Writes Seth J. Frantzman.
ADDED: If you are horrified by what you see Trump doing, is it because when Obama did things like that you just didn't see? Or did everything look different because it was Obama doing them?
AND: I am fascinated by the NYT's presentation of "1984" as the book to read to understand Trump: "George Orwell’s ‘1984’ Is Suddenly a Best-Seller," "Why ‘1984’ Is a 2017 Must-Read"
It seems to me that Obama was more of a Big Brother figure. You saw his smiling face. You loved him. You trusted him. Not all of you. But that was the overwhelming spirit of the time, reinforced by the press that served him. That face!
... the face of Big Brother, black-haired, black-moustachio’d, full of power and mysterious calm, and so vast that it almost filled up the screen. Nobody heard what Big Brother was saying. It was merely a few words of encouragement, the sort of words that are uttered in the din of battle, not distinguishable individually but restoring confidence by the fact of being spoken... But the face of Big Brother seemed to persist for several seconds on the screen, as though the impact that it had made on everyone’s eyeballs was too vivid to wear off immediately. The little sandy-haired woman had flung herself forward over the back of the chair in front of her. With a tremulous murmur that sounded like ‘My Saviour!’ she extended her arms towards the screen. Then she buried her face in her hands. It was apparent that she was uttering a prayer. At this moment the entire group of people broke into a deep, slow, rhythmical chant.... It was a refrain that was often heard in moments of overwhelming emotion. Partly it was a sort of hymn to the wisdom and majesty of Big Brother, but still more it was an act of self-hypnosis, a deliberate drowning of consciousness by means of rhythmic noise.Here's screenshot from my Kindle, sorted by author:
Posts
330 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 330 of 330Yes. Yes. Everyone knows the SPLC is a hate group. Everyone knows. Just like the Anti-Defamation League, another hate group.
Blacks and Jews, hate groupers.
A pariah to the rest of the world?
A pariah that has to implement travel bans and build walls to prevent people from flooding across our borders.
Some pariah.
Irony, thy name is "rest of the world."
mockturtle:
Your phobia of spiders is easily handled. I suspect either a husband, father, child or jackboot can assist.
;-)
"Senior administration officials told CBS News Saturday that for permanent American residents — those holding green cards — from the listed countries, their readmittance to the U.S. will be done on a “case by case exemption process.”"
That just might have something to do with the fact that "thousands of green cars have disappeared" during the Obama administration.
ARM,
Sigh.
The "left" is Orwellian because, among other things, it hasnt got a fixed principle of any sort. Women can go hang, as it suits, and no precedent applies, nor any logic, nor any fact.
Its all contingent.
THAT is one of those things that makes it Orwellian. Its all about power, the boot on the human face forever being the only principle, if such it is.
Read, read, read. Dont argue with me until you have it all down.
exiledonmainstreet said...
neglected to mention Loughner also murdered a very conservative judge in the same attack.
From Loughner's own writings he clearly targeted Gifford's for assassination. Are you so deluded that you are going to ignore the assailant's own writings?
Chuck,
I have asked you not to speak of write of PURPLE ELEPHANTS. And on this very thread you mention PURPLE ELEPHANTS.
Unthink the PURPLE ELEPHANTS, now, Chuck!!
"Everyone knows the SPLC is a hate group."
Obviously everyone does, since you are clueless enough to think they're a reliable source of information.
buwaya,
You are on fire today. Carry on. Get some.
All this bedwetting over the green card holders seems misplaced.
Read this, by William Quick:
http://dailypundit.com/2017/01/28/the-fakenews-about-trumps-eo-banning-the-return-of-green-card-holders-of-course-its-bullshit/
"Green card holders already overseas seeking to return to their homes in the US will be processed through a waiver authority that has already been established.
One official said there is a case-by-case admissions process and another said it is being done “expeditiously.”
People from the seven countries who have green cards — a government document granting permanent residence in the US — should not leave the country because they may not be allowed back in the US, one source familiar with the matter said."
"So…despite Rick Moron’s hysterical shrieking – and the unfortunate fact that Glenn Reynolds took it at face value – this is not a ban on green card holders returning home from the seven countries affected by President Trump’s EO. And the machinery to allow them to return “expeditiously” is already in place.
As for the advisory to the effect that green card holders from those countries currently in the US should not leave because they “may” not be allowed back in while the EO is in effect, well, it makes sense to me. If a green card holder from, say, Syria, leaves the US and goes to Syria, I want to make damned sure his objective was not to receive terrorism training in some ISIS camp there before we let him back in."
I meant "everyone does not."
Islamic terrorists do not pose the same obstacle as communist, socialist, fascist, and imperial state actors of past wars past and present conflicts. The refugee crises occurred because in the process of waging social justice, we did not stand with the people placed in harm's way. Where we actively stood with the people in Iraq, we passively observed the people of Libya, Syria, Ukraine, etc. At least until Russia joined their defense and we projected them as a cause.
The SPLC is a cult and a founding member of the massive leftist array of NGOs. And I say this as a foreigner of mixed race, presumably the sort of person the SPLC wants to defend from largely fictional racists.
Thats not whats going on.
"AReasonableMan" :
You are boring and unsophisticated. Do better.
http://www.theverge.com/2017/1/29/14430082/four-federal-courts-ruled-trump-immigration-ban
"In the last 24 hours, four federal courts have ruled on Trump’s immigration ban
Last night, a Federal District court issued an emergency stay on deportations for passengers affected by President Donald Trump’s executive order banning entry to the US from seven majority-Muslim countries. Since that first decision, three other courts have issued their own rulings, putting a halt to deportations for those detained at airports across the country."
buwaya said...
The "left" is Orwellian because, among other things, it hasnt got a fixed principle of any sort.
I would be curious to hear Chuck's view on how the right has stuck steadfastly to its principles over the last year.
"Anthony Romero of the ACLU who got the stay on the ban, disagrees with you Chuck. As I understand it, when Trump carved out an exception for Christian immigrants, he made it about religion. It's unconstitutional."
Nonsense. One of the reasons for seeking ASYLUM is a fear of RELIGIOUS persecution.
And ...please explain why Obama could shut off Iraqi immigration for 6 months, and that was OK with you.
buwaya said...
Read, read, read. Dont argue with me until you have it all down.
This is beyond stupid. Unlike you, I have read the majority of Orwell's writings. You should sit down and think about the era that Orwell wrote in and the conditions of the people that he wrote about before spouting nonsense about your privileged little complaints.
Muslims are also being persecuted and killed in Syria. Immigrants, both Christian and Muslim are seeking asylum from the slaughter going on there.
Everyone knows. Just like the Anti-Defamation League, another hate group.
I wonder if you are that stupid. You have been reliably leftist but you must know the story of the SPLC.
ADL has done some good things. SPLC is a pure fake law site.
ARM, you're not on form today.
Self-control is the hallmark of the superior troll, and what sets him above the hooting Soros-sockpuppet chimps like WilliamHR. You're just flailing around here like a duffer.
C'mon man, you can do better than this.
Show of hands:
Who heard believes buwaya has read more, overall and Orwell specifically, than "AReasonableMan"?
Carry on, "AReasonableMan".
" As I understand it, when Trump carved out an exception for Christian immigrants, he made it about religion. It's unconstitutional."
It is no more unconstitutional than when Obama blocked Christians because they had fled the Muslim dominated refugee camps.
A lot of lefties seem to have forgotten that the "Religious Test" is for PUBLIC OFFICE, not immigration. Maybe you just never knew it.
"You are in a cold civil war and nothing at all matters other than hurting the other side, or preventing harm to your side from the other.
There is no point to argument or reason anymore.
Its a dishonest sort of fight at this point; properly, to make sense of the emotion behind it, it should be conducted in the open with knives and clubs."
Spoken like a true savage, (or maniac).
I will gladly concede that buwaya, Michael K and Althouse are more well-read than am I. Many here know a great deal more than do I on specific subjects.
And I read quite a bit.
Islam is not just a religion. It is an ideology. Much as we used to keep Communists out, we can keep out those whose ideology is antithetical to our laws and culture.
Robert Cook, unable to argue egfectively, calls named and believes he has refuted buwaya's point.
Irony is dead.
AReasonableMan: "Yes. Yes. Everyone knows the SPLC is a hate group. Everyone knows. Just like the Anti-Defamation League, another hate group.
Blacks and Jews, hate groupers"
By not engaging the actual point made and instead constructing a strawman you make explicit the weakness of your earlier position which you know you cannot support.
Unexpectedly!
Or just watching the other side, Cookie.
ARM,
I recommend, as usual, Russel Kirk, "The Conservative Mind".
He tried to find out some sort of cobservative ideology.
There isnt one.
That does not mean there are no right wing principles, simply that there are a horde of them, as the right can best be defined as that heterogenous mass that is not left.
I am obsessed with Spanish history. The most telling bit about the nature of the right is what Franco compelled two of his factions to do: he forced the merger of the Carlists, whom we would these days most neatly describe as Catholic Taliban, with the anticlerical, national-socialist Falange (personal note: back in the 30s my great aunt dated Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera, their founder, who was also a college buddy of Garcia Lorca). They had literally nothing in common other than their enemies.
There is no greater persecuted group in the Middle East than Christians.
Obama and the left did not care one whit as Christians by the hundreds were lined up on beaches and had their heads cut off by the lefts beloved islamist supremacists.
Syria is over 10% Christian.
# of Syrian refugees allowed in to the US? Approx 11,000.
Number of Christians: about 56.
Yes, just 56.
And that's just how the left liked it for the last several years.
The SPLC is an absolute political joke. They are the equivalent of the NYT "fact" checkers.
The ADL is completely different.
Which is why no one is attacking the ADL.
Which is why ARM dragged them in. He needed them to "win". Badly.
Syria is no longer 10% Christian, as I'm sure you know. Egypt is in a similar situation but al-Sisi is more interested in modernity than the Brotherhood that Obama favored.
Hey, with any kind of luck we can import enough muslims to create our own Sharia-driven no-go zones (which remarkably, exist even though ARM denies them).
We might even be lucky enough to have hundreds and thousands of our women sexually assaulted right out in the open in our streets as well!
But wait, that can't be, can it? Those muslims aren't members of mostly white lacrosse-playing fraternity guys at a major university. Let's face it, that's who the "real" monsters are!
"As I understand it, when Trump carved out an exception for Christian immigrants, he made it about religion. It's unconstitutional."
Trump didn't make it about religion, the Muslims persecuting these people did.
"Do you guys actually read Althouse's posts or is this just a forum to vent emotionally?"
Ah, that brings back fond memories of the night Drago reduced you to helpless tears in this very forum. You actually had a nervous breakdown online, which I wouldn't have thought possible. It's a new world, this crazy Internet of ours.
buwaya:
Those on the right are bound together by some things:
1) individualism,
2) self-determination,
3)
We can be Sweden in no time if we really work hard!
http://dailycaller.com/2014/11/02/swedish-police-release-extensive-report-detailing-control-of-55-no-go-zones-by-muslim-criminal-gangs/
As I understand it, when Trump carved out an exception for Christian immigrants, he made it about religion. It's unconstitutional.
No it isn't. Arab Christians are a recognized persecuted minority. Your argument is akin to saying that we shouldn't have admitted Jews in the 1930s because Judaism is a religion. (Yes, I recognize that Franklin Roosevelt in fact did not permit Jewish refugees to enter the United States from Germany; that's a black mark on his reputation, not a plus.)
Again, ARM, you are ascribing political motives to a crazy man. Once again - how frigging thick and stubborn do you have to be to ignore the victim who was actually murdered by Loughner - the conservative judge?
It's like calling the blacks who tortured that mentally disabled kid "leftists." While they are bigots, I don't in fact think that crime had anything to do with Trump or politics. Do you think those thugs spent any time reading The Nation and watching MSNBC and dissecting Trump's political views? No, saying "F Donald Trump" was just another insult to them. They're ignorant sadists who targeted a retarded white kid because he was white and an easy mark.
"Robert Cook, unable to argue egfectively, calls named and believes he has refuted buwaya's point."
I made no endeavor to refute Buwaya's "point." I'm simply stating my appraisal of the type of mind who sees the present reality as he sees it.
I asked before and I'll ask again, who's angry that Obama shafted the Cubans trying to escape the Castro regime? I'm talking to you, lefties.
ARM: "I would be curious to hear Chuck's view on how the right has stuck steadfastly to its principles over the last year."
Oh no Mr Alinsky. We have learned quite a bit over the past decades and we're playing by your rules now.
Tell me, how do you like it? I hope you like it a lot, because we are just getting started and you have only yourselves to thank for it.
After laughing at the conservatives/republicans and mocking their principles in every public venue for 50 years and calling everyone of them a Nazi (look at what you did dragging that lunatic Loughner into this conversation) you are now surprised (SURPRISED?!) that the right has wised up to your game and decided to give you a taste?
LOL
When you balkanize an electorate and practice Extreme Identity Politics, this is what you get. Well, welcome to the new reality that you created.
And if the left ever decides to go the "Full Balkanization" route, I guarantee you won't like what results from that.
@Michael K
Research Equal Protection and Due Process. You come across as ignorant.
Robert Cook: "I made no endeavor to refute Buwaya's "point."
LOL
A smart move on your part.
For once.
Everyone knows the SPLC is a leftwing front group and a scam.
people like arm who claim SPLC is legit - are idiots.
WilliamHR: "@Michael K Research Equal Protection and Due Process. You come across as ignorant"
LOL
Peggy Noonan said it best: We are being patronized by our inferiors.
Ugh, another boring off topic discussion on what could be a very interesting thread. Yawn. Why does it always seem to degenerate into a "let's attack the lefties" and Althouse's good writingand blogpost subject is simply forgotten in the feeding frenzy?
AprilApple: "Everyone knows the SPLC is a leftwing front group and a scam. people like arm who claim SPLC is legit - are idiots."
ARM knows they are not legit. It's just a weapon that was effective back in the day of liberal/leftist media communications hegemony.
The left is not exactly capable of much adaptation. As has been noted they have 1 play in the playbook and they are going to run with it.
So far today we have ARM smearing conservatives/republicans with BS about Loughner and the ADL.
This MUST be because ARM senses he is on "solid" substantive grounds.....not.
General sentiment: "Oh if only Trump would have done this competently and deprived the left of talking points!"
Wake me when the left is faced with a set of facts that leaves it bereft of talking points. The media must have talking points or the 24-hour news cycle screeches to a halt. Democrats need talking points to keep their people from independently considering what's going on. The only question is what points they're going to push.
Eleanor nailed it: "As far as the green card thing goes, Trump always overshoots what he wants. It's part of being a good negotiator. Everyone gets all upset about folks with green cards not being admitted. Trump backs down on that, the non-green card holders get put on a plane and sent back to where they came from, and the left pats itself on the back for "beating Trump". He laughs because he never intended to deny them re-entry in the first place."
The "incompetent" White House is now writing the talking points for the left to consume. Like free donuts in the lunchroom, they can't help themselves.
WilliamHR: "Ugh, another boring off topic discussion on what could be a very interesting thread. Yawn. Why does it always seem to degenerate into a "let's attack the lefties" and Althouse's good writingand blogpost subject is simply forgotten in the feeding frenzy?"
"Loughner" and anti-ADL lefty says what?
I don't quite see the grounds that Federal Judges are using against this Presidential order. It seems that the President has this power:
8 U.S. Code § 1182 - Inadmissible aliens
"(f) Suspension of entry or imposition of restrictions by President
Whenever the President finds that the entry of any aliens or of any class of aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, he may by proclamation, and for such period as he shall deem necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants, or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate."
Two WilliamHR's in one!
Earlier WilliamHR: "Bannon said he was a Leninist. Does that sit well with you folks?"
Later WilliamHR: "Ugh, another boring off topic discussion on what could be a very interesting thread. Yawn. Why does it always seem to degenerate into a "let's attack the lefties" and Althouse's good writingand blogpost subject is simply forgotten in the feeding frenzy?"
Gee, I don't know.
Whatever could be causing these off-topic threads.
It's inexplicable, it really is.
"And if the left ever decides to go the "Full Balkanization" route, I guarantee you won't like what results from that."
Their strategy appears to be fouling their own nests - tearing up blue cities when they don't get their way. Setting fire to a limo owned by a Muslim immigrant, for instance.
Wouldn't it make more sense for them to go to the red counties and try to punish the people who actually voted for Trump? Like, say, setting fire to pickup trucks in rural Texas, or smashing up a corner bar in a blue collar Michigan neighborhood. Gee, I wonder why they don't try that?
WilliamHR: "Ugh, another boring off topic discussion on what could be a very interesting thread."
Translation: We're not winning this one. Retreat!
Birkel:
buwaya:
Those on the right are bound together by some things:
1) individualism,
2) self-determination,
3)
Mmm, no, not really. One needs to stop thinking that the post-WWII American "right" (the right-liberal official "conservative" opposition) is "the right". That's not true, even for American conservatism. Which I believe is part of buwaya's point, and why he recommends reading, e.g., Kirk.
Poor WilliamHR. He was so sure he finally had the smoking gun to shoot down those Nazi's in the Trump admin.
But then the smoke cleared and real facts emerged about the basis for this EO, where the 7 countries identified came from, etc.
And things went down hill fast.
Not to worry though. There will almost certainly be some selective riots here and there. Can't let those laundromats, liquor stores, fast food joints and small retail shops get too comfortable.
Birkel,
Unfortunately I disagree, I don't think so.
The "right" is far more diverse than that.
"Individualism" is not universal, or the definitions thereof are fundamentally incompatible.
"Self determination" is a contingent value. Self determination for me/us, but for that other lot? Maybe not.
You can pull up Kirk's ten principles, and you can maybe shoehorn every conservative strain into SOMETHING there. You could just as well take bits and pieces of the left and do the same.
You could, for instance, take a lot of the overt institutional strains of Islam and cram them into Kirks principles.
P. U.
Who let UnkWilliamHR#11 back in?
buwaya said...
I recommend, as usual, Russel Kirk, "The Conservative Mind".
Buwaya has built an entire personal political philosophy around the fact that a majority of California's don't think as he does.
You know what Orwell would say? "Grow some balls man and move to Texas".
Orwell dealt with real issues, the Depression, World War II and its aftermath. Buwaya is just too fucking lazy to move. That's his only problem, laziness.
I don't like California much either. Guess what, I don't live there.
buwaya:
As a classical liberal who has been shoehorned into the right, I stand by those principles against the Leftist Collectivists.
Drago said...
look at what you did dragging that lunatic Loughner into this conversation
That was AprilApple. Try to keep up.
My parent also dealt with those issues, the just didn't write about them.
So what?
Angel-Dyne:
I am quite well read. Thanks anyway.
Robert Cook:
Tell another one.
oh stop it, moron. Pizza shooter.
Why should he have to move?
You're jumping the shark here.
1. Diversity.
2. That's how Evita lost.
3. If you are actually promoting people choosing membership, as it were, does this mean bakers won't be forced out of business for declining jobs?
ARM,
I very much like California.
Its more annoying and much worse run lately.
But only lately.
And it's not an exemption for Christians, it's an exception for religious minorities. Like Yazidis, or maybe Alawites or Jews, or Zoroastrians, as well as Christians.
If any of the affected countries chosen by Obama had Muslim minorities that were being persecuted by the non-Muslim majority, Muslim's would be covered too.
Curiously no Christian countries are persecuting their Muslim minorities, so no scope. UNEXPECTEDLY!!!
buwaya said...
You are in a cold civil war and nothing at all matters other than hurting the other side, or preventing harm to your side from the other.
There is no point to argument or reason anymore.
Its a dishonest sort of fight at this point; properly, to make sense of the emotion behind it, it should be conducted in the open with knives and clubs.
As Robert pointed out, this is just sad.
Contempt for Louisiana, which had Democrats in charge until very recently? Sweet.
Nobody from Louisiana will see Leftist Collectivist hatred and move away from it.
Carry on.
buwaya said...
I very much like California.
Californian cities have been full of liberal fruit cakes for as long as I can remember. Obviously, you like the environment that they created or you would move. Everything else is you being a Drama Queen.
Uncool, deleting your contempt for Louisiana after I voted it, "AReasonableMan".
Chicken shit.
Cited, not voted
This ought to be good.
Birkel:
buwaya:
As a classical liberal who has been shoehorned into the right, I stand by those principles against the Leftist Collectivists.
That's fine, but I think the point is that "the right" comprises lots of people who aren't classical liberals, and whose foundational views on many things are going to be at odds with the premises of classical liberalism -- and that includes "individualism" and "self-determination".
So if you're going to be "bound together" with them, it will have to be by something other than those things.
Drama Queen? Drama Queen?
I admit, when I arrived in San Francisco and felt the outdoor air conditioning, I went to the top of a hill and yelled at the skies "As God is my witness, I shall not sweat again!"
To be more accurate, the California I saw in 1986 was a conservative land, full of libertarian entrepreneurs rapidly building new industries. San Francisco proper was actually, physically built by generations of Catholic ethnic craftsmen. The later generation, an enclave at the time, now turned hegemons, live on and in the legacy of people they would have hated.
Angel-Dyne:
It is the only dichotomy available. Individualists versus Collectivists is the whole ball game. That some misapply labels is hardly my fault. I am quite clear to call the Leftist Collectivists what they are.
As Robert pointed out, this is just sad.
1/29/17, 12:58 PM
Thing is, it's sad because it's true...truer every day.
San Francisco proper was actually, physically built by generations of Catholic ethnic craftsmen.
I thought they build that city ... they built that city ... on rock 'n roll? :)
No, Roughcoat. According to Obama they didn't build that.
Angel-Dyne is a unit of force to be reckoned with.
"Robert Cook: Tell another one."
As David Byrne sang: "Say something once, why say it again?"
San Francisco was wonderful in the late 60s and early 70s. Wacky and fun, and affordable too (both to live in and visit). This was before the gays and progressives took over and turned it into a stratospherically expensive politically correct Sodom-and-Gomorroh theme park. The movie Bullitt provides a glimpse of the city's atmosphere during that time. I wanted to be just like Frank Bullitt, with short hair and wearing turtlenecks and a gun in a shoulder holster, zooming around town in a 1968 Ford Mustang 390 GT 2+2 Fastback, and coming home at the end of an exciting day chasing bad guys to have sex with a young Jacqueline Bisset.
Not the same joke. I am asking for another one. Another joke.
You have so many good ones.
Tell the one about international law.
Roughcoat:
I hope you get the car, at least.
Birkel:
I'd rather get a young Jacqueline Bisset.
San Francisco together with New York are the only two unarguably world class cities in the US at the moment.
Buwaya lives in one of these two cities and all he sees is decline. He should visit the rest of the country to understand the real problems we have.
This is the basic problem that Trump and Bannon will ultimately face, most of the country is not world competitive. Not going to be easy to fix that.
Roughcoat:
Embrace the healing power of and.
Know that I am rooting for you!
We should all be so lucky.
Birkel:
Thank you, sir, for your encouragement and support. I shall endeavor to persevere.
Psycho Killers.
On January 12, Obama ended the "wet foot/dry foot" policy for Cuban refugees. Where was the outrage?
"San Francisco together with New York are the only two unarguably world class cities in the US at the moment."
Well there you go. We're all flyover country.
You know Arm it sounds like you'd like to make America Great Again.
ARM
The SPLC is,as someone recently wrote, six inches from calling Chik-Fil-A a hate group. You could easily qualify as a hater under their very fluid standards.
At the least they would consider you somewhat unhinged to pick any sort of fight with Buwaya, your intellectual superior.
Your comment regarding NY and San Francisco being the only two world class cities in the U.S. betrays an insularity, a midwestern kind of insularity, that is jaw dropping. Wrong too.
"AReasonableMan": "...most of the country is not world competitive..."
It is a good thing there is movement toward deregulating those artificially imposed barriers to competitiveness.
I did not know "AReasonableMan" was such a Trump fan.
Birkel:
It is the only dichotomy available. Individualists versus Collectivists is the whole ball game. That some misapply labels is hardly my fault. I am quite clear to call the Leftist Collectivists what they are.
Fine, Birkel. All "rightists" are classical liberals or libertarians. If you say so. Everyone who is not a classical liberal or a libertarian is a "leftist collectivist". Whatever. Enjoy wanking in the corner by yourself over the "misapplication" of question-begging labels.
And good luck with trying to understand the huge dislocations and re-alignments going on, in the U.S. and across the globe, in terms of the single dichotomy of "Individualists vs. Collectivists".
Snippy, today, are we?
Well, ARM, to stop the decline, maybe we should force The Rich to move?
Is it healthy all that wealth is concentrated so narrowly?
Michael said...
Your comment regarding NY and San Francisco being the only two world class cities in the U.S. betrays an insularity, a midwestern kind of insularity, that is jaw dropping. Wrong too.
Happy for you to correct me. Give me some names.
Isn't "1984" still required reading in high school?
Seeing Red said...
Is it healthy all that wealth is concentrated so narrowly?
It is hard to say. Without a few concentrated regions of successful export orientated industries and services we would be really screwed when it comes to the trade balance and global competitiveness.
I'd like to see a definition of "world class city" so we can assess the criteria.
Blogger WilliamHR said...
@Michael K
Research Equal Protection and Due Process. You come across as ignorant.
Says the DNC troll. HAHAHAHAHAHA
ARM: "This is the basic problem that Trump and Bannon will ultimately face, most of the country is not world competitive."
Again, define "world competitive" as it relates to geographic areas.
Are you speaking about competitive exportable products/services? If so I hope you are taking into account tariffs/currency manipulations that currently the US allows to put us at a disadvantage.
Are you speaking about geo areas that are "enticing" to immigrant workers (skilled, white collar, etc)?
Are you speaking about the availability of goods/services/lifestyle?
It's probably a combination of all of that but I can say right now that along the above 3 as well as other dimensions you could easily lob in Chicago, Atlanta, Dallas, Los Angeles, San Diego, Miami, amongst others.
"The movie Bullitt provides a glimpse of the city's atmosphere during that time. "
I first began going there in 1956 and it was a really fun city. There are still a few spots that retain the old charm. I was staying in a hotel one time about ten years ago and across the street was the site of Miles Archer's murder in "The Maltese Falcon." The place is still there.
I'm sure the people riding the Google buses to work have no idea who Dashiell Hammett was or ever read the novel.
I think he means homosexuals per square mile.
San Francisco proper is not a center of export industry at all. It's the home to a bunch of corporate HQs, a tourist industry, a bunch of government, and one important soecialized university.
The rest is a whole lot of upscale housing.
The Google and Genentech and other corporate buses are for taking SF residents to the penninsula.
Drago said...
It's probably a combination of all of that but I can say right now that along the above 3 as well as other dimensions you could easily lob in Chicago, Atlanta, Dallas, Los Angeles, San Diego, Miami, amongst others.
Of those LA has the strongest case as the world center of the English speaking entertainment industry. None of the others seem to have a slam dunk argument as a world leader in some export industry, like NY has in financial services and SF/SV has in software.
I am thinking of cities in the same league as Hong-Kong/Shenzhen, which is the greatest electronics manufacturing complex in the world. Cities that clearly dominate the world in some globally competitive industry.
Boston has a case in tertiary education, but also has a lot of close competition.
buwaya puti said...
The Google and Genentech and other corporate buses are for taking SF residents to the peninsula.
I am combining SF and silicon valley. I think this is fair, just as the NY economic area encompasses a relatively large tri-state region and Hong-Kong/Shenzhen is a region. The hedge funds in CT exist because of NYC.
Actually, it isn't hard to say.
Which is why you got Trump.
Of those LA has the strongest case as the world center of the English speaking entertainment industry.
Actually, LA is building a significant coding and app industry in the Santa Monica area. Some may be fleeing the real estate prices in the Bay Area. Of course, they are adding to the exodus of middle class by bidding up rents in west LA.
LA is an interesting city. It has an east side lower class, with many illegals probably a couple million, who are living in warren-like settings in poor neighborhoods.
West side is partly rent controlled (Santa Monica) and the rest incredibly expensive.
San Diego is doing well for reasons I don;t understand. Some is spin-off from the UCSD and Venter's projects.
The entertainment industry is increasingly like the software industry with a few highly paid people in LA and production going all over following subsidies which I hope Trump ends.
Little known fact:
Moving targets are hard to hit.
Back to you, "AReasonableMan".
Guys, concerning San Francisco:
Late 60s - early/mid 70s, beautiful, elegant, stylish, classy, and fun.
And, as I said, affordable. This was before the tech boom. I had a girlfriend who lived in Los Gatos. Friends in Mountain View. Those were middle class towns with affordable housing and rents.
No more. Now I don't like the Bay Area at all. The cost of living alone is an insult and an offense to my sensibilities. I can't stand the culture of the area.
The movie "Who'll Stop the Rain" (based on Robert Stone's "Dog Soldiers") also provides a good look at San Francisco in the early seventies. Lower income people, hippies and teachers and whatnot, living in Victorians in the heart of the city.
Fair enough to take SF Bay as one metro region. I would count everything from Novato to San Jose n-s, SF to Livermore w-e, inclusive.
Using your criteria though there isnt a single "world class" city in Europe, except for, maybe, London.
As for the SF Bay Area, I think you overestimate whats being done here. Its not just SF thats a headquarters city. A great deal of actual work is not in the HQ buildings dotted down the Penninsula. A great deal of business activity here is pure HQ-itis. Much is dispersed, in Asheville NC or North Austin TX or some suburb of Atlanta.
Note also that US export industries that lead the world include aircraft and aircraft engines, which is well dispersed, electric generation equipment (GE HQ for their division is in Atlanta, and plants dispersed), electronics, of which a huge lot is in TX and little is left in "Silicon valley", etc. Consider the case also of world-leading companies like Caterpillar (Peoria, world class?).
And then we get to chemicals, pharma, corn, wheat, soybeans, etc. These are all huge.
The US total exports are not led by software/entertainment royalties and financial services. Those are big, but a fraction of the whole.
It would be interesting to compare TX vs CA for their contribution to US exports. I suspect its going to be close. Someone probably has data somnewhere.
Victorians (painted ladies) in SF these days are for rich people, or those lucky heirs. Its what you bought if you struck it rich with software boom stock options.
Wherever you go across the planet you can find cities trying to be the next silicon valleys or build up their financial services to match NYC. I have never heard of one boasting that it is going to be the next Peoria.
Silicon valley, or the software parts of it, is very easy to outsource, especially since its mature, consolidated, and disruptive tech is rare, and it has been outsourced.
You are seeing mainly the corporate courtiers, not the worker bees or the madman with the next big thing.
As far as finance, this industry is being centralized, commoditized and outsourced. A very easy thing to do. Again you mostly see corporate courtiers.
I am surprised no one pushed the case for Seattle. With Boeing, Microsoft and Amazon it is doing OK. I guess being in a blue state might have counted against it.
buwaya said...
Silicon valley, or the software parts of it, is very easy to outsource
No one is saying that every last line of code is written in SF/SV, that would be naive given how easy it is to move those tasks around. But, the creative heft is still there, for software with Apple and Alphabet and even still for some hardware design. Apple still dominates tech industrial design and Intel leads in microprocessor design.
You seem determined to downplay the blue state successes but without them there is very little industrial activity that is on a genuine upswing in the US. And this is where Trump/Bannon's plan falls apart in my mind. Much of the rest of the country appears to lack the necessary human capital to compete internationally. Don't shoot the messenger, I am just observing the actual behavior of industry titans and politicians. I am on Trump and Bannon's side when it comes to America first, at least when it comes to manufacturing, but I can't actually see it working with the anti-intellectual attitudes prevalent throughout much of the country.
In 1984 terms...
Obama = Big Brother
Soros = O'Brien
Trump = Emanuel Goldstein
Martin said...
In 1984 terms...
Obama = Big Brother
Soros = O'Brien
Trump = Emanuel Goldstein
Oh look, someone still has his original Cliff Notes.
ARM,
An awful lot of US human capital is being grossly misused.
As for Silly Icon valley, no way, creativity is dead.
Industry titans are about keeping upstarts from upsetting their oligarchies. This is a consolidated, mature industry, preserving their near-monpolies until, maybe, someone outside cracks it open again.
Anti-intellectual attitudes?
Let me take you through some California high schools.
Nobody, but nobody in the US is as anti-intellectual as California. The bits that arent are very small and very exclusive.
buwaya said...
Nobody, but nobody in the US is as anti-intellectual as California.
You really are a Johny One-Note. You seem to know nothing about the rest of the country. Have you lived anywhere else in the US other than CA? There are plenty of shitty schools, shitty parents and shitty students littered all over the country, all of whom seem to believe that the US will maintain its privileged economic position because it is god given right rather than something that can only be maintained across generations by hard intellectual effort.
Hard physical effort as well ARM. Not all business is internet business.
My advice to young people today is ; go ahead and get yor degree, but also learn a trade.
The problem with this is that Americans have collectively become a bunch of snobs and do not value physical work the way they once did. Most people can no longer make things, everything is from a store or done for them. The consequence is that this work is not valued, by most. I still make things, sometimes badly, sometimes OK. My grandfather was a carpenter, one of my sons is a decent woodturner, although now too busy. Not sure how this particular trend gets reversed, if it ever does.
The problem with this is that Americans have collectively become a bunch of snobs and do not value physical work the way they once did. Most people can no longer make things, everything is from a store or done for them. The consequence is that this work is not valued, by most. I still make things, sometimes badly, sometimes OK. My grandfather was a carpenter, one of my sons is a decent woodturner, although now too busy. Not sure how this particular trend gets reversed, if it ever does.
Techno-snobs, like Hollywood celebrities, think themselves irreplaceable as virtual reality has superseded 'real' reality in so many ways. But the people who know how to make real stuff and fix real things are of much higher value and it may become apparent in the not-so-distant future.
ARM
San Francisco is a tourist city with some tech business. The city was once the financial capital of the west but decided that money was too complicated a business and virtually offloaded their banks to Los Angeles which now has all the significant financial outposts, private equity firms etc. L.A. has a better symphony and more diverse art institutions and a better modern music scene. San Francisco has a better opera.
Miami is the capital of much of free South America. Great art, emerging music scene, excellent architecture, splendid night life. Latin.
I could go on, but I think SF should be removed from your great city category and you should revisit some other metro areas in the US
AReasonableMan said...
"The problem with this is that Americans have collectively become a bunch of snobs and do not value physical work the way they once did. Most people can no longer make things, everything is from a store or done for them. The consequence is that this work is not valued, by most. I still make things, sometimes badly, sometimes OK. My grandfather was a carpenter, one of my sons is a decent woodturner, although now too busy. Not sure how this particular trend gets reversed, if it ever does."
I have no answer, but perhaps we should encourage the next generation to embrace a vocation rather than a college degree.
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