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U-S-A! The American Politics Thread. (Read 500098 times)

seankenny

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#600 Re: Trump
September 08, 2017, 09:00:22 am
This is hands down the best thing I've read on Trump's victory. If you're going to read it, please read it all:

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/10/the-first-white-president-ta-nehisi-coates/537909/?utm_source=atltw

Thanks Andy, that was excellent. How has it gone down amongst the white people you know? I'm assuming that the Atlantic is at least reasonably widely read amongst bookish Americans.

andy popp

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#601 Re: Trump
September 08, 2017, 09:52:37 am
I'm currently in the UK and haven't spoken to anyone who has read it yet (except my wife, who is far hotter on these topics than me). Some, many, will fully acknowledge and accept its argument and the conclusions that follow. But others, including amongst liberals and progressives, will either deny or deflect what Coates has to say. It makes people uncomfortable - but then again, its meant to and should.

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#602 Re: Trump
September 08, 2017, 12:45:46 pm
From the outside (even though I've spent quite a lot of time in US over the years, and have family who lived there) the main tenor in the Atlantic article seems to ring true.

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#603 Trump
September 08, 2017, 05:00:05 pm
I lived in San Hose for a couple of years in my early teens. ~'84. This coincided with the advent of CNN, or at least it was still new then. I was struck by the lack of international news back then. I remember the only 24hr news available was "Bay area", with "State" features on the hour and two "National" slots at midday and ~5pm iirc. International news was confined to a single evening slot, not more than 30mins or so.
The last time I spent significant time there was a year in Savannah 1999/2000 and frankly, it didn't seem much better then. I assume there is greater global awareness now, but I wouldn't put any money on it being very widespread.

So I'd guess the readership or interest in something like this, or even global opinion, would be limited...

andy popp

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#604 Re: Trump
September 08, 2017, 05:09:55 pm
This is hands down the best thing I've read on Trump's victory. If you're going to read it, please read it all:

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/10/the-first-white-president-ta-nehisi-coates/537909/?utm_source=atltw

Thanks Andy, that was excellent. How has it gone down amongst the white people you know? I'm assuming that the Atlantic is at least reasonably widely read amongst bookish Americans.

Thinking about this again, my wife has a cousin, a lawyer in the suburbs of Philadelphia, mid 40s. I've met hime once socially and he seemed a nice chap, swears blind he didn't vote for Trump and would deny he's racist till the cows come home. But he has a massive problem with the Obamas, Michelle especially, that he's let slip more than once. When I challenged him about this he said it was because she'd been an interfering, activist First Lady. When I pointed that almost all First Ladies do this and some much more (Eleanor Roosevelt is the most obvious example) he didn't have an answer. Like many white Americans he consciously or otherwise held the Obamas to a much higher standard. They'd got above themselves basically - its not far from there to the "uppity n****r" stereotype of old. Its this as much as open bigotry of white supremacist that the article is talking about.

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#605 Re: Trump
September 08, 2017, 06:05:42 pm
I grew up in a very sexist society, which has given me a lot of biases — some that I'm aware of and that I've been trying to work on, some that I'm not aware of, I'm sure. I assume that I'm still pretty sexist even though I don't subscribe to any obviously misogynist ideologies. I'd assume it is the same for those who grew up in a racist society: they are still pretty racist even if they are not ideologically so.

(Trump is clearly an open racist)

Oldmanmatt

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#606 Re: Trump
September 08, 2017, 07:06:13 pm



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andy popp

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#607 Re: Trump
September 09, 2017, 08:33:21 am
I assume that I'm still pretty sexist even though I don't subscribe to any obviously misogynist ideologies. I'd assume it is the same for those who grew up in a racist society: they are still pretty racist even if they are not ideologically so.

(Trump is clearly an open racist)

Yes, absolutely, in many cases. But one important differences: you acknowledge your sexism, many white Americans do not acknowledge their racism.

Oldmanmatt

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#608 Re: Trump
September 09, 2017, 07:55:03 pm
This is hands down the best thing I've read on Trump's victory. If you're going to read it, please read it all:

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/10/the-first-white-president-ta-nehisi-coates/537909/?utm_source=atltw

Though I have The Atlantic web site bookmarked and often read articles there, I found this one somewhat TL;DR. From a skim-read, the thesis seems to be that white racism was the primary reason for the Trump presidency, and that economics (especially pertaining to the rustbelt white under-class) was less of a factor than the consensus imagines. Is that approximately correct? If so, it raises the question as to how Obama managed to get elected in the two preceding elections? (Or is that also addressed in the article somewhere?)

Yes and no, on Obama being elected.

Just like everything else that has been said on Trump's election and the state of the States; it's true for a given value of "true".
I mean it raises very logical and quite probably real issues, but dismisses others of equal value. In someways it suffers very much from an inverse of the very tenets it purports to expose.
 
My guess is that it's very much a "bit of both" thing and a great deal more besides.

What was the voter turnout amongst African Americans ? Anyone know? (I'll look too, but someone here probably has the figures to hand already).


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andy popp

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#609 Re: Trump
September 10, 2017, 08:52:16 am
If so, it raises the question as to how Obama managed to get elected in the two preceding elections?

Does it though? To argue that racism helped elect a specific white President is not necessarily to argue no African American could ever be elected. In any case, the article does really address this in its argument that Trump is the first white president. Of course every single President prior to Obama was white, but Trump is the first elected since the fact of a black President and, the article argues, elected largely because he is white, because he is not black.

On the other issue, the intersections of race, class and economics are treated extensively in the article.

OMM asked about turn out amongst African Americans; it was poor, down on the last two elections.

Oldmanmatt

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andy popp

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#611 Re: Trump
September 11, 2017, 05:36:10 pm
If so, it raises the question as to how Obama managed to get elected in the two preceding elections?
In any case, the article does really address this in its argument that Trump is the first white president. Of course every single President prior to Obama was white, but Trump is the first elected since the fact of a black President and, the article argues, elected largely because he is white, because he is not black.

Yes I read that bit. It seems more like a rhetorical device than a robust argument? Trump's opponent was also white.

Repeating the comments above, I am unconvinced there is a single dominant factor explaining Trump's win. Correspondingly I doubt Obama's unpopularity amongst some demographics was wholly explained by his colour. For example, I am sure for many he was insufferably clever and articulate (as Trump so definingly isn't).

Isn't rhetoric argument? Anyway, I'm still not really getting some of the logic. That Trump's opponent was white hardly proves racism proved no role. Elections are about much more than simply the two candidates. All of the crap about the US being a "post-racial" society has been fully exposed for what it is.

I don't think anyone, not me, not the author, is arguing that there is single explanatory factor. But race is a very powerful factor because of the way it intersects with so many, if not all the other factors, from economics and class to culture. As to Obama, anyone put off by his erudition and learning is likely to also view those as especially unforgivable traits when found in a black man.
« Last Edit: September 11, 2017, 05:42:44 pm by andy popp »

seankenny

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#612 Re: Trump
September 12, 2017, 09:58:54 pm
Not necessarily Trump, but this half hour film is well worth a watch - a week in America's heroin epidemic.

http://www.cincinnati.com/story/news/2017/09/09/editor-why-we-did/635589001/

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#613 Re: Trump
September 19, 2017, 03:55:51 pm
We have just entered the Twilight Zone.
I won't bother with a link, there can't be a media channel that's not carrying the story "Fat Orange Baboon casually says it's going to snuff out tens of millions of people, because Fat Funny Haircut Baboon called him names".
And so ends the world.

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#614 Re: Trump
October 25, 2017, 09:24:53 am
Geoff Flake announces retirement. Can't really argue with this observation, well done:

Quote
“The alliances and agreements that ensure the stability of the entire world are routinely threatened by the level of thought that goes into 140 characters,” Flake said. “Would we Republicans meekly accept such behavior on display from dominant Democrats? Of course we wouldn’t. And we would be wrong if we did.”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/oct/24/jeff-flake-retire-republican-senate-trump

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#615 Re: Trump
October 25, 2017, 10:59:10 am
Geoff Flake announces retirement. Can't really argue with this observation, well done:

Quote
“The alliances and agreements that ensure the stability of the entire world are routinely threatened by the level of thought that goes into 140 characters,” Flake said. “Would we Republicans meekly accept such behavior on display from dominant Democrats? Of course we wouldn’t. And we would be wrong if we did.”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/oct/24/jeff-flake-retire-republican-senate-trump

It is good to hear some of his own party publically condemning him. Perhaps it might start making people think/a chain reaction...

Though it is also a shame that people who disagree are leaving also. It would be awful if they ultimately get replaced with people whom Trump approves of...

andy popp

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#616 Re: Trump
October 25, 2017, 11:49:15 am
Geoff Flake announces retirement. Can't really argue with this observation, well done:

Quote
“The alliances and agreements that ensure the stability of the entire world are routinely threatened by the level of thought that goes into 140 characters,” Flake said. “Would we Republicans meekly accept such behavior on display from dominant Democrats? Of course we wouldn’t. And we would be wrong if we did.”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/oct/24/jeff-flake-retire-republican-senate-trump

It is good to hear some of his own party publically condemning him. Perhaps it might start making people think/a chain reaction...

Though it is also a shame that people who disagree are leaving also. It would be awful if they ultimately get replaced with people whom Trump approves of...

Too little, too late.

There's a good chance that in states such as Tennessee (Corker) and Arizona (Flake) the candidates picked through Republican primaries will be far more right wing/crypto-fascist, just as the people of Alabama selected the unhinged and wholly unfit Roy Moore. It is hard to go too far in stressing how far these people want to go in destroying and remaking the fabric of American society. And in some places, such as Alabama, they will get elected.

The only possible positive is that people such as Moore are so undisciplined as to make the work of the Senate even harder and less effective than it already is.

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#617 Re: Trump
October 25, 2017, 06:10:38 pm
Have you kept a journal of your observations while living in the US Andy? I wish I had.

andy popp

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#618 Re: Trump
October 26, 2017, 12:25:13 pm
No, I haven't. Perhaps I should have? It can become bewildering trying to keep up. Each fresh outrage rapidly recedes into the past as it is replaced by some new idiocy. At the same time it feels like Groundhog Day. Something like attempts to repeal ACA feel like ancient history but it also seems like we're stuck on a treadmill.

andy popp

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#619 Re: Trump
October 26, 2017, 12:39:28 pm
By the by, here's the latest article in the series The Guardian have been running from neighbouring Northampton County. Doesn't really add anything new though: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/oct/26/no-regrets-one-year-after-they-voted-for-trump-has-he-delivered

andy popp

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#620 Re: Trump
October 30, 2017, 12:09:33 pm
As widely predicted over the weekend, Robert Mueller's investigation into possible collusion with Russia has just moved into a new phase with erstwhile Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort ordered to surrender to the authorities a few minutes ago. Let's see what's next!

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#621 Re: Trump
October 30, 2017, 01:29:38 pm
12 counts. Serious charges inc. Conspiracy against the US. Serious atuff

andy popp

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#622 Re: Trump
October 30, 2017, 02:06:55 pm
I was just about to post the same FD. Conspiracy against the USA is much more serious than I was expecting. This could get interesting quick. Will Trump resist the temptation to fire Mueller?

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#623 Re: Trump
October 30, 2017, 02:44:57 pm
Conspiracy against the USA is much more serious than I was expecting.

Hit the smaller guy with a really serious charge, plea bargain in return for the dirt on his boss. Don't you guys watch any American TV crime  ;)

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#624 Re: Trump
October 30, 2017, 02:50:54 pm
It would be incredible if he did.  The two of them are in court later today... let's see what happens.  Trump's been on Twitter saying it was all 'years ago' - yeah right!

I learned that Treason is only an offence during wartime and that Conspiracy against the US is effectively treason by another name.  They could easily go away for life so they might both be singing by teatime...  <what Duncan just said>

 

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