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After Losing Support, Trump's Business and Manufacturing Councils Are Shutting Down (theverge.com)
Over a dozen anonymous readers share a similar report: Two White House advisory councils that once included tech leaders like Elon Musk and Travis Kalanick have dissolved, after several members resigned over President Donald Trump's weak condemnation of white supremacists. A member of the Strategic and Policy Forum told CNBC that it wanted to make a "more significant impact" by disbanding the entire group: "It makes a central point that it's not going to go forward. It's done." Soon after, Trump took credit for shutting down both that group and a separate Manufacturing Council, "rather than putting pressure on the businesspeople." The councils' members came from a range of industries, including several major Silicon Valley companies. Besides Musk and Kalanick, executives from Intel, IBM, and Dell had joined. It's been controversial from the start -- Musk and Kalanick both left months ago -- but a major exodus started this week, after Trump issued a vague statement blaming "many sides" for violence at a white supremacist rally that left one woman dead. Intel CEO Brian Krzanich resigned on Monday, saying that politics had "sidelined the important mission of rebuilding America's manufacturing base." Axios has more details.
Fewer.
It has nothing to do with the Left. When dozens of CEO's of American companies representing billions of dollars of shareholder value are running away from the supposed "leader of the free world".... well, you have to ask yourself did America seriously fuck up in choosing a President? I think the answer is pretty obvious.
We aren't bashing Trump for being Trump but for being a POTUS that is dividing America in the worst possible way
I'm tired of winning.
Do you really think this is a left vs. right issue?
If you don't want to be called a Nazi, perhaps don't act like a fascist, and don't defend those who do by providing shade for them to hide in.
Half a year in and Trump has fucked up on every single endeavor.
I agree, that userid is not one that has been around 15 years. Mine, yes, that one, no. Guess she could have got an ID after being an AC for years....
Per /. being a platform for conservative nerds that is a good one. I literally had to walk away from /. for about 5 years because it had become so leftist infested that I literally couldn't say a word without being modded straight down. On practically anything I said as a Conservative.
So, while the ratio of conservatives to liberals on /. now seems about 50/50 to me it has absolutely not always been that way.
Caution: Contents under pressure
Give me a break. This is a tech story. The president of the fucking United States has killed two boards, which consisted of several top CEOs, whose companies produces tech products and services that the vast majority of people in the fucking world use. If you think it's a left vs right issue, or a political issue, maybe you're not nerd enough to know the difference. Stop the whining. Open any news outlet's site and you will see a ton of Trump stories there. Look at Slashdot's front page, and in the last five hours, all they have run is a math article, a few Science-related stories, a story about Microsoft Office and another story about Google's services. That's a fucking fair balance.
Fuck them, and full all those that support this Orwellian oppression.
You mean like Trump and Sessions wanting the logs from an anti-Trump website? Or a bunch of African-American protestors who'd like the odds of "death by cop" to come down a few points?
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
Don't blame Slashdot because the President of the United States is a loudmouthed idiot.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Yeah real MURICAN you are. I saw your post advocating on asking Muslims to renounce their faith and then shooting them if they say no. Real fucking anti-statist of you. You're are disgusting human being.
And you didn't quit, I FIRED you!
God that guy is pathetic.
You're seriously trying to sell it as a win?
Trump setup those councils when he took office. Everybody on the council left, and now he's disbanding them.
That's not a win. That's the loser kid sitting in a corner by himself because he smells like cat piss.
Plenty? How many? Provide a number, along with full citation and reference to the polls and/or studies used to derive the data. Go on, you've made a claim, now actually back it up.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Do you realize that if you keep antagonizing moderate on your right by calling them nazi, they might actually become such [and run over leftist cuckholds without shame] ?
Dafuq? "Liberals called me mean names and now that means I have to be an extremist murderer!"
Calm down already, you little snowflake.
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
Exactly right. I don't think Paul Ryan is a Nazi. I don't think Mitch McConnell is a Nazi. I don't think Ted Cruz is a Nazi.
Let's be pretty clear here, the majority of Republicans are not Nazis. But then again, those marching in Charlottesville with their white nationalist and white supremacist flags and sheilds are not your average Republicans. They are, well, yes, that's right, they're Nazis, and their so repugnant and evil that just about goddamned Republican out there is running from them as fast as possible...
With the exception of the Republican President of the United States.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Are you suggesting that voting for the Great Orange Jackass might not have been the smartest choice?
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
There are violent BLM members. No denying it. But BLM itself doesn't stand for violence, nor is that its goal.
White supremacists, on the other hand, do stand for violence, do stand for racism. You can criticize BLM for perhaps showing some tolerance for hooliganism, but groups like Vanguard America are, to the every last one of them, violent extremists who, like their spiritual forebears, use political conservatism and the First Amendment as cover for their evil ideology.
So no, it ain't the same, and I wonder why you are trying so hard to defend the white nationalists, white supremacists and Neo=Nazis, and trying so hard to make BLM and Antifa into some sort left wing version of them? Is it a silly attempt at equanimity, or perhaps do you sympathize with people who hate blacks, Jews, and believe white people are the master race? Go on, explain yourself.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
So you find antifa and BLM disgusting but say nothing of the literal nazis marching chanting heil trump preaching a message of all non whites must die? That doesn't phase you tho.
No you aren't fighting for America. You are fighting for an ideology that is hateful and disgusting. But keep telling yourself that you are right.
Feel free to leave. No one will miss you.
s/dividing/divided .. USA has been divided for years and it's not something that started all of a sudden when Trump took office. America is undergoing the tyranny of SJW's and has been for years. Trump simply exposes it for the hysteria that it is. He's very clumsy in doing so, but at least he isn't walking away from the over-inflated snowflake issues and all that comes from it. He may be a big bad bully but that doesn't make him wrong on all accounts.
Oh, and for the record, I'm not a US citizen, I'm looking at this from the other side of the ocean, wondering WTF got into you people.
The fact that you believe this drivel is astounding.
As another non-US citizen, Trump is a complete dumpster fire in every way.
He isn't exposing things or confronting issues.. he's making issues worse with his horrible understanding and statements about them..
I find that entire argument pretty ridiculous. So, history is getting rewritten because statues are being removed? Do you teach from them?
There's a reason Germany doesn't have Hitler statues, you know, and it is not because they're willing to forget.
1. Hillary won the votes by 2.86 million, remember that always
2. Russia's fake news, blog bombing and comment robots created astroturf in the flyover states for Trump.
3. That's called Campaign Donations In Kind, and when done by a foreign government, as the CIA says, is a felony.
If anyone at Trumpland coordinated with this campaign donation, that is a separate felony AND an act of sedition.
Who brought the guns, the pipes and the shields?
To fight for this country, shoot the bastards who did bring deliberate and premeditated violence.
Anything else is fighting for Putin.
And I bet you really outraged when all those Lithuanians, Estonians and Latvians toppled statues of Lenin! Truly a crime against humanity.
The fact that you can still have statues of the likes of Robert E Lee and Jefferson Davis a century and a half after the Confederacy was beaten into the ground astonishes me. It's one thing to remember one's past, but to actually honor the leaders of the Confederacy with statues and memorials, no thanks, that's not remembering a bitter chapter from the past, that's celebrating it.
It all stems back to the fiction that the former Confederate states were allowed to propagate, that somehow the formation of the Confederacy wasn't about preservation of slavery, that somehow it was some great campaign for liberty. Well, that's bullshit. The Confederacy was entirely about slavery, and it stood and fell on that principle, so fuck Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee and all the other men who sent hundreds of thousands off to stain hundreds of battlefields red for the cause of keeping men in shackles because of their skin color. We shouldn't topple their statues, we should fucking dynamite them.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Many sides are to blame for the dissolution of the Councils. Noone is saying it, so I'll say it, where are Hilary's missing emails? JOBS! What about that infrastructure bill, huh? I prefer John McCains who don't vote against my healthcare bill. THE MOOCH! JOBS!
For some feminists that definition isn't far off. Plenty of them hold a radical viewpoint that is discriminatory, allows for violence, and other socially unacceptable behavior that could be associated with fascism. But indeed anytime you start painting any group with a broad brush it's likely to be inaccurate. Not saying your wrong just pointing out that there's an element of reality there which makes it a poor analogy.
I don't believe in karma, I just call it like I see it.
Do you really think this is a left vs. right issue?
Everything has to be portrayed as a left or right issue to keep people distracted and fighting among themselves instead of working together to solve the actual problems.
Based on the idiotic posts in this thread, that plan is working out really well.
Who's defended them? When both BLM and Antifa have caused actual real physical violence, destruction of property, and general lawlessness, we don't hear much of anything, let alone its prosecution.
Life is not for the lazy.
since the black community is underrepresented in the countries police forces.
Going to have to call bullshit on that, and yes, I did bring a citation.
Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS): Local Police Departments, 2013: Personnel, Policies, and Practices
Click on the PDF link, and go to Page 5, Figure 5. Black officers are right around the 12% mark. Nationwide, blacks are about 13% of the US population. You couldn't ask for a more representative sample.
Different cases. "Business leaders" is a plural noun, integer value is a singular noun.
For better or worse he's going to be President of the United States for the next three years and a couple months. Everyone, those dozens of CEOs of "American" companies included, would do well to remember that.
Antifa is an organization that openly embraces violence. So they are very much like the Nazis.
Trump condemned every side that commits violence. It's hysteria to take umbrage at his failing to specifically call out one particular side of things. From the way people are reacting you'd think he closed his statement with a heil Hitler.
I don't like Trump, as I consider him a serious threat to free speech. Still, he was right on this one. Violence is bad and should be condemned. People guilty of it should be brought to justice regardless of their political affiliations.
Getting it right? By re-framing it through the morals of the day... That is not getting it right. Why not put another statute up next to it to show future generations what we think?
They were a product of their time and to judge them against our morals is wrong. You miss the lessons learned. You miss the motivations. You are ignoring history.
How far does your offense go in destroying history? Robert E. Lee isn't the monster the left make him out to be. He held a position that persisted for hundreds of years. Slavery was an issue for hundreds of years. All of the founders had slaves... Are we to burn the constitution and abandon the ideals because they have because we judge them with today's standard? I have heard many support that because "3/5ths compromise" yet not realize that it was slave owners that wanted slaves to be counted equally!
ISIS destroys antiquity because blasphemy. We do it because offense. I see no difference.
Those statues do not tell us where we are going or where we are. They tell us where we have been. By destroying them and moving them out of sight we forget our past. We lose a part of us that help us become better.
It really makes me sad to see history destroyed and defaced. At least with moving it is still there but out of sight out of mind does not challenge you to understand it.
I believe he is referring to the excellent and well researched Youtube videos:
FEMINISTS BUSTED11!! - by unpcgamer82
Sarkeesian - EXPOSED! - by CARLOFSWINDON772
SJWS REVEALED!!! - by nogirlsallowed81
Also this is covered extensively in the book "SJWs and Feminists? Am I right? Right?" by Milo "Account suspended" Yiannocannohavotwitto. He comments extensively on the subject here.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
This NY Times article, quotes Trump's tweet:
Rather than putting pressure on the businesspeople of the Manufacturing Council & Strategy & Policy Forum, I am ending both. Thank you all! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) Aug. 16, 2017
But I'm more inclined to believe that Trump is disbanding the councils to avoid being embarrassed by the publicity of the people on those councils quitting. On the other hand, they don't seem to be really doing anything productive anyway:
Moreover, the panels have not been seen to be particularly effective. After a few high profile events for the groups early in the Mr. Trump’s presidency, there have been few meetings since, and none more are planned.
“So far they haven’t done much,” Ms. Admati said. “They had a few meetings with a bunch of fanfare, but it was more symbolic than anything else.”
Perhaps their intended purpose was simply to make Trump look good and the councils haven't achieved that. Certainly people quitting them en-mass doesn't help that effort either.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
Actually, the Electoral College is a handcuffed and corrupt body. If the Electoral College functioned the way it was originally intended then every member of it would cast their votes as they saw fit for whichever candidate they thought was better. However, it's members have been handcuffed by a variety of state constitutions that force a state's electors to vote according to their state's majority opinion. Electors don't vote as they see fit as originally intended. The Electoral College is in no way a Representative body when members of a given state cast all their votes one direction over a 51%/49% public vote in their state. If Electoral Votes were actually representative of the popular vote in each state during the last election, then neither candidate would have received 270 votes.
But a state's representation in Congress is often a mix of Democrats and Republicans. A state's representation in the Electoral College is generally single party.
So no, the EC does NOT operate the exact same way Congress does.
All my liberal friends think I'm a conservative, all my conservative friends think I'm a liberal.
You are confusing your own media narrative with reality. You are a classic Usenet troll creating a fiction about their opponent and then proceeding to argue against that rather than facts.
They aren't literal Nazis. You are just calling them that because you think it gives you an excuse to strip them of their rights.
THAT is actual classic Nazi behavior.
The rules apply to everyone equally. That's a very key element of this whole "democracy and equality" thing.
In your sick twisted little world view, those that actually stand up for American values are accused of being Nazis in an attempt to silence them.
It doesn't matter even what a genuine Nazi is saying, that's never worse then people actually employing violence to silence others.
Yes, the guy punching the Nazi is actually worse than the Nazi.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
So petty virtue signalling is better than telling Trump things he needs to hear. You really don't make me feel very good about voting Democrat in the next election. If you are an accurate reflection on the Democrat mindset then it's horribly unhinged and divorced from any sort of pragmatism.
That's an extra bonus above and beyond advocating the labeling people as Nazis so you can act like one yourself.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Trump gets called out by his betters for being a jerk (again!), throws a hissy-fit (again!), decides to take his ball and go home (again!). He's a narcissistic toddler that got into the gun cabinet and I can't wait for him to be gone.
If you believe in your ideas and you win the election in terms of the rules but can clearly see that you've lost in the market place if ideas, you try to make your case. Obama won both popular and electoral votes but set out to be "everybody's president." When you win an election despite losing the popular vote *and* you know your ideas are wrong, you try to push through as much bad policy as you possibly can under the premise that you won't ever win another election. The Republicans aren't governing like winners, they're governing like hillbillies who get to spend a weekend at a mansion.
Yeah, I'm thinking white supremacists are a helluva lot more dangerous than any left-leaning protester/activist groups:
https://www.adl.org/sites/defa...
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Let's not forget about the real problem: leftist nutjob trying to rewrite history by tearing down confederate statue.
Don't Confuse History with Monuments:
There is a crucial difference between leaders like Washington and Jefferson, imperfect men who helped create the United States, Ms. Gordon-Reed said, and Confederate generals like Jackson and Lee, whose main historical significance is that they took up arms against it. The comparison, she added, also “misapprehends the moral problem with the Confederacy.”
“This is not about the personality of an individual and his or her flaws,” she said. “This is about men who organized a system of government to maintain a system of slavery and to destroy the American union.”
As for the idea of erasing history, it’s a possibility most scholars do not take lightly. But James Grossman, the executive director of the American Historical Association, said that Mr. Trump’s comments failed to recognize the difference between history and memory, which is always shifting.
When you alter monuments, “you’re not changing history,” he said. “You’re changing how we remember history.”
Some critics of Confederate monuments have called for them to be moved to museums, rather than destroyed, or even left in place and reinterpreted, to explain the context in which they were created. Mr. Grossman noted that most Confederate monuments were constructed in two periods: the 1890s, as Jim Crow was being established, and in the 1950s, during a period of mass Southern resistance to the civil rights movement.
“We would not want to whitewash our history by pretending that Jim Crow and disenfranchisement or massive resistance to the civil rights movement never happened,” he said. “That is the part of our history that these monuments testify to.”
“The amazing thing is that the president is doing more to endanger historical monuments than most of the protesters,” he said. “The alt-right is producing a world where there is more pressure to remove monuments, rather than less.”
Also, it seems like many of these Confederate statues glorify traitors and treason - not heritage.
It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
You know the far right is on the ropes when they stop trying to defend their position and start pushing conspiracy theories about actors paid to put on a fake Nazi march and fight with the (real) leftists.
Of course, all these actors are so loyal to the cause, none of them have come forward with proof (like a paycheck).
This one is weaker than Pizzagate, on a par with moon landing denial.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
When is the last time that you voted on putting up or taking down any statue?
When the statues were put up it was only "few politicians are making the decisions rather than putting [it] to the vote of the people." Why raise the bar now?
It would be great if the Electoral College Member was selected by the November Congressional district vote as opposed to the winner take all. The two College Members that represent the Senators should be based on the total of the state vote. Each party puts forth a slate from their state conventions and the person seated is based on how the party won the congressional district. The United States is republic, not a democracy and the Electoral College reflects that. If people want the popular vote to select the President pass a Constitutional Amendment.
We aren't bashing Trump for being Trump but for being a POTUS that is dividing America in the worst possible way
Incorrect. He has united the world like on one else ever.
Instead of thousands of little groups, now there are only two. One group hates him, the other loves him. I think you can all guess which group I am in. But I will just sit up here in Canada with my healthcare, and watch the festivities.
First law of people: People are generally stupid.
By re-framing it through the morals of the day
Well yeah, because being against slavery is soo 2017...
They were a product of their time and to judge them against our morals is wrong.
Actually, if you look it up, quite a lot of these monuments got erected decades, even a century after the war. They were certainly a product of their time, just not the one you think.
You miss the lessons learned. You miss the motivations. You are ignoring history.
In order: The South got off easy. They wanted slaves. They lost. None of these monuments make any of that clear, so I fail to see what's being lost.
Robert E. Lee isn't the monster the left make him out to be.
This should be fun. Please explain to me how someone who owned slaves and decided to commit treason in order to be able to continue having slaves is not a monster.
All of the founders had slaves
Yeah, veneration of the founders has always baffled me too.
Are we to burn the constitution and abandon the ideals because they have because we judge them with today's standard?
What a bizarre argument considering the 15th amendment is sitting right there.
yet not realize that it was slave owners that wanted slaves to be counted equally!
ROFLMAO! Yes they did. Can you tell me why, though?
ISIS destroys antiquity because blasphemy. We do it because offense. I see no difference.
Well, one group thinks those statues desecrate their entire worldview. The other group thinks that celebrating treasonous slaveowners is not what modern democracies do. The fact that you can't see the difference says a lot more about you than either of those 2 groups.
By destroying them and moving them out of sight we forget our past.
Nah, I'm pretty sure the thousands of books, movies, history classes and artifacts from the era will manage to take up the slack.
We lose a part of us that help us become better.
Please explain to me how one statue of Nathan Bedford Forrest, let alone several, accomplishes this goal.
At least with moving it is still there but out of sight out of mind does not challenge you to understand it.
And I've yet to meet a leftist that has a problem with this solution.
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
You do realize that Robert E. Lee was against secession, right? He was more loyal to Virginia and at the time people were more loyal to their state than to the federal government. Even Abraham Lincoln asked him to lead the Union Army.
Read a history book.
Other people come to slashdot for other things. Accept it. Don't read and comment on postings that you're ostensibly not interested in.
Which this is...
This is the only article on the disbanding of certain Presidential advisory councils that included a slew of technology leaders. Your wish has been granted twofold.
The holy book of Islam reads more or less like the bible.
It is obvious you never read any of both.
Why spread your hate here? Get a psychological consultant instead.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
Only 2% of the southern population owned slaves. 98% did not. Many opposed slavery outright. In New Orleans there were more free people of color than there were slaves and many of them owned slaves themselves.
For better or worse he's going to be President of the United States for the next three years and a couple months.
Maybe, maybe not. He's rapidly losing the support of Republicans in the House and Senate, and he really, really needs that support. The House has the power to impeach and the Senate has the power to remove him from office after the House impeaches. You know the Democrats would love to do both of those things (even knowing that Mike Pence is ready to step in), so Trump really needs to keep the Republicans on his side.
And then there's Mueller's investigation. Were a smoking gun proving Trump intentionally colluded to throw the election to have been found a few months ago, Trump might have survived it simply because the Senate would have refused to give him the boot. That is no longer true. He's become enough of an embarrassment to the GOP that if Mueller finds something even moderately bad, the Reps will kick him to the curb. And as time goes on, the Republicans are getting more and more fed up with him. A few more months of the current trends and they're going to be right there with the Democrats, looking for a reason to boot him, or worse.
At this point, I give Trump even odds of completing his first term, but that's only if he gets rid of Bannon, and starts accepting advice in the fairly near future. If he doesn't, the odds tilt heavily toward not making it four years.
I don't think he'll actually get the boot, mind you, he'll resign first. He never actually intended to be president and the job is nothing like what he thought it would be, so he might not even wait to be impeached, but instead resign in a fit of rage, blaming the media, Congress, disloyal staff and everyon else for his failure to accomplish anything of note. He may do it in the hopes that it will stop the Mueller investigation, but I strongly doubt that it would. I have no idea if Pence would pardon him if anything criminal came to light. Wouldn't shock me if Trump doesn't have any idea what Pence would do, either.
Bottom line, Trump had better figure out how to act like a president if he wants to be president for another three years and five months. And he'd really better step up his game if he wants another term. Either that or attempt to pull a Nicolas Maduro, but I don't think that would succeed in the US.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
Do you advocate tearing down the Korean War memorial in DC? The Wall for those killed in Vietnam?
I was going to give you shit for more stupid false equivalency, but it's late, so my answer is: Sure, why not?
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
I agree. I find it really disappointing how many people here seem to be looking for ways to excuse Nazis. They go through a lot of trouble to make it seem "fair" and "objective" by drawing false equivalences, and trying to distract from real issues.
Because first, as you point out, BLM is not in itself a violent extremist hate group. Its fundamental message is, "It's not ok for police to kill black people." To all the people saying, "white lives matter," yes, of course that's true. That goes without saying, literally, which is the point. The reason they aren't saying "white lives matter" is that we all know white lives matter without even saying it, but some of us don't seem to realize that black lives matter too, equally as much.
But I digress. The point is, though there may be some violent people associated with BLM, they're not equivalent to Nazis. Any group can have some violent members, but you have to look at the group as a whole, and it's just not fundamentally a violent group.
But aside from all of that, it doesn't matter. Even if BLM were a violent extremist group, it's irrelevant. It doesn't serve to justify Nazi groups, not even a little. We should condemn the Nazis, full stop. No justification or equivocation. Other people's bad acts are for another conversation.
Because when you say, "Sure the Nazis are bad, but BLM is bad too!", it doesn't count as a condemnation of the Nazis. What you're actually doing is taking a combative rhetorical stance, assuming that your opponent is on the side of BLM, and you're taking the side of the Nazis. Sure, you're literally saying that the Nazis are bad, but then you're defending them by comparing them to a group you assume your opponent will want to defend.
You also see this approach where Trump supporters will say, "Maybe Trump has done some unethical and illegal things, but Clinton is a crook!" Even if we were to assume that Clinton was a criminal, that's not a valid argument that we should ignore Trump's misdemeanors (and possibly high crimes).
It's you.
Fun Fact: America doesn't like Nazis.
I'm sorry if that's a shock to you, but there it is.
As to why the story is in tech news, it's specifically referring to the business and manufacturing councils that tech firm CEOs were on.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Can you give us any examples of American Muslims who want to enforce Sharia law on all Americans?
You know, you're a special kind of jackoff, DigiShaman. A loudmouthed, bigoted jackoff. You got nothing bad to say about neo-Nazis who loudly express their desire to put Jews, Muslims and "mud people" in ovens, but you literally make up some shit about how you're going to be forced to follow Sharia Law. You and motherfucking Trump. Disgraziati.
You are welcome on my lawn.
It is fully up to the people of each of these states.
That's right -- and those are the exact people who decided to take the monuments down.
So, what's your point, exactly?
It all stems back to the fiction that the former Confederate states were allowed to propagate, that somehow the formation of the Confederacy wasn't about preservation of slavery, that somehow it was some great campaign for liberty.
That's the cover story.
In reality, all of those statues were put up during the Jim Crow era, and were part of a deliberate effort to make sure that blacks never forgot who the boss was. Other elements of the effort included segregation, regular lynchings, and use of the criminal justice system to recreate the system of black slavery, only at lower cost and with less regard for black lives, because they were now an operational expense not a self-replicating capital investment.
I recommend Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II by Douglas Blackmon, to learn about this incredibly nasty and hypocritical part of American history that has been effectively excised (not accidentally!) from American education.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
They aren't literally members of the old Nazi party but they literally call themselves Nazi's and spout the same slogans. It isn't necessary to accuse them of being Nazi's when they are sporting Swastica tattoos and chanting blood and soil.
So taking them at their word and referring to them as Nazi's seems quite reasonable.
Reasoning with Nazi's, whether they are literally Nazi's or just acting like Nazi's, isn't going to be any more successful today than it was 80 years ago, though I'm sure the Commander-in-Chief could convince himself that he could have made a great deal with them and prevent WWII.
I'm pretty confident that being a Nazi is worse than punching one in the face. Maybe we can ask some of the WW2 vets who were sent to Europe to do more than just punch Nazi's in the nose. But, sure, punching Nazi's in the nose is a crime and I don't recommend it. If you want the moral equivalent of a Nazi I'd go with a serial killer. I'd put them on about the same level of worseness.
Please explain to me how one statue of Nathan Bedford Forrest, let alone several, accomplishes this goal.
Because it's a window to understand history for anyone willing to learn. Because it's a story that a people from a different time wanted to tell future generations. Either as a warning, a lesson, or to just be remembered. Reading the Wikipedia... Why wouldn't you want his story to be told? Seriously... I think his is a story that should be told.
He is one of the few officers in either army to enlist as a private and be promoted to general officer. "The Wizard of the Saddle" to the 1st Grand Wizard of the KKK who ordered the KKK to take off their masks and "“volunteered to help ‘exterminate’ those men responsible for the continued violence against the blacks.”
The most important aspect I think relevant to the conversation about racism: "By the end of his life, Forrest’s racial attitudes would evolve — in 1875, he advocated for the admission of blacks into law school — and he lived to fully renounce his involvement with the Klan that he headed and abolished."
Times change. People change. If a Lieutenant General of the Confederate Army and 1st Grand Wizard of the KKK can change their view on race, any one can. Do you think there is a lesson to be learned? Do you think we can learn from him? Do you think anyone can read his story and reflect on their own life to be a better person? ... I don't understand what you perceive history to be but it's a flawed dirty mess of people just like us.
If you are butt hurt about the Electoral College then you should be equally butt hurt about the Congress. They are both designed the same way for the same reason.
It's interesting you mention that; they are both incorrectly proportional for the same reason, which is specifically to make them unfair in precisely the way that you believe to be justice. See, the purpose of the electoral college was never to ensure that that populous states couldn't walk away with the election; it was literally to take the vote out of the hands of the people so that they couldn't get carried away. At least, that's what Alexander Hamilton intimates in Federalist Paper No.68.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Simply put, CEOs of publicly traded companies have a fiscal responsibility to their companies. They constantly ask the question, "Will this increase or decrease the value of company shares?"As soon as it becomes apparent that it will DECREASE the value of the stock, they get the hell out of there! Note that this is not a complete explanation, since some of the people that resigned were not the CEOs of publicly traded companies. Apparently they also thought it would be bad for them to be associated with the Trump train wreck.
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
I'd be more sympathetic to that argument if gerrymandering wasn't a thing.
politics had "sidelined the important mission of rebuilding America's manufacturing base ...
Nice suckup there Brian.
Actually it wasn't politics, it was just a relatively minor Trumpian faux-pas. It wasn't the worst or dumbest thing he's ever done, or will do. It's is if, after 9/11, George Bush had said that the people working in the World Trade Center had been just as responsible for the attacks as the people on the planes. Or after the San Bernardino massacre, Obama has said "14 Americans got an unpleasant surprise as they came together to celebrate the holidays. The injuries and possibly worse were the result of actions by everyone present". Trump knows where his voter base is and didn't want to upset anyone with harsh, politically incorrect labels like "intolerant" or "hate-monger" or "racist" or "dickless inbred, syphalic-brained diarrhea guzzler".
The Russians have won. They have made the world a cesspool of distrust, greed, fear and hate.
Robert E. Lee fought for the right to own other humans. If that makes a hero to you then you are proclaiming your own views by defending him.
once more into the breach
less than 2% of the population rape children. If the other 98% were willing to die in a prolonged war defending child rape I still wouldn't be cool with them putting up statues to glorify their effort.
once more into the breach
And slavery has been around since the beginning of human history and was debated for centuries by his time. In fact, it's still going on today. I think putting it as "anyone's hero" is disingenuous. He was well respected in his time by both sides and still respected for a variety of reasons (particularly military) but also as a means to remember the Civil War.
It's not about idolizing the figures. It's about remembering. History is uncomfortable.
If you think the US is Communist, then you really have no idea what the fuck Communism is.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
It's not trying to "change the rules" of the election. Nobody is suggesting installing Hillary. The political term is "mandate" and the Republicans clearly didn't get one. That's why they are struggling so much to govern right now. You don't have a mandate with 49% of the vote. Do I really, truly, honestly think that's what the Republicans are all about? Certainly not all of them. There may be no good neo-Nazis, but I have no doubt that there are good Republicans as individuals. However, having watched the Republican primary debates, every single candidate would answer each and every question with an inspiring vision of a great society followed by declaring that they would achieve that outcome by cutting taxes for the rich. I don't believe that cutting taxes for the rich is a panacea and I can't imagine any thinking person actually subscribes to that. So if you are going to stand up and proclaim such a thing, you aren't being intellectually honest. The Democrats consistently put policy before politics and genuinely believe in their policies (even though some of them are a bit unreasonable). The Republicans put politics first because they only policy they care about is corporate welfare. Many of the ideas that the Democrats put forward scare the life out of me, but at least I know that, when elected, they will try to implement policies that they think will make our country better. The Republicans, tax cuts for the rich only. Bad social policy that tries to help people isn't ideal. But it's better than bankrupting the country to put a few extra bucks in billionaires' pockets.
It's not trying to "change the rules" of the election. Nobody is suggesting installing Hillary. The political term is "mandate" and the Republicans clearly didn't get one. That's why they are struggling so much to govern right now. You don't have a mandate with 49% of the vote.
So the whole concept of a mandate (from the people, I'm assuming is what you mean) is fairly pointless when US elections typically get only 60% of eligible voters to even cast a vote. Let's follow your logic through: from your comment I'm assuming you feel that Obama's 2008 win with 53% of the vote counted as a "mandate"? He won with 69.5 million votes. In 2016 Trump got 63 million. To say that one got a mandate from the people when the other didn't seems like there must be a pretty incredibly thin line between what qualifies as a mandate! Guess what? The reality is that *neither* of them received any sort of mandate. The US has about 200 million eligible voters but about 80 million of them don't cast a vote for either a D or an R in any given election. Obama got about 34% of the eligible voters to vote for him. Trump got about 32%. Those are both quite low and both quite close - either they are both mandates or, much more likely, neither are.
There is no firm definition of what would even count as getting a mandate from the people, but if you can only get about 1 out of 3 people to throw their support behind you, that probably doesn't cut it.
(and BTW, I'm just going to skip over the whole notion that the Republicans are struggling to govern and that the source of that struggle is the lack of a mandate - that seems like quite a stretch and you didn't provide any evidence to support it, so... moving on!)
Do I really, truly, honestly think that's what the Republicans are all about? Certainly not all of them. There may be no good neo-Nazis, but I have no doubt that there are good Republicans as individuals. However, having watched the Republican primary debates, every single candidate would answer each and every question with an inspiring vision of a great society followed by declaring that they would achieve that outcome by cutting taxes for the rich.
You're missing the point: just as you like the D convention and were repulsed by the R convention, there are a similar number of people out there who liked the R convention and were repulsed by the D convention. You don't seem to be even open to the idea that the vast majority of the "others" are rational, caring human beings. Both parties have the nutters on the extreme, and unfortunately those types make for entertaining news coverage, but on neither side are they representative of the vast majority of the people in either party.
I don't believe that cutting taxes for the rich is a panacea and I can't imagine any thinking person actually subscribes to that.
This is a straw man argument. Please show me where any candidate came out and said "the solution to our problems is to cut taxes on the rich" (their position, not your wild interpretation of it). And then show me where that candidate came anywhere close to claiming that such a move would be anything close to a "panacea". You have taken their position and used your own bias to distill it down to something absurdly simplistic and not actually representative of their position.
Again, it seems like you've dreamed up a caricature of the other side and are arguing against that. I know, I know, it's far easier to feel good about a position if you can demonize and/or belittle the opposing point of view, but the reality is that both sides' positions on every single issue are far more nuanced than you seem willing to believe. Defense spending, abortion, gay rights, states vs federal powers, entitlements, budgets, healthcare, and on and on - every single one of those involves tradeoffs and less than perfect choices.
At a very high level, pretty much all sides want prosperity, fairness, the good of the country, e