dreaming, every socialist experiment that's since failed spectacularly started with the same stars you have in your eyes. The problem isn't in the details it's in human nature
Uh, sure. Do you really think voting makes it ethical to take private property?
Unless you're a natural-law freak, property is a set of social relations defined by (human-made) law and traditions. Or, you can just make stuff up, I suppose.
Term limits
Sanders is an act, nothing more.
I’ve never understood the attraction of that man. He’s a grifter, just like most politicians and their parasites like Farrakhan. Sanders has talked but never walked. And he likes it that way.
If Bernie Sanders once had balls (which he may have), he cut them off himself under the scrutiny of millions when he zealously endorsed Hillary Clinton on prime time television. And once removed, never recoverable.
Perhaps the zeal was for the promises of book deals worth lots of bucks as recompense for Clinton and the DNC slandering his character to sabotage his own campaign. At the time he entered the 2016 race, he had a net worth of something like $300K, now he's a multi-millionaire. I guess he didn't come all that cheap, but he didn't come all that dear, either.
Nancy Pelosi, too, used to be concerned in public about the trade imbalance, especially with respect to China.
But now, of course, they are Trump's tariffs, Trump's attempt to redress the trade imbalance, and therefore evil, dangerous, and to be vigorously opposed. Because Orange Man Bad, or something, and anything he does is wrong, even when they wanted it themselves BT.
Ellen, it’s not about Bernie vs Trump or Pelosi vs Musk.
It’s American corporations (enabled by government) who killed the middle class, by shipping good jobs elsewhere and replacing them with shit jobs like Uber and Door Dash.
You gotta get over the distractions they want you focused on, like Democrats vs Republican. Keep your eye on the target—globalization, which has been long loved by leaders of both parties.
The Dems and the Republicans enabled the corporations to kill the American middle class. They couldn't have done it without the willing acquiescence of the two parties. So they do bear responsibility for this outrage.
Yes, but since they're both culpable, it does no one any good to argue which is worse.
Wrong. The Trump Republican Party is not the same as the Bush/Globalist Republican Party. Entirely different party with (almost) entirely different principles. The RINOs who helped to create this mess are mostly gone (looking at you, Mitch McConnell).
The Republican Party is still the Republican Party. It is still one of only two in this country that can guarantee ballot access, for one thing. It happens to have a very different politician running it now, different from most Rs or Ds.
And Matt and we are talking about the past few decades, not what Trump is doing now.
Republicans and Democrats are both responsible. If you guys want to argue whether it's 55-45 or 48-52 is inconsequential.
The UniParty is not liking any of this that's happening to them...dramatically changing the status quo and altering the Bureaucracy.
For it's worth noting the very nature of a Bureaucracy is Self-preservation.
MAGA is a amalgamation of We the People types who are tired of the Elites and Establishment lording over us at every moment of our day and serving themselves vs. the people they were elected/chosen to serve.
Then off to the corner you have the DSA and their Marxist/Anarchist wing who just wants to destroy America and remake it in the eyes of Karl Marx, which 99% of MAGA wants no part of, even lifelong Democrats disillusioned by Democrats today.
Choose carefully Pacificus...you're either with the UniParty, MAGA or the Marxists.
Yes, but Bill Clinton and others opened the door. The corporations followed him out the door.
Oh . . . Ross Perot was right after all.
The negative effects of "free" trade had been visibly apparent for over a quarter century by the 1994 NAFTA debates. Our gold supply was in crisis debated in the Senate by 1968, going off the gold standard with the 'Nixon shock' of August 15, 1971. The entire decade of the 1970's was one of industrial decline.
You are 100% correct. And let's throw in the consultants and attorneys and accountants who pushed or facilitated all of this and the educational complex that brainwashed kids into identifying themselves as global citizens.
Look, though Tim Walz organized, orchestrated and led over 32 different missions of students from MN to China where he fascinated them with stories about how great it is when Communism means everyone is equal..it has nothing to do with Minnesota young people marching in the streets for Equity.
It's merely a coincidence...along with that very expensive shotgun Walz has that he seems unfamiliar with. I wonder if it came with instructions in Chinese.
And it's mere coincidence that Walz has pushed hard for the Confucius Institute Scholars being inserted into the University of Minnesota where some of the most advanced medica device technology is developed.
The Uni-party British politicians were certainly globalist. The Conservatives simply pretended to be otherwise, but it was a poor pretense in the end.
However, too many Brits did not catch on. They thought the Conservative Party had to be taught a lesson for its failures......and so they voted in large numbers for the opposition - Labour.
Bingo! That was the Uni-party plan all along -- to get Labour in power (with a majority). The British voters were like sheep being led over a cliff.
I am aware. My initial comment was in response to one specifically about Sanders. The rest proceeded.
Not that I disagree with you, but please lighten up a bit.
In capitalism (as we usually know it) globalization is inevitable. What's happening now is deciding who gets to cut the pie. If you're worried about it, might as well not -- you know what George Carlin said.
I take your point, but socialism is antithetical to living and working hard in a Republic where freedom is king. Bernie took his wrong turn when he backed so-called security for the worker over freedom for the people and fealty to a foreign power/philosophy over his own great country. (I mean who in their right mind believes any socialist regime ever is better in any way than the United States of America including in the way of late-capitalism.) And now he's dissolved into being a contradictory shill who has repudiated his own views, saying the opposite of what he once said. When the avowed socialist drinks the kool-aid of the evil, money-grubbing Hilary and crew from the DLC, you know his values are long gone and it's time to leave the party. Lights out.
Translation: "Yeah, we shouldn't be talking about Bernie. But I'll go ahead and talk about him some more."
We dodged a bullet with Bernie, and I say this as someone who supported him the first time 'round. He has proved himself either blackmail bait or spineless at this point. But I would have loved a NYC beatdown between Trump and Bernie. That is epicness that was stolen by sourpuss Hillary...
Bernie has always been a fake. Bernie plays Bernie on TV…the central casting token socialist created for public consumption; and has been rewarded handsomely, hence the multiple handsome properties.
And he’s family involvement in schools and charities. But Again they all do it. Write a few books and then blame the large increase in net worth as that. Something really worth watching, better than any day time soap opera. Audit every dam one of them. Start with McConnell, Pelosi and Schumer.
I understand that now.
Was the highlight of his career his "onesie speech"?
I was initially praying for a Sanders-Paul matchup back in 2015, as I thought that would for once give us a choice between two decent and honest men.
Now I am hoping Paul runs in 2028, and have nothing but contempt left for Sanders.
But, as a born NYC girl (small town Maine, now, quite contentedly), I would have to agree that showdown would have been worthy of many buckets of popcorn.
My second husband was from NYC. I met him on the west coast working in a NY style deli that employed mostly people from NYC and New Jersey. They taught me to love the 'no shits given'/'heart of gold' personality of that region.
His wife's college land purchase scandal is obvious state leverage over him.
To be fair, that was a VERY nice second vacation home that Bernie got from the deal.
Ralph Nader stood firm against the Democrats. He was marginalized and rendered ineffective by said party. I’m sure the lesson was not lost on Bernie when the Democrats threatened to do the same to him. He really didn’t have any good choices. He chose to keep his voice and some power over the political process rather than become a martyr. Try a little understanding before criticizing him from afar.
Ralph Nader I respect. Bernie Sanders, I did once, but, seriously, I understand quite well what (sucking Hillary Clinton's ass out for the nation to see, and becoming a pet lapdog, including lately shilling for the Chinese to keep us robbed, thereafter) and why (to save his career, get millions in payback, and retain some tiny bit of influence - not any real power). I do not think any of it, or him any longer, worthy of one iota of my respect.
Now, Rand Paul deserves plenty. But he's still willing to buck his party for what he thinks is right.
I don't think selling the country out to what you believe is wrong is anything but contemptible.
I loved "bank sucking spokestools."
And CNBC’s ‘Whore Box’….
Probably one of the best articles that Matt has written IMHO.
It's amazing to watch these podcasts and see in real-time Matt's struggle with his long held beliefs while being a distanced journalist. He has been a man weighing the options of his heart. I think he had an epiphany in Thursday's podcast (with his compatriot Walt and maybe mentor, gently being his wingman to safe and solid ground) and today's article, and he's mad as hell! His Pulitzer should be in the mail for dismantling globalism's destruction of America! Walt was much less a Republican and more an anti-globalist in that podcast. I noticed his restraint and his affection for the American worker, both an effect of and an encouragement of Matt's struggle. Remarkable podcast! I cannot overstate how instructive it was to me.
Everyone needs to experience the epiphany Matt has had about how "The System is Rigged and we're all getting F'ed."
Thankfully he's in the US where his free speech rights have not yet been rescinded, but then again...the FBI did pay him a visit to see what he's been up to on social media pages just a couple years ago under Biden.
Biden is back...and Andy McCabe and others are waiting in the wings to seize power...and when they do....poor Matt Taibbi is going to end up in Gitmo for crimes against the State.
We can't let that happen to Matt.
I for one will stand to defend his right to offend anyone...including me.
And that...my friends...is what makes America Great.
Ok, true, but what do you mean by "Biden is back"? That guy wasn't back in 2020!
Best work when he's pissed off.
He went full New Jersey on this column.
And we're talking Exit 15W type anger (Harrison NJ)
So many gems in this article.
Matt is a very good journalist.
I'm trying to parse 'tools' and 'stools'. I guess both works.
I had to read it twice and sound it out :)
Spokes-tools
Is that a spokesman turned tool?
Speaking of "balls", if Matt had anything left down there dangling in the nutsack he would focus the anger he seems to direct toward China "stealing" little diddums' Merkin jobs toward the American capitalism that pisses all over American workers daily.
But when you are all lubed up to take MAGA dick so far up ya your voice cracks? Can't say the thing that is real.
Gotta say "chink chink chink", eh Matt?
The whole article is about Smerican business leaders exporting jobs to unfree labor zones to up their personal xompensation. Maybe learn to read?
I have been saying all along. Americans voted for big pay. Safety. And benefits. Then took their dollars to countries that use slave,slave like labor and no benefits and no safety.
I didn't know all the international stuff. But I saw clearly for years we got poorer the more money we made.
Govt is too expensive. Along with globalist ideology we need to strip govt much more than has happened yet. I was really hoping for a Twitter lean workforce.
Bringing mfg, farming,bavk home is critical. I'm in Healthcare and it was obvious during covid that we have lost our medical mfg. Wearing disposable ppe for a week when it's safe onky for thar 1 use....loud and clear. '22-'23 years when chemo, antibiotics and IV saline shortages called it out again
Depending on enemies for food, medical, and energy waa obviously self destructive and some of us have known for a decade or more.
But congress is full of compromised people. Both sides. Trump is only one i trust in this. He loves America. And Americans. For me. That's been enough. Someone on our side. Fighting for us. Yes he can run off at the mouth. But really. Sweet grandfather Biden is better?
And that is exactly it. I have commented before. Wall Street needs ever increasing numbers to run up the stock price and the value of their options to cash in. I saw it firsthand in the early to mid 2000s. And to build on your point, all the people that write about Wall Street or make money off it, and their politician friends are not the ones who lost their jobs. They are the ones getting rich off the changes they foisted upon everyone. The second kick in the teeth is the importation of cheap or cheaper (think H1bs) labor to compete with those who still had jobs or trades. I worked residential construction in the late 80s and early 90s with my stepdad even while in college and law school because it paid comparatively well. Everyone spoke English well, even Hispanics. Everyone was from here. By the late 90s, that was changing rapidly. Now we are told Americans won't do those jobs. I think they would if the pay and benefits kept up with American standards.
The awards for globalist corporations are many, including cheap labor and a free pass to avoid the cost and harrassment of safety and environmental regulations--you know, those laws that apply to "the common people". They can just look the other way on horrific human rights violations. Global corporations based in the US get all kinds of special privileges and treats such as subsidies, tax breaks, and special allowances to bring in trained foreign cheaper workforce, while basking in the comfort of property protections and due process guaranteed to US citizens. And with all their profits, heads of these globalist empires get to set up charitable foundations that allow them to further dodge US income and taxes, freeing them to amass billions which they then use to influence control and determine political outcomes. For example, Apple just put up enough pressure to get tariffs waived for the smart phones they contract to manufacture in China. Why? Because Apple's profit margin of 37% and stock holder shouldn't be affected because they are so special. So shout out for the globalists who showed up for the Trump inauguration but heavily fund the Democrats. MAGA is a pesky threat that they will work around. Why should anything change? Its all just hunky dorry for these folks whom our trade polices allowed to become masters (monsters?) of the universe who get to develop and then fly their private jets to their own private-bomb sheltered islands. All as these supra-national royals deserve, right?
Matt loved the perspective of this article and yours and Walter's ATW. It occurred to me on a long drive this AM is an active war of the globalist elites on the deplorable (or whatever they're calling Americans these days). This is a reverse revolution to me exemplified by the teachers unions who want to lock kids into failing schools. This seems so different than other historical revolutions. I would love to hear you and Walter's perspective on this notion.
Says the commie with TDS
I actually like Trump, chica.
And I'm a socialist, not a communist. I know for you knuckle-draggers words mean whatever your meme-circle pretends they mean.
But some of us can still think.
"Some of us still think we can think."
Fixed it for you.
Methinks you flatter yourself. Hard for you to see that the two are the flip side of each other but one and the same. Socialist being the cleaned up one welcomed to all the best parties while the Communist arrives with the blackjack smelling of sweat and unclean clothes who drags the ritzy party-goers off to the gulag. You're deluding yourself, but I can see why.
"I actually like Trump, chica."
For what, exactly?
Initially, because I had no idea who he was until his campaign in 2015 caught fire, I thought he was hilarious.
I loved the way he punctured the conventions around political campaigning in the US. I liked his nicknames for the other ghouls in the race.
And I liked him because he apparently provoked fear and disgust in the rank assholes of US elite media and academia.
After he won I liked him because, as I wrote in a blog post at the time, he was like a mirror of American reality that almost no American wanted to look into: a crude, fundamentally ignorant, aggressive narcissist with no capacity to recognize the real existence of other people. In short, the perfect representative of America.
And now I like him because he is going to burn it all down and America is not going to be running the world any longer. Americans are going to be poorer and it is going to be increasingly difficult for their narcissism and stupidity to continue to maintain the false image they have of themselves.
I like him because the way his supporters defend him reveals the depth of ignorance and delusion that is the outstanding characteristic of Americans across the spectrum.
And I like him for legislating biological reality in spite of the fact that Americans ultimately can't handle even that portion of reality and so will revert to whatever ideological tap-dance the capitalist medical industry orchestrates in order to be empowered to carve up human bodies for profit in the future.
Thanks for explaining that.
"I had no idea who he was until his campaign in 2015 caught fire, I thought he was hilarious."
So, the most salient thing that jumped out early on was that he's a master showman? Nothing POV/policy-related stuck out?
"I liked him because ... he was like a mirror of American reality that almost no American wanted to look into"
So, you then liked him because some 70-80 million people -- that is, about half the voters of the U.S. -- could, in an case of mass projection of "crude, fundamentally ignorant, aggressive narcissis[m] with no capacity to recognize the real existence of other people", shift their own manifest ugliness onto him without admitting it themselves?
"And now I like him because he is going to burn it all down and America is not going to be running the world any longer"
So, you'd rather the U.S. suffer immensely than that it learn fix its problems first?
"I like him because the way his supporters defend him reveals the depth of ignorance and delusion that is the outstanding characteristic of Americans across the spectrum."
How many "across the spectrum" do you know quite well personally? Serious question. Say, 5 or more unrelated people in each decile of wealth? Population-representative numbers of each (major) racial/ethnic group? geographic, age, LGBT, education, intelligence, etc. etc. Do you listen carefully to all, even those you disagree with? Do you find it hard to respect any who haven't (roughly) followed your path?
FWIW, I don't think you understand very well the vast majority of people who voted for him. (I didn't vote for him; I'm a Leftist.)
What *is* your preferred future? For the U.S. (if you're American)? For the world?
Michael-bot is angry! 😡
This is really a big bucket of retard. The whole piece attacks the American capitalism that pursued globalization. Did you read the same words we did?
Exactly - I’m not sure what he’s reading.
I’m not a socialist, and not particularly an anti-capitalist. I am however against companies that evade labor laws by regulator-shopping. It wouldn’t make sense to attack “capitalism” in this piece because that’s not really the issue with US-China imbalances - the issue is opening “free trade” agreements with nonmarket countries that artificially suppress their currency, abuse workers, pollute, etc. Is that capitalism, communism, neither, both, a bastardization of all those systems? Without question I’m placing blame at the feet of American business leaders who beginning in the eighties cooperated with China (and Indonesia and other countries) to evade regulatory headaches and up their share prices at the expense of American workers. You’d have to be nuts to read this as jingoistic.
Along this line, I would love to listen/read your impression of the most recent All In podcast where the guests were Larry Summers and Ezra Klein. Your take would be interesting, to say the least.
Matt, I agree with your comment. I just don’t agree with the bombastic tone of your article. And I don’t think your criticism of Bernie is fair comment. Concerning those who agree with you , you might want to comment on how critical commentary doesn’t include cursing and swearing and general potty mouthing it. It does not speak well of your audience when they do this, and I hope you will discourage it. I’m sure the oligarchs like to see us fighting like cats and dogs and using all sorts of profanity against each other. They can continue to oppress us while we fight against each other.
Were regulations very onerous in the 80s ?
yes. Especially to the detriment of mature business. However, they were fairly applied across the US. Going overseas allowed businesses to evade them completely. The original case of labor savings on low skill labor intensive industries had some weight but when management saw the regulation burden fall they went all in.
I agree with a lot of what this article says but there were people on the other side of this argument making valid points. As I said above, mature industries were getting their ass kicked by foreign competition for a variety of reason, labor costs, outdated equipment, regulations, bad management. Trade liberalization addressed a lot of those issues for the benefit of many but opened up a different cans of worms.
Capitalism in its contemporary form emphasizes "shareholder value".
Corporations have a "fiduciary obligation" to maximize profit. ie increase shareholder value.
The factories you say "China stole" were sent outside of the USA to cheap labor destinations to do what capitalism does, ie increase shareholder value by maximizing profit.
Most of the valuable things you've written over the years are forensic examinations of the workings of capitalism and the money-obsessed culture that it gives birth to inevitably.
But you're a jingoistic American so you can't bring yourself to actually see what it is you are looking at.
Because America is about "freedom" and that includes the "freedom" to fuck over your communities and your nation if it "maximizes shareholder value".
Get a grip.
Corporate execs and business leaders are going to do capitalism as much as they and their shareholders can benefit from it. I would put greater blame on the people representing the American people for allowing the business sector to proceed on the backs of the American worker. But then this brings us right back to laws and regulations that are written to be broken. How do you fix corrupt politicians? You get a Pole to screw in a lightbulb.
One basic thing is to make sure that "free trade" no matter the trading partner is "fair trade" I think a lot of Matt's frustration is that this was obvious to anyone paying attention to how communist regimes work, CCP being the worst, and screwed American workers -- and the capitalists that make things -- anyway. There is no room for competition with the CCP. They lie, cheat, steal and game every system. How much IP has to be stolen, domestic companies crushed before Washington notices that this is not fair trade. It's an abuse that benefits the very few at the expense of all of us. And it's like we're just now catching on?
Don't you suppose it,s because our representatives are themselves so heavily invested in the corporations they regulate? Congress does well when business does well.
"The whole piece attacks the American capitalism that pursued globalization. Did you read the same words we did?"
As a bit of a stickler for grammar, I have to point out that your use of the restrictive relative in the phrase "the American capitalism that..." (deliberately?) suggests that there is more than one American capitalism.
There really isn't. And anyone criticizing "globalism" (the right's term of art for avoiding critique of capitalism) by naming "China" 15 times and "capitalism" none is a cuck.
I used to defend Matt (as recently as within the past 24 hours) when liberals cosplaying leftist attacked him with "he used to be _____ but now". But the fact is he's refused to recognize a genocide taking place and his jingoism, which is stupid but understandable, has mutated into outright MAGA buffoonery.
"Translation: a serial trade and human rights violator that with the help of decades of corrupt politicians from both parties polluted, price-dumped, and stole its way to a generation of American jobs and revenue, now owns so much of our debt that we must put up with its shit indefinitely. That’s the point of view of our own federal news agency. We have officially cucked ourselves past the point of no return."
"China" occurs 15 times in the article. No mention of capital or capitalism.
When Matt writes things like "It was an asset-stripping scheme, designed to help CEOs boost their share prices by cutting costs of American parts, labor, and regulatory compliance from their bottom lines", and your complaint is that he didn't explicitly use the words "capital" or "capitalism", you're not giving serious responses here.
When Matt writes things like that he is harping on about the trees and the result is the forest disappears.
Capitalism demands that CEOs "boost share price". It's not as if CEOs could have chosen to support America and American workers once the legal, military and infrastructural frameworks were in place to make it more profitable to make t-shirts in Bangladesh.
As Matt says above, he has no problem with capitalism. I suppose he actually believes that if a better class of person started taking over as CEOs these bad things just wouldn't happen.
The 30 year period that followed WWII, during which capital was hamstrung by the regulatory frameworks established in the wake of the Great Depression and as part of the war effort, was the result of FDR's program to save capitalism from itself.
When Bernie rants on about "billionaires" or Matt pillories "CEOs" we are just witnessing the left-liberal version of the right blaming "immigrants", "the Chinese" or "socialist feminazi trannies".
Talk about anything but the structures and institutions that necessitate that things run the way they do- capitalism and its insistence on increasing profit aka "shareholder value" as the be-all and end-all of everything.
That is the first rule of Fight Club.
Help!! The sh't has hit the fan Sir. Clowns to the the left of me. Jokers to the right. And I'm stuck in the middle with the rest of We the People. Money always helps but when lawyers and guns are the fall back the only alternative is a golden parachute and the parachute packers union has become totally unreliable. It ain't happening to me so it isn't happening is poor political policy and it doesn't matter who shot the sheriff when the darkness is lying through its teeth and the shadows are running on empty (running wild). But "C'est la vie" say the old folks, a wink is as good as a nod to a blind horse and a numbered account guarantees the harbor lights of St. Barts will always shine for thee. If I could only get some sleeves for my records and some laces for my shoes. But don't worry. Be happy.
(RACKET/Taibbi and the gypsy scribbler Kirn rule. Likewise--my opinion-Matt Stoller and N.S. Lyons. I can't read everybody.)
The recent quickly becoming controversial D.Murray/D.Smith Rogan podcast is interesting because Murray almost put his finger on the actual reality of the disease undermining our national conversation. Electronic media is pathogenic. It distorts reality and, despite their best intentions, the viewpoints of those dependent on it for their livelihood. If J.Haidt is correct about the addictive nature and harmful effects of electronic media on American youth it is also crazy making for adults. Manipulation of the American psyche is an industry. RACKET/truth speakers absolutely. But continuing to embrace an electronic sewer as the lens through which We the People view the world is not the solution. (And I know you're not saying it is.) Truth matters and subscription journalism is a two way street. The only path forward is creation of a truth/fact based national conversation that will create a solutions oriented truth/fact based American reality. Can we get there from here? There is the Republic, the Constitution and the free citizen. Everything else is psyop. Depart the psyop and live.
"the gypsy scribbler Kirn" is brilliant. Well done. And he would love it too.
Just having fun on a Spring Saturday. Keep on rocking'!!
Electronic media isn't "pathogenic". The way it is "monetized", ie turned into a profit center, is through algorithmic manipulation.
There is no law of nature that says the way algorithms distort the worldview of people who use electronic media is inevitable.
One Mike to another, what should have been the new Library at Alexandria became a weapon of surveillance, psyop lies and life cancellation. The potential is still there. Why manipulation and "algorithms" at all? Nothing is inevitable. For myself I've come to believe that I need to make a conscious reconsideration and realignment of my relationship to electronic media. Subscription journalism is in its infancy and the potential for the creation of the healthy solutions oriented truth/fact based national conversation that will heal what I see has a shattered and manipulated American national reality is growing daily. "It's getting better all the time..."
Well, I hope so, because I don't see another way out of the quicksand.
"Subscription journalism", like most manifestations of capitalist reason, will inevitably create "castes" to run in conjunction with "silos".
The more free cash you have, the more New Right posters on Substack you can shore up your prejudices with. Those unfortunate enough not to be able to afford to read widely will be left at the mercy of whatever agit-prop is freely available.
"Why manipulation and "algorithms" at all?"
Because when the investment bankers and VC vultures demand to know where the profits will come from, the answer is in the algorithms and the surveillance. On top of that fundamental, there is the state with its interest.
So... "inevitable"? Not in any hard determinist sense but in the world of capitalist relations? Relatively inevitable.
And just BTW... NS Lyons' "history" is about as "truth/fact based" as the 1619 Project.
"Translation: a serial trade and human rights violator that with the help of decades of corrupt politicians from both parties polluted, price-dumped, and stole its way to a generation of American jobs and revenue, now owns so much of our debt that we must put up with its shit indefinitely. That’s the point of view of our own federal news agency. We have officially cucked ourselves past the point of no return."
"China" occurs 15 times in the article. No mention of capital or capitalism.
As a bit of a stickler for grammar, I have to point out that your use of the restrictive relative in the phrase "the American capitalism that..." (deliberately?) suggests that there is more than one American capitalism.
There really isn't. And anyone criticizing "globalism" (the right's term of art for avoiding critique of capitalism) by naming "China" 15 times and "capitalism" none is a cuck.
I used to defend Matt (as recently as within the past 24 hours) when liberals cosplaying leftist attacked him with "he used to be _____ but now". But the fact is he's refused to recognize a genocide taking place and his jingoism, which is stupid but understandable, has mutated into outright MAGA buffoonery.
WAH! Matt hasn't covered your pet peeve topics, poor you.
Is every journalist expected to cover everything? Do you bitch about Hannity and Rachel Maddow not spending enough time commenting on how seamlessly Luka has fit in with the Lakers?
I don't know anything about Hannity and Rachel. That's the kind of "substance" American media consumers need to wrestle with.
The topic here is "globalism" aka "free trade" and how Matt sees it as a "bad thing" for America that "needs to go".
In my reading of Matt's celebration of Trump's tariffs, Matt concentrates, as does the Orange Man, on China, which he says "stole its way to a generation of American jobs and revenue" as one among 15 total mentions of China.
So Matt covers the topic we are talking about but he covers it with all the insight of a retarded MAGAss.
The responsible parties for all those American jobs and revenue is American capitalism writ large. China didn't steal them. Apple and Foxconn did. (Rhetorical)
No one forced your fat opioid-slurpers to buy Chinese-manufactured flat screen TVs. Some fatty could have gone to Japan and learned how to make them in bumfuck Ohio, set up a factory and a range of services for opioid addicts, and made them in the US.
And no doubt 7 or 8 patriotic fatasses would have paid the 500% premium to buy the low quality crap and a few thousand "victims" would have thanked them for their service.
But it didn't happen. Cuz you folks do one thing well. Whine and blame furriners.
"Whine and blame furriners." That's two things.
But there are other things "we folks" do well. Ever heard of the Super Bowl, the World Series, SpaceX, white-tailed deer, Silicon Valley, Dow Jones, Lewis and Clark, Bob Dylan, the Lockheed-Martin F-35, firing squads in Idaho, the "moon walk" (Michael Jackson's and Neil Armstrong's), WWII, Ted Turner's Montana Grill and his Superstation, Orville and Wilbur Wright, or the Grateful Dead? (EDIT, to add:) The Masters!
I agree we are pretty worthless these days, but "American capitalism" isn't and hasn't been all bad. Even an avowed socialist can find something to love here, like Hollywood and the Democratic party for two examples.
It’s ignorant to say it’s the fault of capitalism. Therefore you must be ignorant.
Who is going to loan the money to build a factory when you can't demonstrate the ability to be profitable? Setting up a factory to produce electronics goods costs a bit more than the spare change in the back of your couch. How exactly is this magical strawman of yours actually supposed to work?
You seem to have an unhealthy hunger for fat, fatty fatasses, especially those hailing from Bumfuck, Ohio. BBW must be your go-to on adult sites. (Bumfuck is actually a well-known place in Iowa, not Ohio, but you can have a pass on this. Bumblefuck, Iowa is not too far from Bumfuck.))
You're missing the point. Journalists have a beat. Sam Donaldson used to have the White House. Bill Simmons has the NBA. Matt's beat has been, in the past, presidential politics, financial crimes, and now he has been focusing on free speech for a while. I don't disagree with you that Israel is doing terrible things in Gaza, and I suspect Matt doesn't disagree either. But it's not his responsibility to cover and comment on every story out there. Even if you call him names when he doesn't.
There also appears to be an unhealthy bone up your ass about the United States. Did we do something mean to you? Or your country? What is your country? Is your wife really fat? Are you, and are you projecting? You're projecting on a lot of stuff, but specifically here I'm talking about whether you're fat and therefore say mean things about fat people.
lol
Had to look up jingoism. That was NOT in Matt's article! Is that your MO, take your latest pet insult and then construct a false argument around it?
"The right's term of art for avoiding critique of capitalism"? Capitalism needs no critique. It can stand on its own based on 250+ years of success. It's the corrupt participants that deserve severe critique (as Matt was giving), be they CEOs, bought-and-paid-for politicians, greedy union bosses who abuse and sell out their members or the mad billionaire puppeteers like Rockefeller and Soros, all are evil, selfish destroyers. The ones to blame are the individual perpetrators within the system not the system, but then that's what socialists do, right? Create bitterness and revolt by maligning the system, so they'll sign up for slavery? And your ugly meanness is showing. Matt did not deserve your hateful critique.
This is all cover for impending absolute capitulation on tariff fallacy. Trump fucked around and your 401k found out. But we’re going to blame Bernie? The fuck outta here. But at the church of stupid pastor Taibi is god.
401k is irrelevant unless you're old enough to use it, then you are irrelevant.
Yeah, I agree with your comments, Lawyers and Guns. I just don’t believe we can ‘
burn it down as Taibbi advocates by following Trump. He might “burn it down,” but he’s gonna burn it down everything else with it.
You may well be right. However, what we've been doing for the past 35-40 years continues to make things worse. When billionaires and rich people whine about market losses, it might be a sign that something good is happening. I lost a shit-ton of money in the past few weeks, but I have to be ok with it if I want to stick to my beliefs about what is good and what is not for working Americans.
Would someone else try to radically fix things if it weren't for Trump? I don't know. Some would argue that Bernie would have had he not been sabotaged by his own party and then did nothing about being shivved. Twice. There's no one out there that would have either the beliefs or the balls to do this.
My concern is what happens when Trump leaves office. Will his successor continue with the attempt at reshaping the economy with working people in mind vs. the ownership class? Something that took decades to fuck up won't be cleaned up in just a few years.
Sure, I'm concerned about what could go wrong. But when the alternative is guaranteed wrong, I'm willing to roll the dice.
You can tell I don’t have much to do this Sunday afternoon. I got a knee replacement and I spend my time sitting around or exercising so I’m waiting you back.
You’re a braver man than I am ( or more foolish). I’d be more swayed if he at least had been consistent, rather than undoing everything he did within three days much to the benefit of his oligarch friends. Then there’s his background which other than the rhetoric doesn’t show a heck of a lot of concern for the common man. I guess we’re gonna find out what’s gonna happen and who owns the dubius right of “I told you so.” I’m arguing the probabilities based on the available evidence right now are with me.
Sorry about your knee, and good luck with the recovery. Be as religious as you can with the P/T exercises.
I don't know about brave, but it may turn out I'm more foolish. Here's the thing--the current (pre-Trump tariffs) economic model worked great for me. Executive with two large publicly traded companies, getting rich from share price growth fueled at least partly by better margins earned by replacing expensive workers and ditching regulated America to find cheap labor that can be abused elsewhere. All companies did the same, as it was not illegal, and the crowds cheered globalization.
But I've always known that it's rigged against working people. And no one--no Democrat or Republican President has done shit about it for decades. Well, that's actually not true. Democrat and Republican Presidents have both made the problem worse. Shit, and remember Hillary trying to sell us on the TPP trade agreement when she was running? Would have been NAFTA cubed.
If the current system works great for me, and I STILL want change, I can only imagine the folks for whom it's not working. Maybe everyone will be disappointed. But to quote Lloyd Christmas: "So you're telling me there's a chance." Maybe it is only one in a million. But with any other candidate who was running (save RFKj) it would be a continuing zero in a million chance.
I didn't vote for Trump. I joined 1.2% of my fellow state citizens in supporting "None of the above candidates." But if he's successful in improving things for working people, and scaling back the influence of pharma companies and insurance companies on health care (maybe turning today's "sick care" into actual "health care," I will regret not pulling that lever.
I can't see that it attacks capitalism. It definitely attacks unscrupulous capitalists. There is a difference, you know. The system is good. The human corruption is not. Same old same old. Time for another flood - oh, but wait, God promised no more floods. Matt is right. It will be burned down.
Like any other belief system, capitalism has clear goals: the maximization of profit and growth. Except for maybe Ben & Jerry's, capitalism is not benevolent. And even Ben & Jerry's sold out to Unilever.
This is why capitalism is regulated. Getting the right balance of regulation is the important question.
Capitalism is the best system, but calling it good is a different story.
Capitalism is not a belief system. It's an organizational model for every facet of life in societies dominated by capitalist organization.
Liberalism is the belief system that interacts with capitalism in a never-ending chicken-and-egg shimmy.
And liberalism is why Americans cannot imagine a world without capitalism. Reality needs to impinge on the mind for actual thinking to be birthed into the world.
And liberalism is the most effective condom ever invented.
What? Capitalism is not just numbers on a P&L statement. Capitalism is the opportunity in a free society to end up better off than you started. And if not better off, then you were at least free to find your own way with your own skills and sweat in order to live the life God gave you on this earth. I know you want to boil it down to economics but it is chiefly people. And yes, people can be slaves to the almighty buck but that's nowhere near to what socialism enslaves the people.
Go away
Why don’t you refute his claims? Because you can’t. Matt was carefully explaining that you’re not a pos for shopping at Walmart and this Micheal fella ruined it by rubbing your nose in your mess. And now you want the mean man to go away.
"Why don't you refute his claims?"
It's hard to find a claim that doesn't pertain to Matt's balls or lubed MAGA dicks.
Valid
Gibberish. Talk about policy.
Who the F are you, and please seek help.
I'm really tired of the caustic insults by commenters who style themselves as the next Taibbis or Hunter Thompsons, of which Michael's and many others here, pro and con his position, seem to feel expresses their post-modern literary brilliance.
Is there a real person and argument here, or has AI just been learning how to swear?
The "thing that is real" is not so much capitalism, it is the intelligent psychopathy that corrupts the iron law of oligarchy no matter what the system. We barely know how to recognize that problem, much less fix it. (I'm confident that's by design.) But fixing it is the only way out.
derp, derp, derp.......brown nosing for china-globalism.
Potty mouth
What a great socialist. Errr guy.
Yeah.
The kind of socialist who knows that gormless fatties without the balls to stand up to the bosses are gormless no-balls fatties.
You are sure fixated on balls.
You can't have unions without strong businesses and you can't have strong businesses with "free" trade. How'd all the strikes in Britian in the 1970's work?
Capitalism won.
Eventually too many Brits wanted to be spanked on the botty by stern Margaret.
At least I got to confiscate money raised by our football team's Homecoming Event and send it to support the miners' wives and kids.
Solidarity across the globe more or less died somewhere in the 90s and the "left" capitulated to liberal identity politics in its embrace of capitalist values.
You should reboot the IWW. Wobblies always say Workers Unite!
The IWW relied heavily on immigrants, people who weren't as dickless as Americans tend to be.
Every time the actual left has had energy and impact in the US, it's because foreign-born people were influential at every level of organization.
The only counter-example is the 70s when some unions actually "stood up" and workers, some workers anyway, were willing to stand up with them.
Wildcat strikes are fun.
No other option but burn it down. I feel queasy when I hear politicians like Schumer want to call for meetings and committees and democrats to get in the discussions where nothing gets done but talk.
Trump has managed to get the world talking about the failure of the globalists. Before they completely rob us and feed us bugs.
Wall Street has very little to do with the working class and they don’t care either.
It is but “politician with no balls” is redundant
That would be Bernie Sanders.
Other ironies include suddenly becoming concerned with human rights and other liberal niceties when the political wind changes with regard to one's official opinions about China's state policies and practices. How long will hate-China week be promoted this time around?
Hope everyone will enjoy paying $2500 for an iPhone from now on because that’s what Trump‘s 140% tariff on Chinese goods is going to do to America. Moreover, everything in your automobile and all of your prescription drugs come from China. Hope you got enough money to pay for them. I don’t like to say swear words, but “when the shit hits the fan“ a lot of people are gonna be changing their tune.
The 140% tariff on China is what they call a regressive tax. It means the increase cost of goods through tariffs will be paid disproportionately by ordinary Americans— not the rich. Chinese manufacturers will pay the tariff and that money will go into the treasury, but then it will be passed along to us in higher prices. Thuss, we pay that tax.
The added money into our federal treasury will then be used to offset the trillion dollar tax cuts Trump will give to the rich. The tariffs to be effective will have to last years and will not be effective if the Trump administration and Congress does not pass statues that assist domestic industry in rebuilding. Moreover, the rebuilt factories will be run by robots, not people so don’t expect the Working Man to benefit all that much.
So do you see where all of this is going? Don’t you think this should be brought up by a skeptical independent journalist like Matt Taibbi before he says “burn everything down?” Don’t you think we the public should be questioning Matt when he doesn’t rather than cursing and swearing everyone that disagrees with him?
Full disclosure: I am not a Democrat. I’m not a Republican. I vote independently based upon the best critical analysis I can make of the situation. I am for tariffs and other measures designed and actually capable of rebuilding America’s industry and employing people that are now hopeless. I do not agree with Mr. Sanders on many issues. I just don’t see enough evidence that Trump‘s true motive is to help the Working Man. I see nothing is background to support such a conclusion. People should be allowed to question his motives without being cursed and sworn at.
People have gotten so used to buying cheap shit off the backs of people in other countries who do not enjoy the same human right's protections, labour laws, or standard of living. I suspect most people don't think about that, and more importantly, don't want to think about that. Maybe it's good if "why is stuff from other countries so much cheaper?" becomes a mainstream topic again.
Don’t know the answer. Maybe things will work out great, but I’m fearful they won’t.
I bet you believe corporations pay their corporate taxes.
Heck no! I hate corporations! I’m from a broken down factory town. I saw what they did to my mom and dad and my friends. I became a lawyer because of it and I’ve been suing corporations every chance I get when I see them take advantage of people.
You got me mixed up with a Democrat. I don’t belong to either political party. Gives me an independent mind, don’t you know.
I’ll bet you and I and a lot of other people that I make critical comments to have a lot in common. I just believe in the constitution and critical thinking rather than flying off the handle with my gut reaction.
Your response to me shows the first step in critical thinking: Asking questions. Good on you.
Erik
BurnNNeee👹
These people pulled a Sopranos style bust-out for years. But they say a creditor who holds an extremely large debt is actually vulnerable to the debtor. Trump knows a lot about negotiating and restructuring debt. The MSM doesn’t have a clue - there is probably no one better to steer us through this storm. Fingers crossed anyway 🤞
I have great respect for Trump’s bravery and smarts. For those who think he’s a bastard, at least he’s our bastard.
Trump is the Dennis Rodman of politicians; flamboyant, a bit crazy, opposing fans hate him, but wildly effective at what he does.
Fair analogy. Greatest rebounder of all time, one in basketball, the other in business and politics. (Naturally Rodman and Trump are friends.)
As a retired banker, I wholeheartedly agree with you that a creditor who holds an extremely large debt is actually vulnerable to the debtor.
I expect we will find an excuse to cancel the debt since there is no way we can ever pay it off. We got goods, they got paper.
Trump has been in business doing deals all over the world and developing multi million dollar properties since 1968. He has knocked it out of the park in business, in entertainment, and in politics. So I don’t know about genius but for sure he has more international business experience than any modern president.
The number of bankruptcies put a bit of a damper on his business “successes.”
None of those were personal bankruptcies. Trump organizes his real estate holdings in a number of separate limited liability companies, usually one per property. Several of those properties connected to his Atlantic City foray and one or two others failed to attract the tenants and the businesses he’d planned and he consequently took them through bankruptcy. It’s standard practice in commercial real estate.
Right. It's standard practiced for failed commercial real estate. The opposite of success.
Given the number of real estate ventures he’s been involved with, he’s got maybe a 5% failure rate. Some investors would regard that as quite successful if Trump were publicly traded. Ever notice how many properties REITs write off?
Maybe you just don't understand business.
Well, for sure you don't. When a company is bankrupted, that is counted as a failure in business.
The only difference between his corporate Chapter 11 filings (and maybe even a Chapter 7 filing) and the ongoing bankruptcy of our federal government is that his companies never had the power to print their own currency when the debt got out of control. I would suggest that it is those bankruptcies COMBINED with his successful track record that make him the most qualified leader to unwind our global trade debacle, as well as the institutional corruption that created it.
Trump never filed for personal bankruptcy. He had four bankruptcy - Chapter 11, which is used for corporations trying to reorganize. They were in the casino mess for the most part. You might try to at least add he’s many, many successful businesses.
They won't b/c they would have to be honest. Like LGM, they are jealous of Trump and those that believe in him.
Try to keep up. Diana commented that Trump has been successful in business, entertainment, and politics. I pointed out that there have been a few business failures. This is an observable fact.
Why do I need to restate what she already stated, that he has had success in business, entertainment, and politics? Is there insufficient waxing of his schwanz occurring for your taste?
You folks who think the man can do and has never done anything remotely wrong are as bad as the TDS people. Flip sides of the same tarnished coin.
We are told that his bankruptcies were strategic.it is clear he has 'failed up' a lot.
What will the future bring?
It will be interesting.
If you review the history of all casinos in Atlantic City it’s not a healthy picture. They are barely surviving, surrounding area crime ridden, politics played a huge part. There’s more to the story of Atlantic City than orange man bad, but he’s just such a juicy target.
Not really a concern in his current position. If he managed to keep *some* of his companies solvent then he's a better executive than any other recent President. Consider the company he's keeping: When is the last time Congress balanced a budget?
He didn't have any bankruptcies himself. He had interests in 100+ companies, some were under water, a handful were reorganized and unloaded. Have you ever heard of William Zeckendorf?
You guys ought to be getting paid as members of Trump's PR team. What an overreaction. Someone says he's conquered business, entertainment, and politics. I make a slight comment on some well-known bankruptcies, and it's overreaction city.
Calm down. I support what Trump is trying to do. I hope things change for the better.
Used properly, bankruptcy is a financial tool, not a sign of failure. Many very successful businesses have been bankrupt and recovered, some more than once.
To be clear neither Trump or the Trump organization ever went bankruptcy. Specific entities that owned real estate they were managing or developing did. The bankruptcy system was designed to encourage risk taking. Trump tried to fix some bad properties and failed. It you never fail, you haven't assumed much risk, particularly in real estate. Henry Ford, Walt Disney and Abraham Lincoln also went bankrupt, Ford twice.
And definitely more experienced than the media pundits (i.e. puppets).
And he's still a risibly awful president. And, of course, a contemptibly awful human being (as I'm sure you would agree).
Clinton and LBJ have similar reputations. I actually think there is a public and private Trump, and many have observed this. And I don’t have a problem with either.
I think the only thing Trump may be good at is being one large asshole con man!
As I said elsewhere, I would prefer to have someone else doing what Trump is doing - but no one else was offering to do anything but extend the status quo.
Same for killing DEI and sealing the border.
A weird Goldilocks Syndrome has broken out in DC: yes, I wanted that policy, but just not in that precise way!
The only person who could do any of this would have to be an anti-politician not beholden to any Party apparatus and not worried about what names the MSM called him.
Thus Trump.
How about that. What did everyone think would happen to someone who actually played all the face up cards that were on the table for decades that the rest admired and talked about, but never picked up.
I’m not sure they all admired them, since they were voting to make the problem worse.
Excellent point. Unfortunately, the problem exists in both parties. No one wants to focus on the issue, just want to focus on the him vs her. The D vs R. But both D and R are responsible for enabling the gutting of our economy.
Case in point: Matt writes that globalization needs some nihilism, and a bunch of our fellow commenters decide it’s the time to attack Bernie or fucking Pelosi.
Bernie is a naive Socialist with Utopian views surpassed only by the ideological fantasies of young AOC.
Pelosi knows precisely what she's doing.
1) She feeds intel to her husband all the time on investments, which is why several years ago I invested in the ETF named NANC...which mirrors her stock trades. My momma didn't raise no dummies.
2) She ain't leaving DC. She's an addict to the power and knows what happens if she loses all her security protections Jeffries provides for her.
Uh oh! By investing in that ETF, you too profited from globalism. Sticks and stones and glass houses and all that, brah.
Imagine that. And he was turned into the definition of a-hole by those who got us where we are today and profit immensely from the way things are. Funny how that works.
Trump was an ass before he was President. He was also astute, seeing the clown-show that was the '16 Republican nominee-wannabes. He's also been smart enough to not repeat his mistakes for the most part from his first administration - that is better than I expected.
HIS mistakes?! He was a DC newbie, who got there without DC blessing, and who trusted advice given to him by DC, I’ll wager. DC screwed him at every turn. He may be a jerk, but no one offered to help, but in fact worked to —- Resist!
Some of his "mistakes" were in not sticking to his instincts and instead being swayed (by those swamp-dwellers), at least that's my opinion. He doesn't appear to be doing that this time, which doesn't mean everything will be fine, but at least it won't be the same old shit.
Especially Republicans.
I don't disagree.
I"m not a Trump fan at all..was a long time NeverTrumper...but came to realize that if we were ever going to restore the balance of power between those who govern and We the People they govern...we'd need someone with cajones the size of Texas to do it.
MAGA parade was already under way from 2010 on...Trump was savvy enough media-wise to jump in front of the parade and appoint himself Parade Marshall.
Truth is...he's a useful tool for us who've demanded these changes for 2-3 decades but never had the political tools to do it on our own.
Now we have what is..in essence.. a downfield blocker for us to get some first downs.
We're a long way from the endzone, but momentum is on our side.
Don't get too excited, nothing has changed with Congress, and for long term results it will take Congress to enact them.
Do you mean upend the rule of law by defying court orders? Or do you mean that you want someone else to tank global markets to the tune of trillions within days (the US hurts, too, when this happens, btw)? Or do you want someone else to...ah forget it. At the end of Trump's second term, just as at the end of Trump's first term, the status quo will be fully preserved and a lot of billionaires will be billions richer. That's what the Repugs do--make their clients richer. That's their raison d'etre. Of course, the same is true of the Dems.
Well Harry C, if you’ve watched politics for decades like I have, and like many Racket readers, name me one politician that could accomplish what Trump is doing. Just one. Get rid of waste, fraud & abuse through DOGE? ✅ Fire crooked grifter bureaucrats and defund CIA fronts like USAID?✅ Deport gangsters running fentanyl into the country?✅ stopping child trafficking from Mexico & South America?✅ Establishing tariffs to make other countries pay & saving US taxpayers billions?✅ Lots and lots more. Only Trump has even considered doing anything to help Main Street. And you think he’s an asshole?
Those are nice green checkmarks there. Too bad not a single one of them has any basis in reality.
But just like some people can say "fiery but mostly peaceful" with a straight face, others will look at empty shelves and tripled prices for whatever's left and claim that they are "winning bigly."
Don’t be dumb in public Boris. It’s unseemly.
Yeah, I have no idea why you keep doing it.
Shit! Did another pandemic break out! Is all the fucking toilet paper gone from
Costco again?
Eggs had a very Soviet-looking "no more than 3 cartons per customer" signs on them. Toilet paper could be next. (Hmmm, where does a lot of raw materials for it come from?...)
Don't you have a bidet at home? Water's still local.
Yes there was a planned egg shortage manufactured by the previous administration who culled the egg producing chickens because of a bird flu plandemic, lol.
One problem with your analysis: other countries do not pay tariffs, Americans who use imported goods pay them, if businesses pass them on as part of the cost of acquiring the goods to process or sell, or American businesses pay them if they absorb them as a cost, rather than pass them on to consumers, and some goods must be imported (e.g. tropical crops we cannot grow in adequate supply to meet demand, like coffee, cacao, bananas, or rubber).
Americans have been paying for foreign tariffs for 80 years, since WW2. If countries don’t want their market share to tank, they will absorb the cost of the tariffs. If they don’t, they won’t sell product. Many companies (like my MIL’s in Mexico) will absorb some of the hit and the retailers will absorb some & buyers the rest. It’s time for a reset. Europe et al have been coasting on our money for decades. No more.
I've often heard the argument that other countries don't pay tariffs; we do. At one level, I agree with that analysis, but on another I wonder why it should matter then to the countries being tariffed?
Just this morning I was on a UK substack and the Brits were surmising that Starmer would be subsidizing Jaguar so it would not lose money when Americans could no longer afford their cars. That is how the UK absorbs the tariffs charged on UK products coming to the US .
I should add, the article was written in support of Trump's tariffs and 90% of the commenters agreed. They want their government to man up and quit with the globalist agenda.
Jaguars and Range Rovers suck anyway.
The working class of the UK does...but not the Globalists who are currently in power.
Anyone who dares protest will be arrested and jailed..for daring to share their opinion that the Globalists are selling out the UK.
Why? Supply and demand: a tariff increases the price to the buyer (and without generating more revenue for the seller per unit sold), demand decreases with respect to the increased cost to the buyer. If the goods being hit with the tariff have highly elastic demand, the country exporting them will drastically loose revenue.
Right. Several movements may come into play here. 1. Consumers pay a higher price for the foreign product, or for a domestic replacement, or do without. 2. The foreign company loses market share, and hence revenue. 3. Domestic companies who can replace the product are shielded and gain some of that market share, which provides profit and jobs domestically. 4. The nation evolves to become more self-sufficient, united, and perhaps resilient to external hostilities or control.
The anti-tariff side would emphasize the first two factors; the pro-tariff side would be concerned with the latter two. I think it's worth keeping them all in mind when we argue the issue.
That's correct! My comment to the Brits was the Nov. 2024 video commercial Jaguar did had the internet in a buzz and it was not a good one.
Right. Surprising to see the braindead parroting of that lie regarding *who* pays tariffs, even here, on Matt's substack. Tariffs are a consumption tax.
To your point about US consumers paying for tariffs. People like Bernie rail against tariffs and in the next breath demand corporations pay more income tax, he thinks we are stupid and don't realize that higher income taxes are passed on to the consumer as higher prices.
Great comment.
but sometimes that's just who u need!
This country was built by ass-hole con men. It is just that the history books were written to make everyone think most of our leaders were some pias Mother Teresa's who never swore or cheated on their wives. We now know the truth. Guess what they did!
You nailed it--from Carnegie to Morgan to Ford, our nation-builders were some nasty kind of work.
Pussies don’t build anything.
And those in charge currently. Probably 90+% of CEOs are assholes too. Speaks to what one has to do and be to get the top jobs in industry or government.
What nonsense. The constitution they wrote is a fantastic document. You are the ahole who has benefited from their genius. Otherwise you’d be the one doing menial labor.
Yeah, Sam Adams and Ben Franklin are two that come to mind that current bluestockings would edit out if they could.
Joe Biden's Democratic party says, "Hold my beer, chump."
There you go, Harry
That’s exactly what we need after Bush, Obama & Biden almost destroyed our country.
Start your list with Lyndon Baines Johnson...
And we can’t forget the guy who turbocharged income and wealth inequality—Reagan; and the guy who sold out workers for Wall Street money—Clinton.
And who are you—and why should anybody care what you think?
He is still what we need.
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What are you trying to say?
Agreed.
Are you a Tesla scratcher withTDS?
Yet he was elected to the highest office (in the world) twice. What is the highest public service office you have held Harry? Are you successful in business ?
To some extent, all successful politicians are conmen.
Don Surber (sarcasm): "Yes, the billionaire doesn’t understand economics but the fellow [referring to a NY Times reporter dissing Trump's tariff tactics] paying $2,000 a month for a one-bedroom apartment with a view of the next building does."
Essentially correct, but NYC apartment rental prices have soared. Change to: "Yes, the billionaire doesn’t understand economics but the fellow paying $4,000 a month for a one-bedroom apartment with a view of the bricks in the next building does."
2K a month is getting to be the norm in fly-over towns much smaller and less glamorous (though cleaner and more racially tolerant) than NYC. Do any elites understand the state of country these days?
04/11/25: Since they're the ones setting the prices, yes, that's a reasonable assumption as far as the economics go. The moral rot that they've curated in their ideological petri dishes please them as much as their profits. Blind to the ultimate end results, they're the pashas sitting on fetid lotus blossums, smoking the hookahs that fog all and obscured eveything until the thunder crack of 2024-25 broke. Now they're scared. Too bad. May they drown in their own volcanic bile.
Maybe I should have used "care" instead of "understand," but that would have been too obvious a statement.
And $2000 won’t leave much for meth.
And no, the elites have no fucking clue about greater
America.
Borrow a million and the bank owns you. Borrow a billion and you own the bank. Borrow trillions and you gonna have to learn the Pledge Of Allegiance.
If we defaulted on the T bills, China would collapse and Communism would end.
Interesting… thank you!
04/11/25: I just finished reading (for the second time in 50 or so years) Nevil Shute's 1957 novel, "On The Beach." Quite appropriate for the situation we find ourselves in now.
That book had a big impact on me. Thanks for mentioning it.
You're welcome! I'm not naive. For the following to be produced by a Hollywood saturated with casting couches, the insiders must have laughed all the way to the bank. But I didn't know that then. From my book notes:
Of course, I had to see On The Beach with the unforgettable Gregory Peck.
Heady stuff for a ten-year old.
Somehow, I don't see this getting into Easy Rider (1969):
Dwight Towers: "I'd rather go fishing... there's just one thing, honey. I wouldn't want to go if it was going to mean that you'd get hurt."
Moira Davidson: "I shan't get hurt... Not in the way you mean."
Dwight: "I'm going home quite soon ... It's nearly over now ... I've got a wife at home I love and I've played it straight with her the two years that I've been away. I wouldn't want to spoil that now, these few last days."
Moira: "I know ... I've known that all the time ... I wouldn't want to start a smutty love affair when I'm dying in a week or ten days time. I've got some standards, too --- now, anyway."
"He smiled at her. We could try out Junior's rod ..."
It's 1957.
Here comes Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky, sooner than you think.
Easy Rider also had a profound impact on me. As did The Trial of Billy Jack. Somehow, that got me ready for the harshness of the pandemic...
Imagine if Tony Soprano and his “glorified crew” as Phil called them, held a bunch of John Gotti’s debt. Gotti is not worried about Tony. It’s the other way around. How the hell am I ever going to get John to pay me back?
I don't trust Trump, but I know msm is lying, so ... I read Racket.
I've often said exactly that. With the US facing bankruptcy, who better to negotiate with our creditors than the man who once famously said: "If you owe the bank million dollars, the bank owns you. If you owe them a billion dollars, you own them."
Sure, right…more like Trump knows a lot about what it’s like to declare bankruptcy, and instead of swindling all his low wage workers out of their earnings, he’ll just do the same to Americans
I guess now is the time to share this.
1983 PROPHECY ABOUT TRUMP
https://andmagazine.substack.com/p/james-zumwalt-does-trump-have-a-...
04/11/25: Superb. Thank you.
I don't care about Pagan prophecies.
Good for you Ed!
Super Genius?
Your last sentence nailed it: our ruling class, Republicans and Democrats, have put us in a death spiral.
$40T in debt thanks to the "smartest guys in the room".
Smartest Bloodsucking parasites in the room for sure. Produce nothing, financialize and extract and when it blows up, extract more from the suckers!
We are NOT going to die.
We are going to suffer but survive.
As for factories it’s already happening in a tidal wave.
https://reshorenow.org/
Yesterday I got into it with an economics professor from my alma mater on this topic. He claimed to thoroughly debunk my argument for tariffs on Chinese goods by citing Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations. According to him running a massive National Account deficit is a good thing because China is massively investing in our country by buying our debt.
That makes sense to me so long as 1) the creditor isn’t our enemy 2) the creditor doesn’t have too much leverage over us (the debt isn’t too large and 3) the creditor isn’t stealing American IP / flooding our country with fentanyl.
To the globalist I was arguing with, those concerns were silly.
What am I missing? Am I on crazy pills or is it just all the “experts?”
He’s a professor. Inform him Tuition and buying his book are respectively Tariffs and Monopoly.
He’s not a capitalist
You’re not crazy
He’s corrupt
You’re not alone. We ARE reshoring now. Quietly, steadily, it’s already happening.
reshorenow.org
No? Gimme a zip code USA and I’ll show you a factory coming or being built or in discussion with local government, banks, etc.
Oelwein, Iowa. Not sure what the Zip code is. I’m reading Methland by Nick Redding, about how closing businesses and their meth replacements nearly destroyed a nice town.
If they’re getting a factory that pays more than minimum wage, I’ll submit your name for nomination for POTUS.
Right so where's that factory or whatever you said?
See them plural above?
Well just starting with google and moving to assisted search -
(Yes I know Methland is Oelwein, looks like LIES again)
“manufacturing companies near 50662 Oelwein IA”
here’s a lot of 😊 Happy Spam 😊
🏭 Local & Regional Manufacturing Activity
• East Penn Manufacturing
A major battery manufacturer operating in Oelwein’s industrial park, contributing to the local economy and employment.
🔗 East Penn Manufacturing – Oelwein Chamber
• Quality Plus Manufacturing
An agricultural and industrial manufacturer based in Oelwein, supporting the region’s manufacturing sector.
🔗 Quality Plus Manufacturing – Oelwein Chamber
• Oelwein Industrial Park
A 30-acre site zoned for light industrial use, offering utilities and community tax incentives to attract new businesses.
🔗 Oelwein Industrial Park – Oelwein Chamber
🔧 Additional Industrial Developments
• Transco Railway Products in Oelwein
Operating in the historic Chicago Great Western yard, Transco repairs freight cars, maintaining Oelwein’s legacy in rail-related industries.
🔗 Transco Railway Products – Flickr 
• R S Construction
A local construction company specializing in residential remodeling, contributing to the area’s economic activity.
🔗 R S Construction – Yelp
🚀 Regional Reshoring & Expansion Projects
• Danisco US Expands Cedar Rapids Operations
In 2025, Danisco US (a DuPont subsidiary) announced a $68 million investment in Cedar Rapids to expand enzyme production, creating 40 new jobs.
🔗 Danisco US Expansion – ReshoreNow 
Oh and Indeed shows 118 construction jobs for Oelwein -
“118 Construction jobs available in Oelwein, IA on Indeed.com. Apply to Concrete Finisher, Painter, Painter/laborer and more!” Indeed.com
https://reshorenow.org/library/14751/Denmark-Based-Danisco-US-Expands-Cedar-Rapids-Iowa-Manufacturing-Operations/?utm_source=chatgpt.com
https://www.flickr.com/photos/jterry618/52323035639/?utm_source=chatgpt.com
I’m CERTAIN I can improve on;
‘Human Settlement…” 😉
“Oelwein, Iowa
Human settlement in Fayette County, Iowa, United States of America • cityofoelwein.org/main
Oelwein is a city in Fayette County, Iowa, United States. The population was 5,920 at the time of the 2020 census, a decrease of 11. Wikipedia.”
Ok Well just starting with google and moving to assisted search -
(Yes I know Methland is Oelwein, looks like LIES again)
“manufacturing companies near 50662 Oelwein IA”
here’s a lot of 😊 Happy Spam 😊
🏭 Local & Regional Manufacturing Activity
• East Penn Manufacturing
A major battery manufacturer operating in Oelwein’s industrial park, contributing to the local economy and employment.
🔗 East Penn Manufacturing – Oelwein Chamber
• Quality Plus Manufacturing
An agricultural and industrial manufacturer based in Oelwein, supporting the region’s manufacturing sector.
🔗 Quality Plus Manufacturing – Oelwein Chamber
• Oelwein Industrial Park
A 30-acre site zoned for light industrial use, offering utilities and community tax incentives to attract new businesses.
🔗 Oelwein Industrial Park – Oelwein Chamber
🔧 Additional Industrial Developments
• Transco Railway Products in Oelwein
Operating in the historic Chicago Great Western yard, Transco repairs freight cars, maintaining Oelwein’s legacy in rail-related industries.
🔗 Transco Railway Products – Flickr
• R S Construction
A local construction company specializing in residential remodeling, contributing to the area’s economic activity.
🔗 R S Construction – Yelp
🚀 Regional Reshoring & Expansion Projects
• Danisco US Expands Cedar Rapids Operations
In 2025, Danisco US (a DuPont subsidiary) announced a $68 million investment in Cedar Rapids to expand enzyme production, creating 40 new jobs.
🔗 Danisco US Expansion – ReshoreNow
Oh and Indeed shows 118 construction jobs for Oelwein -
“118 Construction jobs available in Oelwein, IA on Indeed.com. Apply to Concrete Finisher, Painter, Painter/laborer and more!” Indeed.com
https://reshorenow.org/library/14751/Denmark-Based-Danisco-US-Expands-Cedar-Rapids-Iowa-Manufacturing-Operations/?utm_source=chatgpt.com
https://www.flickr.com/photos/jterry618/52323035639/?utm_source=chatgpt.com
So all these companies and jobs are because of the new administration? Or perhaps they were already there?
They have been there for years, in particular Transco all along.
Well just warming up, there is a railway shop there now Transco that still employs 190 people -
However that’s wiki
Let me plug zip in 50662
I am testing this weekend
Here; plug in a zip code and find manufacturing and reshoring by zip. Already happening.
https://bnd-muse-23.net/index.php/2025/04/13/hope-search-plug-widget/
All I can say is that I grew up in a 'rust belt' factory town. I went to a very good high school (we had 2, one public, which I attended, one catholic). I went to that school with kids from all backgrounds whose parents worked in those 4 factories- one was a Watkins flavoring plant, another made knitting, sewing supplies for Boye, a Honeywell factory and a Tire Plant. Many other parents commuted to a larger city 30 minutes away where there was even more industry. There might have been more. The huge majority of my friends and fellow students lived in houses their parents owned. Those parents also had campers, boats and the money to contribute to the community in terms of both supporting small business and local boosterism. We had great public parks which we kids spent hours navigating. I graduated in '81 to a landscape in which those jobs were being sucked away. I had to move across the country to find real work in what became my trade. I have not gone back to my hometown, last I knew, it was a shell with the downtown completely closed down and emptied and most people who were left getting by on Kmart jobs.
There's a lot of people out there who say the work isn't coming back and if it was, Americans wouldn't do it. These are the people willing to sell us out to the lowest common denominator for sheer profit. I'm not going to forget that.
PS: The schools I went to were so good that I coasted through my college requirements without even having to buy the textbooks. They not only killed the economic base, they killed the economic base that was funding real education.
Thank you for this comment.
Wow! Great article and agree with everything you said - and I mean everything.
Matt - welcome to MAGA world. It ain't pretty and there is a lot to be skeptical of, but what choice is there?
I love Matt because of how fiercely independent he is, and his willingness to call BS (usually in a way that makes me laugh rather than my blood boil) on all deserving targets regardless of party or status. I hope Matt never identifies as (or is thought of as) MAGA. No disrespect at all for the MAGA movement, but I won’t fence Matt in with that kind of label. He needs the free range.
I can't like your comment enough. It's people who want to pin labels on him that have a problem accepting Matt's commitment to the truth. If he happens to side more with the right these days than with the left, it's because the mainstream left has abandoned principles and sanity.
Hear! Hear!
Hey, even Gretchen Whitmore…
Nah, she still sucks.
Best Comment Of The Day
I have long respected Matt for that fierce independence.
But it is gone.
Whether the attacks from gormless Dems, the IRS and the faux-left in online spaces have driven him to abandon reason and go whole MAGA hogbrain or whether it is just the money he'd lose if he pissed off enough of his mouthbreathers, it doesn't matter.
Matt is sucking right wing dick now.
Congrats, your not only ignorant but vulgar too. Try a few sentences without the disgusting references. Dictionaries are free and they're full of useful words!
Those words are useless in the face of the Humpty-Dumptyism of Americans who think Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are "socialists".
So vulgarity it is, Heidi. I have this horrible proclivity for finding mass murder obscene and the occasional "dick sucker" funny.
But middle class morality has never been my thing.
EDIT: And you mean "you're" not "your", dumbass.
TROLL Alert!
Yeah.
Liberals always do the "TROLL" thing when they have nothing to offer but their platitudes and someone frankly tells them to fuck off.
You're the troll, fuckwit.
You’re way to the left of the Overton window if you think Matt is a bootlicker for the right.
lol... The Overton window in American "politics" is the windshield of that stretch limo that Robert Pattison lives in in Cosmopolis.
And it only looks in.
The current iteration of the American right is cloaked in the faux-populism that allows once-genuine critics like Matt to gabble on about the evils of "capitalism" as long as no one mentions capitalism and there is a strong flavor of bad chinks and bad gubmint sellouts.
That way, the gormless fatties that make up the MAGA hordes can fulminate against the chinks and the gubmint while capital fucks them in their fat asses.
"The gormless fatties that make up the MAGA hordes can fulminate against the chinks and the gubmint while capital fucks them in their fat asses." as opposed to the blue haired, infinity pierced, triple gender, violent pyschpaths, and the limo liberals of the left?
Precisely my good friend.
Americans on either side of the divide are so ideologically stupefied that they can't even name capitalism as the source of the malaise.
It has to be immigrants or transphobes, China or racists (sic).
You sound bummed he's not sucking yours.
Well, let's face it: He's MAGA. He's been supporting anything Trumpian for so long (with minor hedges here and there) that they can adopt him as one of their own.
I wouldn’t characterize Matt as having entered MAGA world. He did write a book about Trump called Insane Clown President.
And don’t give any more ammo to the Democrats who used to be liberal until they decided to support forever war, censorship, and spying on our own citizens. And killing some of them with robot planes. They loved Matt when he was making fun of Bush (as was appropriate), and now call him a traitor, often in these pages. Dumbasses. He hasn’t changed. They have.
This.
It's weird how in the past our government treated the country like it had to be more or less self-sufficient. (A good proxy for this is the past government wanting you to be healthy, while the current one doesn't.) Then the globalists come along and (rightly) point out that countries that trade basically never go to war. So we offload our manufacturing of important industries to our political enemies......for some reason thinking they won't take advantage of the situation?
We can't trade pieces of paper for actual goods and services forever.
We can't rely on foreign nations doing our bidding forever.
SOMETHING'S gotta give. The world isn't going to keep slaving away to feed the fat American forever.
"(rightly) point out that countries that trade basically never go to war"
The ironic thing is, it was exactly this argument that said WWI would not happen - because it was too economically costly to the general prosperity of Europe. Norman Angell's The Great Illusion (which would later be alluded to by The Grande Illusion).
It's like the nugget of truth that makes you believe the whole lie. Trade is good for both nations, and DOES decrease the chances of war. But that doesn't mean you act like an idiot an outsource your ability to produce what you need to wage war. (Real or economic)
This isn’t true. Never was.
“Then the globalists come along and (rightly) point out that countries that trade basically never go to war.”
Trade is often a gateway to war.
That’s like saying money brings people together 🤣
Thank you; don't know where they got that idea from. Almost all wars throughout history have been about trade (I want it but not at your price). It was the entire basis of colonization.
If I recall, that was the underlying cause of the rebellion in Star Wars too. ;)
Well “they” will say anything for money. Lol
They will feed us as long as we pay them to.
With what?
Surely we can just zap up trillions of dollars every year and the people who need those dollars to buy things won't be upset by the cratering value of the currency!
The value of the currency only matters if what you have is only currency. We all possess more than that. Some have assets, some have their skills.
Yep. And Government will devalue all of it so they can continue syphoning off cash to their friends at home and their enemies in China.
Once the money is fake, the rest of the economy is doomed to follow.
Charleston Heston knows.
Our labor. Our entertainment value. Our innovation. Our crops. All made possible by our stability. We are not unique human beings. We are just more free than most.
For now.
Yikes.
Nor can we rely on foreign nations doing the right thing, or even obeying trade laws forever.
What's weirder is the way Trump and his clownclones frame the global trading system developed by and for American capital as "bad furriners rippin' us off".
The Chinese didn't destroy American unions. And it wasn't German corporations that shoved all that Oxy up the fat asses of whiners who lost their jobs.
So the first step "back" to American self-sufficiency would be to let go of all the "we is victims" whining and get off the couch.
It appears you’re still on the couch yourself. Let’s hope it’s not in your Mom’s basement.
Sorry honey.
Where I live it's 9:50am and I am enjoying a leisurely coffee and bread and cheese brekkie before heading out into the oppressive heat and tropical humidity.
I'm in an "office chair" and my daughter is doing laundry out front as I type.
My "mom", who died about 15 years ago and from whom I was totally alienated, didn't actually have a basement.
Bowling shoes, though. She had bowling shoes to the bitter end.
God bless you! Every fat fuck that kept Walmart in business can shut their whiny little mouths. The cope among this comment section is straight out of a country music song. Home of the brave?😅😅😅
He seemed kooky but Ross Perot -whom I voted for- was right all along.
I've long wondered the REAL reason he dropped out of the race that summer. For some reason, almost no one remembers that and NO ONE talks about it.
But in June he was LEADING both Bush & Clinton in the polls. But he suddenly dropped out in July, claiming some vague threat against his daughter. Everyone laughed at his paranoia and weirdness, but with the benefit of 33 years hindsight, doesn't sound at all implausible.
Anyhow, once he came back, the momentum was gone, though he did manage to siphon away some of HW's support.
Enough siphoned so HW lost. I always believed that Perot's main goal was to deny HW a second term. He hated HW.
Ross was spot on. The biggest issue is that there is never a post-mortem on NAFTA or the WTO with China. Opinions are expressed, then people move on, and no one ever examines what really happened. Individuals like Tom Friedman flip their position without admitting ignorance or mistakes. Blow it up now!
I would venture that a lot of Perot support went to Trump.
Yep.
I voted for both.
The MSM talked more about his ears and his accent than his policies. They had to kneecap him, too much money was at stake.
The media are the most shopworn of streetwalkers.
Yet they are the oddest of streetwalkers, as they also imagine themselves qualified to deliver every Sunday sermon. Journalists are somehow amoral moralists.
Starts with The Good Thief, we’ve found our way back to the Holy Prostitutes of Baal’s Temple in Carthage (true story). They too provided revenue for the state.
A box of squawking whores on cnbc. Matt called it.
I voted for him too. He was one of the first politicians that my husband and I followed. I was so bummed when he dropped out. (
Boy, was he…..
It's so funny how many things we can pile up that the "Left" has entirely flip flopped on. Watching Bernie pander for Capitalism, Tim Walz on a Wild Western Fistfighting tour.... They are for basically anything assinine, or bad for the world.
I for one, lost my rural upbringing and am sick as hell of crappy Chinese goods. Even if American manufacturing doesn't come back (I sincerely hope it does) I am fine with empty Walmarts and no more shitty garbage.
My life wouldn't change if Walmart disappeared. I don't buy that crap anyway
Mine would. I grocery shop there, quality is excellent and prices reasonable.
To each his own. I produce a lot of my own food so grocery is not a big part of my budget
It is good you live where you are able to produce most of your own food and have the physical ability to do so. Many of us are not so situated.
How is Walmart the problem? Yes, they sell a lot of made-in-China stuff, but who doesn't? Taking the snooty I-would-NEVER-shop-their attitude of hipsters doesn't do anything but telegraph your desire to be in the "right" social class, and Trump's populist presidency shows that people care less and less about that.
I didn't say Walmart was a problem. I just don't buy the cheap crap from China that they sell. Trust me, I'm in nobody's "right" social class. I just am not seduced by price if the product is crap. I'm a woodworker and am able to supply my tool and material needs by American, German and Japanese products. Yep, they cost more but also do more and last longer.
Do you shop at Walmart? Cheap crap? A lot of what they sell is the same as anywhere else: food, toys, etc. Some is more than good enough. Is a Walmart-sourced cooler "cheap crap" compared to a much more expensive Yeti one? Even their clothing is, I think, pretty decent; and I would like some to go step-by-step how, say, the stitching is worse than things available elsewhere.
As to American, German, and Japanese products. How exactly do they "do" more? And last longer? Sure, a Toyota will, but a German car? And are we back on American cars being good? And having been raised in the US, lived in Japan, and travelled in Germany, I don't think something being sourced there makes it "better". And I am old enough to remember when older generations called Japanese stuff "crap." Things change.
But going back to Walmart, they--like any business--are going to source stuff based on cost and value. China largely offers that. No, furniture sold there is not solid wood, but is much stuff made in or on offer in Japan and Germany either? And basing an argument around tariffs on "crap" is not going to win you support, especially if you focus Walmart--a clear favorite of the masses.
I buy Purina dog food at Walmart. I'll check and see if it comes from China.
I drive a Toyota pickup, made in Texas. As for everything else, I decide on a per item basis. Unless I'm going to use a tool once and throw it away, I don't buy Chinese. I guess I'm not one of the masses
No, I don’t shop at Walmart. But Walmart already reaches into my pocket for tax dollars to keep their underpaid workers fed, housed, and medically cared for.
Scum.
Walmart has been particularly bad because it used its market dominance to force suppliers to adopt terrible labor practices and to offshore production. It was such a big purchaser that its practices affected the entire landscape. Its leading position has now been taken by Amazon, which controls our access to information about the market.
It’s synonymous with Chinese products. And now a lot of whiny garbage people can’t connect the dots. It’s synonymous with exploitation of people in china America and pretty much everywhere and is the largest employer in the country. Because Americans are self serving morons that kiss ass and spend their money at a place where employees are subsidized by welfare to keep prices low. Don’t worry. No one else I know is smart enough to do that math either. But you can always blame Trump or Bernie or China. Because you are EXCEPTIONAL!!
We have to be honest that there is a strong possibility that some of these jobs will be AI or automated. Entrenched wealth has never wanted to pay workers as Matt so accurately showed us with the history of labor. There will have to be effort made to keep that at a minimum. We have to focus effort next on limiting that number but unlike before we will have a fighting chance to do so. We will either way be more secure as a nation by not being dependent on the rest of the world to provide everything for us. I also feel better knowing that forced labor isn't being used. When we add a more fair trade environment we are better off now than we have been for decades. Trump deserves credit for having the balls to buck the status quo. The shit this administration has exposed to the citizens has felt enlightening. Under decades of politicians in both parties (as Walters photo showed us.) there was a push for a one world order that benefits only the vulgarly wealthy (Remember, you will own nothing and you will be happy? WTAF?) and that effort seemed clear to me and interrupting and hopefully, stopping that was so important. (we have to always be mindful as evil is relentless.) I think about the administrations we have had in just my lifetime who have chipped away at our rights and democracy by gutting our jobs, privacy rights, classifying everything and keeping us in the dark, making deals with international entities or corporate tribunals... all of which fell outside or superseded our own courts or ability to vote our way out of the situation. All of that made me think that it was bull shit and they shouldn't be able to get away with it. The absolute line in the sand for me was the massive effort to shut us up about what they were doing and simultaneously blasting us with propaganda telling us how to feel and that we were radical crazies if we didn't fall in line. That stuff should have raised hairs on the back of the necks of any sane person. Those efforts removed any doubt I may have ever had as to their goals. Can we get all of what they took back? We certainly should put in the effort to try. A fighting chance is better than we have had for a long time.
Manufacturing ALREADY IS - https://reshorenow.org/
Interesting site.
Thanks for the link!
Find Reshoring Near You
Enter your ZIP code to find nearby factory projects tied to America's reshoring boom.
https://bnd-muse-23.net/index.php/2025/04/13/hope-search-plug-widget/
I get how people could delude themselves about the benefits of free trade, in the 1980s. But I will never understand how that delusion continued after Tien an Men Square in 1989, and our experience of Chinese IP theft and non-tariff barriers even at that early stage.
I recall in the mid-1990s the US govt approved the Chinese buying a major stake in Loral, a big maker of satellites with enormous strategically valuable IP. My thought on hearing that was a vision in 20 years of my son, born 1984, in a slit trench on Guam, awaiting the Chinese assault.
I was and am no genius. I therefore believe that our leadership class knew full well what they were doing and sold us out for the last 35 years.
To say I am angry at them, and fully support what Trump is trying to do even as I wonder if he could do it better, is an understatement. I am furious at our elites, and more MAGA than I ever could have imagined a few years ago.
There wasn’t blood and prison sentences after 2008. This time there should be.
"I was and am no genius. I therefore believe that our leadership class knew full well what they were doing and sold us out for the last 35 years." +1. How else could the "civil servant class" afford all these lovely homes in prime spots? I can't help but wonder how much the cartels have enriched our "representatives" (see also $20 million to the Biden family).
Yeah, I think I heard that the wealthiest part of the country was right around DC, Maryland, & VA.
That's messed up, man.
That is, in fact, true.
Those lobbyists make good coin.
The “leadership class” will take money from ANYONE. They will also betray our country for ANYONE. All it takes is driving through the Ivy Leagues waving fists full of dollar bills.
There are benefits to free and fair trade. However, there are diminishing returns as the trade area gets larger. Free and *fair* trade just within one nation as large as the US, gives you 90% of the benefits of trading with the whole world. For small nations - like Hungary as just one example - they would be *much* poorer without trading with other nations. That is one reason US was such a juggernaut in the past.
The transition will be hard - and more disruptive than many appreciate. But it must be done. I would prefer it to be done gradually, starting with critical industries like steel, shipbuilding, pharmaceuticals, electronics, etc. And we may find out that we really cannot bring back critical industries with just tariffs - we will likely need more direct subsidies. I personally would not be against federal government contracting out critical antibiotics, insulin, etc. Some of these things are so cheap to make, there is no profit, so no one makes them, forcing doctors to prescribe things that are more expensive.
I also think the possible benefits of "MAHA" may be huge. Health care (actually sick care) is consuming ever growing percent of GDP. if that cost curve is bent down, the benefits are huge financially as well as in terms of health. And reducing big pharma and big ag's control of our government would be a game changer.
Great, great comment.
Matt Taibbi is at his best when he’s pissed. Thomas Friedman [spit]
A vat of spit for him and the execrable Paul Krugman and Robert Reisch. These guys are always wrong yet remain the go-to for leftist "journalists."
Yes, Matt Taibbi himself would be particularly missed...a lovely little thinker, even better when he's pissed!
He has been pretty mad lately.
I still remember, "I'm an American, motherfucker!"
My favorite slam of Friedman from Matt was on the stupid metaphors. I may be paraphrasing, but it was something like 3a + b = Swedish girls like chocolate.
I asked earlier, still curious... what was the date of the last year the Dems weren't screwing workers over while demanding we vote for them to save us from those evil Republicans? And same question but substitute "minorities" for "workers".
You mean the party of slavery, the Civil War, jim crow, kkk, tammany hall, boss tweed, both world wars, korea, vietnam, george wallace dixiecrats, welfare fraud, medicare fraud, medicaid fraud, election fraud, stolen elections, actblue and usaid and illegal immigration and lawfare and social security fraud and castration and sterilization and organized political violence? That party?
My leftie friends are all about some W Bush these days. How about that.... Seems like they called him all the same things they call Trump.
I pointed out to a friend of mine completely going off the deep end about Trump (everything he does is bad, and if she agrees with it, it's bad because Trump is doing it -- that pretty much sums up the mentality.) Anyway, I mentioned to her that it wouldn't matter what Republican had won, she'd feel exactly the same. She denied it. I said, how about DeSantis, I really like him, and she spent 500 words telling me how awful he is. I rested my case. Trump isn't liberal or conservative. I know they all want to say he's a right-wing fascist, but he doesn't support many traditional conservative values.
Allison, there are 3 types of commenters on Racket.
1) MAGA diehards, many who joined Matt after the Twitter Files and take every opportunity to bitch about Marxists, DEI, PelosiObamaBiden, etc.
2) TDS sufferers, who may like something Trump does, but because he did it, it’s bad. They believe Matt has gone MAGA.
For 1) and 2), issues are not important. Other tribe BAD!! is the only issue.
3) The group you represent, thinking for yourself about the issues.
I hope you and other 3)s stick around, otherwise this becomes a cesspool like The Free Press comments.
I’ve been with Matt here within days of him starting TK, which became the Racket. I’ve been a conservative since HS. (Matt is a year younger than me). I have always strived to learn more, think for myself, and support classical liberal principles. I don’t always succeed but I see the flaws in both parties. I got so mad at Republicans for a time (over the Patriot Act) that I re-registered Libertarian for a few years. But I don’t align with their philosophy about drugs and immigration, so went back to the GOP in 2019.
My story is exactly the same.
When they went all Hasbara all the time, I cancelled. F that.
1827.
On or before January 20, 1993.
Love him or hate him, there is nobody else in the in the US but Trump who would even attempt to correct the untenable course we’re on.
Everyone agrees we now have a big fucking problem. Been around for years and no one has done a damn thing about it. Now that Trump has articulated and exposed the magnitude of our greedy politicians at the expense of the rest of us and stepped up to address it, only now do the cowards decide to participate. Not with anything constructive, only infantile I know betters. These people that got us into this dilemma have no business sticking their noses in it now. Go Fuck yourselves.
I love it that they say Trump and Musk and are doing whatever to make more $.
Reminds me of the scene in “The Fugitive” film where Gerard asks the Chicago detectives what the motive was for Kimball killing his wife. “He did it for the money.” Gerard points out, “But he was a doctor, he was already rich.” Detectives: “But she was more rich.” It doesn’t have to make sense.
Finally!!! Someone unapologetically says exactly what I'm thinking and saying to anyone who will listen. Do you see what China is doing right now??? They were ALWAYS going to do this. Pushing it down the road just allows them even more leverage. Are people happy??? Are the younger generations happy? No. And, yes we are being called to think of people we haven't even met yet. Future Americans. Present Americans. It doesn't matter. If this is the sacrifice we are being called to make, rather than fighting a hot war, can we not sacrifice anything for this nation and citizens??? Really? The buck has to stop somewhere. I worry about giving the crazies power again, but I'm more worried about killing generations of people's ability to live an American dream. We were sold out. Globalization has to die. Now. All at once.
It's not really globalization that is the problem. That is the nationalist diversion. It's capitalism. The US has always been a terrible place to live for most people, but it got a bit less terrible for a few decades around the middle of last century. Then, it went back to standard operating procedure. Capitalists have always moved production to make a few more bucks. You can go all the way back to the putting-out system for easy examples.
Oh FFS.
If "the US has always been a terrible place to live for most people," then how come so many people historically wanted to come here?
Capitalism has lifted more people out of poverty than any other system in history.
What we have now is not capitalism; it's corporatism. It's corporate power wedded to government power, which is fascism.
Capitalism is a guy starting a business out of his garage, and gradually expanding it, hiring employees, and leasing commercial space. Entrepreneurs are doing a beautiful thing. Stop trying to demonize it.
You overestimate the number of people who actually chose to come here willingly. It is true that there were some selfish people who abandoned their communities back home and came here willingly. However, the vast majority of people were stolen from their homes, pushed here by persecution (only to find more persecution here) or were dragged here by patriarchal decisions. Most migrants do not willingly leave their homes. You believe in a fairy tale that hides the real nature of the society in which you live.
Capitalism has also created more poverty than any other system ever. Not only that, but it has led to the destruction of civilization by the profligate use of natural resources.
Capitalism is, by definition, the creation of private governments by public governments in favor of the lazy. Public governments invent the right of some people to own properties and make certain types of laws about how other people may act on those properties. For example, the US government cannot make laws that deprive people of the right of free speech. Private property, however, is withdrawn (privatus in Latin means free from or deprived of) from the prohibitions of public government in this respect. The legal fiction here is that rights are reified and may thus be willingly bargained away -- a concept one can trace to the Romans. So, the owner of a private property may deprive someone (an employee) of free speech via a contract enforced by the public government's goons. Private property was initially created by actions of the state -- in western Europe, the Roman empire stole land from indigenous inhabitants and then kept it as the Roman fisc or gave it to private citizens. The Roman fisc then became the royal fisc. In the US, the British government and the US government stole land and gave it to private citizens, keeping some as public land. The key right that the public government gives to private property owners is the right to make laws to steal wealth from those who have created it. Although capitalists often invent complex terminology and esoteric schemes to pretend that they do work, there is no requirement for an owner to do any work to take the portion of the wealth created known as profits. Owners can sit on fat asses all day and the police will still take wealth from employees if the employees resist. There is no difference between corporatism and capitalism except that a corporation is an undying fiction organized as a plutocracy, while a privately held business is an aristocracy perpetuated by blood inheritance.
… typing on his iPhone …
This is the piece from Matt, I've been waiting for
I know!
(Tell us how ya really feel, Matt!)
He's especially great when he's righteously indignant
We're at the point where we need the global market reset. It's time to even the playing field and bring manufacturing back home. Short term pain will be real, but it'll be worth it. I do worry about applying tarrifs only to China - manufacturing will simply move to the next authoritarian country with lax labor laws.
The industry I am currently working in shifted much of it's manufacturing to Vietnam, Malaysia and India, but there is also more US product than before- and that is the result of Covid. The foreign localities have their faults but they are not as squarely based in forced labor as the Chinese. We are already moving out of China and have been for about 4 years now, this is the temper tantrum and of no real consequence.
That may be true, but hopefully we'll be able to exert more influence than we ever could over China?