Jonathan Marshall
2016-03-09 01:30:27 UTC
Sorry to keep labouring this, but this is an interesting article on Trump - perhaps the first interesting article I've seen by an opponent who has bothered to listen to his endless rambling.
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/mar/07/donald-trump-why-americans-support
some snips
Last week, I decided to watch several hours of Trump speeches for myself. I saw the man ramble and boast and threaten and even seem to gloat when protesters were ejected from the arenas in which he spoke. I was disgusted by these things, as I have been disgusted by Trump for 20 years. But I also noticed something surprising. In each of the speeches I watched, Trump spent a good part of his time talking about an entirely legitimate issue, one that could even be called left-wing.
Yes, Donald Trump talked about trade. In fact, to judge by how much time he spent talking about it, trade may be his single biggest concern – not white supremacy.....
It seems to obsess him: the destructive free-trade deals our leaders have made, the many companies that have moved their production facilities to other lands, the phone calls he will make to those companies’ CEOs in order to threaten them with steep tariffs unless they move back to the US.
Trump embellished this vision with another favorite left-wing idea: under his leadership, the government would “start competitive bidding in the drug industry.” (“We don’t competitively bid!” he marveled – another true fact, a legendary boondoggle brought to you by the George W Bush administration.) Trump extended the critique to the military-industrial complex, describing how the government is forced to buy lousy but expensive airplanes thanks to the power of industry lobbyists.....
I thought of all the arguments over trade that we’ve had in this country since the early 1990s, all the sweet words from our economists about the scientifically proven benevolence of free trade, all the ways in which our newspapers mock people who say that treaties like the North Atlantic Free Trade Agreement allow companies to move jobs to Mexico [when that is what happens]....
[W]hen people [actually] talk to white, working-class Trump supporters, instead of simply imagining what they might say, they find that what most concerns these people is the economy and their place in it.... As far as issues are concerned, “immigration” placed third among the matters such voters care about, far behind their number one concern: “good jobs / the economy.”
************
I'd remark in passing that we had a 'racist party' in Australia - indeed that was all that was ever reported about them, and yes they were furiously hostile to 'outsiders' and non-whites, but they too were massively concerned about the devastation of the economy produced by free-market ideologies - however that part of their project was rarely to never reported - perhaps it could not be allowed to be a common topic of discourse while racism could. I don't know... (I only know about it, because the wife of a friend of mine was a member for a while, and because of one newspaper article).
On another note- here is someone else arguing that Cruz is even worse than Trump...
https://theconversation.com/why-id-vote-for-donald-trump-55817
jon
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http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/mar/07/donald-trump-why-americans-support
some snips
Last week, I decided to watch several hours of Trump speeches for myself. I saw the man ramble and boast and threaten and even seem to gloat when protesters were ejected from the arenas in which he spoke. I was disgusted by these things, as I have been disgusted by Trump for 20 years. But I also noticed something surprising. In each of the speeches I watched, Trump spent a good part of his time talking about an entirely legitimate issue, one that could even be called left-wing.
Yes, Donald Trump talked about trade. In fact, to judge by how much time he spent talking about it, trade may be his single biggest concern – not white supremacy.....
It seems to obsess him: the destructive free-trade deals our leaders have made, the many companies that have moved their production facilities to other lands, the phone calls he will make to those companies’ CEOs in order to threaten them with steep tariffs unless they move back to the US.
Trump embellished this vision with another favorite left-wing idea: under his leadership, the government would “start competitive bidding in the drug industry.” (“We don’t competitively bid!” he marveled – another true fact, a legendary boondoggle brought to you by the George W Bush administration.) Trump extended the critique to the military-industrial complex, describing how the government is forced to buy lousy but expensive airplanes thanks to the power of industry lobbyists.....
I thought of all the arguments over trade that we’ve had in this country since the early 1990s, all the sweet words from our economists about the scientifically proven benevolence of free trade, all the ways in which our newspapers mock people who say that treaties like the North Atlantic Free Trade Agreement allow companies to move jobs to Mexico [when that is what happens]....
[W]hen people [actually] talk to white, working-class Trump supporters, instead of simply imagining what they might say, they find that what most concerns these people is the economy and their place in it.... As far as issues are concerned, “immigration” placed third among the matters such voters care about, far behind their number one concern: “good jobs / the economy.”
************
I'd remark in passing that we had a 'racist party' in Australia - indeed that was all that was ever reported about them, and yes they were furiously hostile to 'outsiders' and non-whites, but they too were massively concerned about the devastation of the economy produced by free-market ideologies - however that part of their project was rarely to never reported - perhaps it could not be allowed to be a common topic of discourse while racism could. I don't know... (I only know about it, because the wife of a friend of mine was a member for a while, and because of one newspaper article).
On another note- here is someone else arguing that Cruz is even worse than Trump...
https://theconversation.com/why-id-vote-for-donald-trump-55817
jon
UTS CRICOS Provider Code: 00099F
DISCLAIMER: This email message and any accompanying attachments may contain confidential information.
If you are not the intended recipient, do not read, use, disseminate, distribute or copy this message or
attachments. If you have received this message in error, please notify the sender immediately and delete
this message. Any views expressed in this message are those of the individual sender, except where the
sender expressly, and with authority, states them to be the views of the University of Technology Sydney.
Before opening any attachments, please check them for viruses and defects.
Think. Green. Do.
Please consider the environment before printing this email.