I can’t afford this Trump economy

Joe Bagadonuts said:

Hi Red,
I dropped by Jazzfanz today for the first time in years because I found myself wondering if all of the crazy political happenings and debate had changed anyones mind about anything. I had no intention of logging on, and definitely didn't anticipate replying to anything, but then I came across this post from you that mentions me. After reading the next few pages of this conversation I decided to come back to your post and reply.

First of all, I want to say that I hope all is well with you. You always struck me as a good guy. I remember when you first showed up on the site because you were a fan of some guy that the Jazz had acquired who I believe went to college in your hometown (or something like that). It's amazing that you stuck around here so much longer than that player (and so much longer than me). BTW, my life has changed dramatically since the days that I used to hang around here. These days I'm far too busy counting my blessings to spend much time on social media.

Second, I don't buy your claim that there are actual differences between liberal and conservative brains. As evidence I would point to people who were formerly categorized on one side of the aisle, and who are now firmly on the other side of the aisle? Did the composition of their brain change, or did they acquire more information or have some dramatic life experience that changed their mind. I think the latter in nearly every circumstance. I believe that the mistake we are all making is to think that any of us have anything approaching a complete grasp of the facts. This world is way too complex and it is moving far too quickly for any of us to ever have a strong grasp of what's is going on. I've found that the more certain someone is about something, the less that they probably know about it. Just as an example, the scientists who I admire most don't ever speak in absolutes, because they have learned from experience that everything we think that we know is just one experiment away from being proven incorrect. (Note: Anthony Fauci is a purported scientist who appears to understand next to nothing about the scientific method.)

And third (most relevant to the reason that I visited JazzFanz today in the first place), it is fascinating to me to discover that, at least on this site, all of the discussion and convincing that has gone on over all of these years has mostly had the result of solidifying the position of the poster who was trying to do the convincing. There are several names here that I do not know, and I can't be certain whether those are new participants or old participants with different names. Among the ones that I do know, they are all still advancing the same sorts of arguments that they were eight years ago, when I was active on this site. That is amazing! I'm guessing it has something to do with the anonymous nature of this forum. It sort of gives people a free pass to ignore facts that don't go their way, and then just plow forward with the exact same sort of future predictions as if they learned nothing from comparing their predictions to the actual outcomes as the future transformed itself into the past. Of course, I have only looked at the first few pages of this one thread, so maybe I'm off on my assessment.

One final thought: I'm not sure why I'm including this but I feel compelled to (and as I think about it, this dovetails into my earlier contention that liberal and conservative brains are not structurally different). A few winters ago I was backcountry skiing (one of my favorite pastimes). On a long hike up the hill I got into a fascinating political discussion with another skier. He seemed well informed. As we reached the summit he said, "I think you'd probably be interested in a book two of my brothers wrote. It's called The Myth of Left and Right. They just published it last week." I was stunned by the comment, because how could he hold a nugget like that until the very end of our conversation. After all, what were the chances that such a book had been published by his brothers only moments before I met and got into this discussion with him? I bought the book later that day. It was only in hardback, extremely expensive (so much so that I almost decided not to pull the trigger), and (I can now say) worth every penny that I spent on it and more. It lays out what I found to be an incredibly compelling case that left and right really are a myth. It shows what these positions really are, why this is a big problem, and it suggests what can be done about it. I would highly recommend the book to anyone who is truly interested in advancing political discussion. It's now available through Kindle at a much less expensive price. Those who are only interested in trying to shove their opinions down their enemies throats (yeah, I'm looking at you, Thriller), are going to hate it, so I would not recommend it to a guy like him. But many of the rest of you could probably get a lot out of it.
Cheers,
Joe Bagadonuts

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Joe Bagadonuts said:

And third (most relevant to the reason that I visited JazzFanz today in the first place), it is fascinating to me to discover that, at least on this site, all of the discussion and convincing that has gone on over all of these years has mostly had the result of solidifying the position of the poster who was trying to do the convincing. There are several names here that I do not know, and I can't be certain whether those are new participants or old participants with different names. Among the ones that I do know, they are all still advancing the same sorts of arguments that they were eight years ago, when I was active on this site. That is amazing! I'm guessing it has something to do with the anonymous nature of this forum. It sort of gives people a free pass to ignore facts that don't go their way, and then just plow forward with the exact same sort of future predictions as if they learned nothing from comparing their predictions to the actual outcomes as the future transformed itself into the past. Of course, I have only looked at the first few pages of this one thread, so maybe I'm off on my assessment.

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Joe Bagadonuts said:

I did not choose that timeframe. It chose me. But the reality is that your core statement is incorrect. There are many prominent people who hated Trump 8 years ago, who like him now. Among those are RFK Jr, Joe Rogan, Elon Musk (until recently, but if you have read either of Elon's bios I doubt you are surprised by this behavior), and numerous others. Moving in the opposite direction are people like Mike Pence, Candace Owens and Bill Barr.

All that aside, my point is not really built around Trump. I understand that some people are convinced that he is one of the worst humans in the history of humanity. The evidence, from my perspective, does not bear that out. That said, he has many weaknesses (he behaves like a 7th grade bully, he speaks and thinks in simplistic terms, he is a womanizer, etc.). To me it's a waste of breath trying to convince anyone to change their mind on the topic of Trump. Everyone is entrenched and polarized, and people on both sides make themselves willingly blind to evidence that points to anything other than the conclusion that they have previously committed themselves to.

I'm far more interested in the broad political agenda. Earlier this year I spent quite a while in Argentina. In fact, I was there when the last US election occurred. Trump only mattered to them, as far as I ever experienced, as a symbol for the same sort of anti-globalist movement that was occurring in their country under Milei. It was really amazing to experience the level of positive energy his government was generating in Argentina during my time there. This resonates with me because I am anti-globalist. I believe that the globalist agenda is driven by an elitist belief that the rules they are committed to imposing on the vast majority of the citizens of the world, should not apply to them. I could give many examples, but here is a very straightforward one. They purport climate change to be the greatest existential threat in the history of humanity. They constantly claim that we are on the brink of this disaster, and that we are on the verge of destroying earth because of our irresponsible use of fossil fuels. They prescribe all sorts of cumbersome measures that they believe that the public at large must take in order to avoid this calamity (don't allow your car to idle, replace beef with mealworms to prevent cow farts, and on and on) while completely ignoring the one individual carbon use choice that dwarfs all others, and this is obviously because that one thing would have a big impact on many of the leaders of the globalism movement, and very little impact upon most of the people they are pushing it on. What is this thing? Private jet travel. A private jet emits more CO2 in 4 hours than the average citizen of a western country emits in a year.

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fishonjazz said:

Israel attacked Iran.
Which means trump is a warmonger.
This is the maga logic used when Russia attacked Ukraine. If some random country attacks another country then it's the sitting US president fault.

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Red said:

The new Trump smart phone, the “all American” phone, is made in China.

Trump Mobile's made-in-US iPhone 17 competitor is really made in China

The Trump Organization has launched Trump Mobile and plans to release the T1, a smartphone that it says is "made in USA" at the same time that the iPhone 17 will launch. The problem is, the phone was made in China.

appleinsider.com

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Sardines said:

Ah yes, anti-globalism.

Can you make a distinction between anti-globalism and anti-semitism? As far as I can tell they are the same thing under different names. Couple that with a description you wrote for a book that to me sounded like it was thinly veiled references to "it's the Jews fault."

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Joe Bagadonuts said:

It's interesting that many of the people who toss the anti-semitism bomb out based upon the flimsiest of evidence are the same people accusing Israel of genocide based upon the challenge of defending themselves from terrorists who cheer for the elimination of Jews while cowering behind human shields (actual anti-semites). I don't know enough about you to know whether you fall in the second group, but you clearly fall into the first. It has become so commonplace to accuse your rivals of anti-semitism, Naziism, facism, narcisism, etc., etc., etc., that most people now recognize these empty accusations for what they are.

I don't like the idea of anybody trying to manipulate the world by pushing lies. The race, religion, upbringing, etc. of the members of such a group are largely irrelevant. Klaus Schwab has been a major leader of the globalist movement. I'm opposed to many of his policies and goals. It has nothing to do with whether he is Jewish (which I'm pretty sure he is not) or anything else along those lines.

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Joe Bagadonuts said:

It's interesting that many of the people who toss the anti-semitism bomb out based upon the flimsiest of evidence are the same people accusing Israel of genocide based upon the challenge of defending themselves from terrorists who cheer for the elimination of Jews while cowering behind human shields (actual anti-semites). I don't know enough about you to know whether you fall in the second group, but you clearly fall into the first. It has become so commonplace to accuse your rivals of anti-semitism, Naziism, facism, narcisism, etc., etc., etc., that most people now recognize these empty accusations for what they are.

I don't like the idea of anybody trying to manipulate the world by pushing lies. The race, religion, upbringing, etc. of the members of such a group are largely irrelevant. Klaus Schwab has been a major leader of the globalist movement. I'm opposed to many of his policies and goals. It has nothing to do with whether he is Jewish (which I'm pretty sure he is not) or anything else along those lines.

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Sardines said:

I appreciate that you don't have time or interest in going back through all my posts on the issue.

My position early in the Israel Hamas war, before Israel had struck back, was that Israel was going to overreact and in the process lose support in a situation where they were clearly the victim.

I frequently point out that Hamas and a few other Muslim extremist groups intentionally attack civilian targets, intentionally hide behind their own civilians, and cry the hardest when their civilians are killed. It is a core part of their strategy. It is up to a power like Israel to at least attempt to thread that needle because as we see, Israel is much more powerful than Hamas militarily. When they just go ahead and blast their way through civilians they lose the moral high ground.

I think the situation with Israel is interesting because I think there are many people who are strong supporters of Israel because they see Israel as the place where Jews belong. It's like a self-created Jewish reservation. Plus most of the same people like the fact that Israel is right there in the Middle East annoying and antagonizing a bunch of Muslims, which they tend to like less than, well, pretty much anyone else.

So that's where I'm at on that stuff. I'm not against Israel defending their self, but I think they have been indiscriminate and unconcerned with both directly killing civilians and the humanitarian crisis they have caused by blocking access to food relief. I'm not ready to call it a genocide, but I am ready to say its not good.

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Rubashov said:

About 15 years ago I was backpacking across South America and every so often we would come into contact with young Israelis'. Now when we arrived we noticed heaps of stand alone accommodation for Israelis' or floors of hostels that were Israeli only. Finding this to be a bit odd I asked about it, and was told, "Oh its what they do after they leave the Army, a lot of Israelis' either do to south America or Asia and have like a gap year." I was like, "oh, ok but why the separate accommodation?", the reply was "It just works better that way."

During that holiday, I had probably about 10 interactions with people I assumed were Israeli, all ranged from negative to repellant. And honestly with no reason, I put it down to a couple of things, one being the experience and indoctrination that comes from being in the army and other, that they probably thought i was a Muslim. I had a shaved head and a long bread at the time. But the takeaway for me was that i had never met a group of people more universally vile.

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str8line said:

Persecution does weird things to people.

I understand what their aim is but honestly Israel are not much better than the Nazis for what they are doing to the women and children of Gaza.

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str8line said:

Persecution does weird things to people.

I understand what their aim is but honestly Israel are not much better than the Nazis for what they are doing to the women and children of Gaza.

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The Thriller said:

How are home prices? Cheap now?

What about groceries?

Has Donald revealed his health care reform or is it still two weeks ago?

How about the price of eggs?

Trump and the GOP claim to be the party of the working class slob but look at how they go after someone trying to make things more affordable for the working class slob

View attachment 18945

****ing newborns. Entitled bitches. They think being pro life means we actually care about helping them? Bastards.

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