It's happening (Part 1)

A change is happening:

A reasoned change in position

A new Trump voter:

Good news coming from Nebraska?

Nebraska is trying to get Donald Trump one more electoral college vote. About time.  This notion of proportional allocation is a miasmic sewer hole of ways to shift votes to Democratic candidates.  You don't see New York or California doing this, why should a solidly Republican state do it?

A change is gonna come

This is anecdotal, but probably telling nonetheless:

Is Ray Dalio right about the changing world order?

If you don't know who he is, Ray Dalio is a billionaire investor and hedge fund manager.  In 2005, his hedge fund became the largest in the world.  He's argued for a tweaking of capitalism since, even though  it's the best system out there, it's not working for most Americans; if unchecked, it can have a tendency to  increase the Wealth Gap.  But where he really has some interesting points to make is about the changing world order.

I've always argued that all things are cyclical; seasons, economic cycles, and empires, among other things.  Ray Dalio makes the same argument here, about the changing world order, using 500 years of data to support his macroscopic thesis.  He looks at the rise of China and decline of America from that perspective.  Thankfully, he like me, believes that the current trend is not an indelible, unchangeable inevitability. 

This reinforces the brilliance of the founding fathers in America.  They foresaw the need to protect Americans from their own government.  Even though the protections they provided have been chipped away and steadily eroded over time, the initial principles were brilliant. They clearly should have been steadfastly maintained rather manipulated over time to suit expedience or the ambitions of individuals or groups.

But the founding fathers focused on governance.  They did not do as much good for economics.  This is where an economic Renaissance, not in GDP but in economic Enlightenment needs to happen, and urgently, before there is no longer any chance for it.  It does not portend a move away from capitalism but a reinvigoration of the greatest economic system devised so far in history.  It requires more thought, and a way to ensure more economic opportunity for all rather than a growing concentration of wealth in the hands of a few; for in that lie the seeds of self-destruction.

Happening Now: Conservative vs Liberal vs Socialist in Ontario

My home province of Ontario (Canada's most populated province) votes today for a new premier (our version of governor).  After 15 years of Liberal party hegemony, fraught with scandal, corruption, inefficiency and some truly bad policy, voters are looking for a change.  Unlike the U.S. we typically have three viable options - the Liberal party (think Bernie Sanders), the New Democrats (think left of Bernie Sanders) and the Conservatives (which vary from people as conservative as Hillary Clinton, all the way over to Ronald Reagan).

Thankfully voters have finally had enough of the Liberals.  The provincial conservative party (sadly named the "Progressive Conservatives") held a strong enough generic lead to form the next government but in a snap leadership race months before the election (due to a sudden, not-so-surprisingly-ill-timed #MeToo-type scandal for their leader) they chose to elect the brother of former Toronto mayor Rob Ford (of crack mayor fame), as their leader.

He has no such scandal associated with him but he is not the most telegenic candidate.  He's been portrayed as Canada's version of president Trump by the media here.  They have attempted to smear him and his party.  Yet he clings to a slim lead in generic balloting.  The Liberals have not made a comeback - and risk garnering so few votes they may no longer qualify as a party if you can believe it. 

But this is going to be a change election.  The only other choice for change is the New Democrats (NDP) - the true socialists.  They have surged with a candidate who ironically speaks yells an awful lot like Hillary Clinton.  See for yourself.

She's also rude and exudes a sense of entitlement:

Just, wow. And apparently just HORRIBLE at basic math:

All that, said I expect our mini-Trump to win a majority government in provincial parliament as his votes are not so concentrated as the NDPs which will solidly over-perform in some areas, just as Hillary Clinton did in California, which did not help her one bit either.   Conservatives deserve to win because they are offering common sense.  They are listening to voters.

I'll report tomorrow on how it turned out.

Put...the...phone...down

Taking a break today on the social media theme, at least personally. Today I'm outsourcing the social media discussion to social media historian Allison Graham in a TedX-related presentation on how social media makes us unsocial.  Following that Paul Miller on his year offline. But is this all just reactionary backlash to societal changes? That's an unfair characterization.

Here's why. Society is changing at a pace faster than ever before, and the rate of change is only going to increase not decrease as years pass. As a result of such a fast paced change, people do not have time to adjust personally. Collectively we do not have the wherewithal to interpret these changes and integrate them into our existing cultural norms at a reasonable place. It's not a technological melting pot we are facing, it's a technological replacement of existing culture. The change has become so quick that framing changes in cultural norms is not possible. Instead the changes frame themselves and society is exposed to a great deal of tangential change that may not always make sense. The generational divide widens as a result and knowledge, morality and perspective to not properly cross the generational divide. The outcome is potentially toxic societal evolution. That's not to say it's guaranteed but certainly the odds of that are higher without a sober reflection on the various implications of the changes we are in the midst of experiencing. Change, unshepherded by our values, is change that is more likely to lead to extremism and isolation as it is to enlightenment. Any crazy idea or innovation can chart its own course unchecked by common sense.

During the knowledge revolution of the era of the printing press, these things did not happen. But the ace was slower. It was centuries between the printing press and Karl Marx or Mein Kampf, neither of which were conducive to a just and prosperous society.

 



It doesn't mean the problem is solved, but at least some people are thinking about it.

The opportunity of change

This election has the potential to be a change election. The #NeverTrump crowd, the Weekly Standard, George Will, John Kasich, the Bush family, and the like have really missed the boat.  Clearly they're more concerned about the status quo than the country.  And by the status quo, I specifically mean their status quo.  They don't want outsiders getting inside the walls - not just Trump but also the electorate.  What they are missing is the opportunity that the change represents.

If the polls are correct, Trump could be on his way to a victory - a possibly huge victory.

By avoiding the opportunity they've guaranteed themselves, should Trump win, a seat on the outside.  The tactics made sense if Hillary remained ahead, even though the strategy was very flawed.  But the tactics are falling apart too - denouncing Trump in the face of a potential Trump landslide. 

Not only do they lose their seats of power on the inside, they're losing their base of followers, readers and supporters.  They've trapped themselves in an ever-shrinking echo chamber.

Meanwhile, America may be on the brink of pulling itself away from the brink of irreversible decay.  The Supreme Court, the military, the economy, and the removal of crony capitalism, bureaucracy, laws that encourage offshoring of jobs and Obamacare are all possible under a Trump presidency.  They might not all be achieved in four years, but they become possible, and theoretically achievable in eight years.  That's the real opportunity of the change.  How anyone who calls themselves a conservative would not be onboard with that is unfathomable.

Trump will not solve everything.  But even achieving a few of these things would be a massive success that could be built upon by future generations.

In addition, populism is not a dirty word.  It's a different way of achieving the Reagan Big Tent approach to conservatism.  If African Americans and legal Hispanics see significant gains under Trumpism, the potential for an electoral paradigm shift is also, huge.

Standing on the outside looking in is going to suck for those currently on the inside of the Republican hierarchy.  Trust the rest of us - we know.

Time for a change

The time for a change has come to America. Like the proverbial frog in a slowly heating pot of water, America is being boiled to death and has become too ignorant, too lazy or both to recognize it and do something about it.  But it grows more urgent with each passing day, as a growing percentage of the populace come to believe that the boiling pot of water, the poison as it were, is the cure.  With 20 trillion in national debt, trillions more in unfunded liabilities, a gutted military, dwindling global influence, an anemic education system, bureaucracy trumping common sense, a choked economy with near-stagnant growth and business looking to move production or themselves entirely elsewhere all just some of the myriad problems facing the country, the time for a change in direction is now.  Every passing day is a day squandered.  

What people believe works for them in the form of government handouts at subsistence levels is the reason that for 50 years poverty, valueless education, the decay of the family, moral decay and other issues have become cyclical. That hand promising to lift you up, is the hand that is actually holding you down.

 What has been tried for decades has not worked, does not work and will not work with more money thrown at it.  The American people are unlike people anywhere in the world but they have been numbed into forgetting it. Within each person in America is tremendous potential that is being squandered in exchange for an Obamaphone - as if that is the solution to the problems in your life.

It's time to change the outcome, not by changing your expectations but by changing your actions.  Do something different.  One election will surely not solve all of these problems.  But when you are walking towards a dead end, another step in that direction only enhances the potential of a dead end outcome.  A step in another direction, ANY other direction, has the potential to reverse the potential for that outcome.  It does not guarantee a better outcome, but it does guarantee a different outcome.  

Let's be clear - not all change is good.  In 2008 Americans were promised change - they got it. The last 7+ years have proven that repeating the changes made in the past have provided the same outcomes - a growing dependent class, a country in a malaise and a people more despondent.  But just because not all change is good, does not mean continuing with a bad change is good.  In fact, stopping a bad idea, is always a good idea.

The time has come for a change.  It is bigger than Donald Trump, who has added a populist face to the notion that America needs to be made great again. It is bigger than Hillary Clinton who0 can provide no positive reason for herself to be president only suggestions that an outsider who has risen to the challenge is not right for the job.  Perhaps.  But clearly Hillary Clinton is the establishment status quo, as evidenced that party elders from both political parties favor her.

If that is not a red flag for you, perhaps you have become color blind because everyone should be seeing that. 

Donald Trump offers a shot at a 4 year experiment in something else - anything else.  It's a roll of the dice at a craps table, but America you are running out of chips and betting the same way decade after decade has not worked. Switch it up and play an entirely new game.  If it doesn't work change it again.  Just do not do more of the same and expect a different result.

Please.

Trump change

The polls might follow, but the important thing is Trump's tone has quite possibly changed.

Next he's got to focus on the winning the debates and I still think a ground game in key states is critical.  There's some creeping down side to a Trump presidency in the fact that he hasn't worked on that, but that's a discussion for another time - post Hillary.

Hope, it turns out, doesn't float

I have not seen this movie.

For Obamacare at least, change has destroyed hope.  The Healthcare.gov website (no link intended) is not going to be ready in time.  The timeline to fix the website is impossible, and it won't be met.  Frankly the chance of it being partially met are dubious as well.  The notion that you can keep your health insurance if you like it, was a myth created to sell the change to Obamacare and it is being shattered.  It has nothing to do really with the website but rather the rules embedded in the law that make the law unworkable.  No one is signing up.  That's not a website issue entirely either.  It's raw skepticism.

 

None of that seems to matter to this administration.  Not even credibility seems to matter anymore.  Remember how lackadaisical the Obama response was to the BP oil spill?  You are seeing that same level of aloof apathy here.  The president has dug a deep hole, jumped in and is now stuck.  And he just doesn't seem to care? Either that, or else he has no clue how to get out.

 

American voters' chickens have come home to roost.  Change with this president was inevitable.  But hope doesn't float.  Not with the trust he was given by voters being stomped into the dirt in a rush to enact all of his wild-eyed ideas about a progressive utopia and America-be-damned attitude.  Hope for those who believed in the pretty packaging Obama came wrapped in, is quickly evaporating.  Hope for those who opposed his leftist agenda is waning too.  Things are not going to get better until they've gotten worse still.

 

 

Not NOT politics as usual

President Obama came into office promising to move beyond politics as usual. He talked about being the first post-partisan president. He talked about the oceans stopping their rising and the earth cooling. Out of those three points he can make a claim of success on two of them. Instead of ‘not politics as usual’, he’s opted for more politics than usual. I guess in a sense that isn’t a lie. More politics than usual is in itself not usual. As for the oceans stopping rising and the earth starting to cool, everyone but Al Gore now sees Global Warming as not completely irrefutable. The earth isn’t perceived as hot as it was the day President Obama took over the white House. While that’s just reality creeping in, and not Obama’s doing, indeed Global Warming isn’t as much a dire future as it once was…perceived. That it was never that bad doesn’t factor into Obama’s claim of course. As to being post-partisan, if by the definition he means hyper-partisan then he’s right, otherwise he has no business backing up that claim.

Climate Change versus Climate of Change

The New Republic has an editorial today about the Democrats being doomed, and yet there's no better time to tackle Cap and Trade (climate change). Really? With health care still not law, and potentially being struck dead (pardon the pun), The New Republic editorialists seem hell bent on putting the pedal to the metal on, well, everything.

To do so would be either turning a deaf ear to the country, or else just having a tin ear. Do the Democrats realize how wildly unpopular their over-reach leftward has become? Or do they just not care, as idealogues bent on passing their Utopian vision.

Townhalls and Tea Parties aside, that represents depths of opinion, not breadth, look at generic congressional ballots that have swung heavily back towards Republicans - from the GOP down 6 points one year ago, to being up 9 points. That's a 15 point swing. Set that aside too - President Obama's approval ratings have plummeted over his first year. That's true in every major polling instance. Consider the GOP wins in NJ, Virginia and near Conservative Party upset in the NY23 congressional district. Look at what's going on in Massachusetts, bordering election of a Republican Senator. So it's not just depth of opinion against the Democrats - it's breadth as well.

The best thing the left can do for the right is to continue to push harder and harder. It will alienate more and more in the middle, and it conveys a real sense of panic too. Pushing a climate change agenda, as bad as it would be for the country, likely would really help push voters further away from Democrats.

The far left, and many Democrats including President Obama and Bill Clinton seem to believe that the country is on their side and wants them to press on with their agenda. The President wouldn't have gone to stump for Coakley otherwise, and Bill Clinton has said as much.

Meanwhile climate change legislation has gone on the back burner. Obama's message of change has been shown to be simply a progressive agenda cloaked (now not so much)in clever rhetoric. The climate has changed - the mood of the country has soured on the progressive cabal, and rightfully so. It's about time.

Hope just won't cut it.

Everyone thankfully, is no longer being exposed to the incessant "Yes We Can", "Hope" and "Change" messages of the Obama campaign machine (including the mainstream media). Besides being grating, there were those of us who knew it just would not materialize the way its devout adherents were envisioning. But there's a problem. Despite the removal of the campaign slogans, the Obama administration is still asking Americans to hope, and to wait for change. Wasn't this administration supposed to be bringing change and creating hope?

This is the crux of the problem. Very little has changed for the better, a lot has changed for the worse, and the level of hope has increased out of necessity, not out of positive results. More people are hoping to get out of the current expanding economic mess, the current international boondoggle, and the current health care zealotry unscathed. They are hopeful, but they are worried. The hope is that the Democrats don't make things so terrible that the country cannot recover. That is not a standard worth being hopeful over.

Meanwhile the administration is asking you to have faith that the policies they have put in play are going to work out well. The President promised that without his stimulus bill being approved immediately, the jobless rate would exceed 8%. Oops. The tune then changed to "it was never supposed to work immediately." Oh, really? That latter message is the one that indicates they want you to hold onto the hope that got them elected.

There's only two ways that can pan out; either the economy rebounds in a couple of years, or it doesn't. If it does, do they really deserve credit for the panic reactions? And if it doesn't, will you still be asked to hold out hope a little longer? The American economy is massive. It's survived a lot of woes. It was inevitable that it would survive the end-of-the-world crisis of last September. It would inevitably find it's way back, and no administration should take credit for an economic recovery, when recessions and growth, boom and bust are a relatively natural part of the economic cycle. The economy would have recovered if left alone. It would have recovered more robustly too.

But, never a team to let a crisis go to waste, the Democrats and the Obama administration pounced oall over the crisis in an effort force a bunch of prosperity-leeching taxes and programs and mandates (for others).

Back in March I had a little fun with the Obama campaign poster;

Take a look at those slogans and tell me you don't hope for a little bit of truth in advertising; no cynical attacks *ha!), no fragmentation (with every bill over 1000 pages, how is that possible?), no gridlock (well okay, right now some gridlock wouldn't be so bad), common sense (still waiting), consensus building (wow...), and transparency (wow again).

Hope however, just won't do it. In order to defeat this Alinsky/dirty-politics machine, more 9/12 marches, more tea parties and more determination than ever is needed.

Hope just won't cut it ladies and gentlemen. Neither will complacency. The alternative to both is worse than socialism - it's socialism under facism. Don't just turn out to vote - turn out to protest at every opportunity. I know it's hard because unlike unions and the unemployed, we have jobs or are busy looking for them. But it's very important that this process be halted in its tracks before any more damage gets done to America. I mentioned earlier that the hope now is that the Democrats don't destroy the country. Clearly, hope just won't cut it for that.

New quote

We must become the change we want to see.

~Mahatma Gandhi

Sweeping change?

NPR is reporting that the budget battle may kick into another gear;

Republicans are continuing their entrenched opposition to President Obama's $3.6
trillion budget proposal, warning that instead of spending, the government should be sacrificing to safeguard the future.

In his weekly address Saturday, Obama said he was ready for a fight. "I know these steps won't sit well with the special interests and lobbyists who are invested in the old way of doing business, and I know they're gearing up for a fight as we speak," he said. "My message to them is this: So am I."

The president directly challenged the "powerful and well-connected interests" that have run Washington for what he says is far too long. "I didn't come here to do the same thing we've been doing or to take small steps forward," he said. "I came to provide the sweeping change that this country demanded when it went to the polls in November."

[emphasis added]

One question: Wasn't the slogan Change We Can Believe In? I don't recall seeing the word "sweeping" in there. Was it implied? Should it have been inferred? Okay, that's really 3 questions but they are variations on a theme.

Another question - how long until you get sick of hearing President Obama say "the special interests"? Does that include the AFL-CIO? Teachers Unions? ACORN? UAW? Okay, that's really 5 questions but again, variations on a theme.

Yet another question - do the lobbyists the President refers to, who are invested in the old ways of doing business include the ones appointed into his administration?

The real meaning of change

Obama throughout the campaign season promised everyone hope and change. Seeing as he's been selecting Clinton retreads for his cabinet, the whole 'new people are needed to solve the old problems' angle is sort of shot. He's clearly not all that concerned about how Washington is run dysfunctionally, or he'd clean house, no?

There must be some other meaning to hope and change. For a while there, it seemed like the Bush tax cuts would be repealed early. At that point I was thinking that Obama would take your taxes in dollars,




and in turn, you would hope to be in one of his special interest groups so he could pass you out some change.

[Sure it looks bigger in the picture, it's shiny and new and impressive, but can you forget that at this point you're out the other $99.75?]

But while that still might happen, and by might I mean "probably will", it's not so imminent. If he's been promising hope and change, there has to be some other meaning to it. At this point for conservatives it can be narrowed down to one possibility - we have to hope that starting in November 2010 and by November 2012 we can begin to change what socialism will be unleashed on the United States of America over the next two years.