Ummmm OK, thank for your personal output. :brow:

But wasn't this thread was about Trump?

Evidence of what? Identity politics?

Remember that today's identity politics is quite new with safe spaces and cancel culture. Identity politics as a term was coined in 1977, intersectionality was coined only in 1989 and terms like woke or sjw were started to be used only in the 2010's. In the 1970's there was the Soviet Union, genuine Marxism-Leninism and a real Cultural Revolution going on at the start of the decade in China. The Civil Rights Movement and the assassination of Martin Luther King had just happened few years ago.

But I'm not sure just what you are asking about.

The media, as Weinstein says, tends to report news that aligns with whatever political narrative an outlet favors, and they tend to not report what doesn't align. I think what he means is that news outlets cater to the interests of their audience, because they're interested in maintaining and growing an audience in order to make money. — praxis

The narrative any media follows is the what the audience wants to hear and what the owner wants to promote. Anything that challenges one or especially both is simply left out. You can observe that many news media that do classic investigative journalism do have the ability to make objective and high standard journalism and reporting, however in today's climate that is rare. So better for Fox News to report on "Joe Biden supporters" rioting in Portland.

Identity politics thrived in academia around the 70', I imagine. It's unclear, however, how academia so readily convinced labor to care more about identity politics than their rights and paychecks. — praxis

Has the academia convinced us of anything in politics?

The change has happened easily, actually. You divide labour to minorities, separate by gender, talk about white priviledge, use intersectionality, talk about how worse women, racial or sexual minorities (or female sexual minority pocs) have it in the workplace. The old calls for "all workers to unite" sounds hollow against the allegations thrown at the "old movement". Dominate the discourse. And what isn't talked about before elections, goes to the background and isn't a priority for the next administration.

Identity politics thrived in academia around the 70', I imagine. It's unclear, however, how academia so readily convinced labor to care more about identity politics than their rights and paychecks. — praxis

I don't think they convinced them to change their ideas as the working class was simply sidelined. The last traditional leftist politician was Bernie Sanders and he had these problems with the woke mob. And let's remind ourselves, it was Clinton who did NAFTA. Also to the disgust of many woke people, many of the classic blue collar workers went and voted for Trump. This is something seen also in Europe too. The "woke" left isn't so interested at the "old proletariat", the white man working at the factory. Thus part of this old guard of the labour movement has been disappointed with leftist parties promoting globalization and have then turned to right wing populist movements. Which of course turns them into the enemy for the woke mob. We also should remember the political activists and the actual ordinary people who vote for a party usually have not so much in common. And this is why I fail to see any "Marxism" in the woke activism as they seem far more interested in race and gender than in class in the way before. More fitting would be call this woke mob simply postmodernists, even if it doesn't sound so good. Postmodernism is very fitting, because there simply isn't a real agenda behind the ideology.

It is probably impossible to find logic and common sense reasoning behind the contemporary ‘culture war’ or ‘cancel culture.’ — Number2018

I agree. The modern social media has created the platform for cancel culture, but it's has just become what it is without anyone having an agenda for it to be this way. Yet it seems it's far easier for democrats to be "progressive" by endorsing the toppling of confederate statues than endorsing raises minimal pay. Guess which endorsement could be a problem with the corporate donors?


Have done that. Both brothers (Eric and Bret) have good podcasts.

What makes it an issue is our glorious leader saying things like the following at campaign rallies — praxis

Trump makes up things? OMG! :gasp:

Such comments are designed to appeal to the conservative moral framework, and pathetically, they actually work. — praxis

Scaremongering isn't limited to one side, it's a way of the country.

Polarization rules!

A very interesting and thoughtful discussion between Eric Weinstein and senator Ted Cruz with a moderator Michael Knowles, which brings up good points. Weinstein, who is basically a society critic at first confuses Knowles and Cruz by going against both political parties and both the American right and left, but later this creates a good conversation.

A good point among others is made by Weinstein (starting at 17:52) that under Clinton the left's traditional voting block, organized labor, was replaced as it made some quite expensive economic demands. And it replace was with identity politics was cheaper, or that you could get people with very little relying on identity politics. I think Weinstein's insight is great to answer why identity politics, rights of minorities (sexual or racial) have become the focus rather than the working class in general. I've now started to think that the whole "culture war" with it's "identity politics" is really a way to divide Americans and have the voters fight each other than to unite in the oppose status quo and face the real problems in the country .

Anyway, it's nice to have such different sides having a fruitful discussion in present day US.

You should ask the person in question.

But if a person says the following:

It basically boils down to my moral framework, which dictates a bunch of conservative stuff that I feel Trump would better facilitate; decreasing immigration, consolidating the nuclear family, restricting late-stage abortion and the like. — MadWorld1

That clearly doesn't mean that in Scandinavia there aren't any restriction on late-stage abortion, just as decreasing immigration doesn't mean that there aren't limitations on immigration to Nordic countries (which actually there are).

Instead of the economy being run by economists — Gitonga

Which actually they don't run.

we should ask entrepreneurs how to run the economy especially those from poor backgrounds because they'd know what needs the most priority in terms of how to succeed financially. — Gitonga

Entrepreneurs are far more in charge of the economy than economists. Although the majority are likely from middle class background with good education (the school dropout billionaires are few).

But instead we take advice from people who've never even started their own business on how to govern the whole country? — Gitonga

You confuse the economy here with government policies. Government economic policy is the small pond where economists cackle to each other. Even the economists in central banks aren't the ones calling the shots behind closed doors. Reality check: the economy isn't run by the government in Western countries. China is the example of basically fascism where the government puts down just where the economy will go, but not the West.

Economists don't run the economy just as sociologists don't run the society.

But back to the subject,

I think the next real issue the Trump administration has is what to do with the unemployment benefits that are ending.

I think over 20 million Americans are recieving unemployment benefits and the 600$ a week has been lucrative as in 2019 the average unemployment benefit was 378$ weekly. GOP wants to go to a model with an unemployment benefit of 70% of the former salary while the Dems argue that this is too complex.

And here we should have again that actual leadership of the President (as in the Corona-virus). Because the future is grim.

Even with the federal boost, many Americans are suffering financially, and its lapse comes days before August rent or mortgage payments are due. Eviction protections included in earlier congressional packages have also lapsed, raising the prospect of homelessness or dislocation for millions.
Losing the weekly $600 benefit would cause an estimated 41% to spend more than half their income on rent, leaving them at greater risk of evictions, according to an analysis released Thursday by Zillow. More than a quarter of adults said they missed these payments last month or who have slight or no confidence that their household can pay next month's rent or mortgage on time, according to a recent Census Bureau survey.

And nearly 11% of adults are in households where there was either sometimes or often not enough to eat in the last seven days, the survey found.

If nothing is done or the response is unsuccessful, maybe later in the fall those protest won't be just about George Floyd.

Quick sidestep from the thread:

But the more urgent question is why doesn’t Scandinavia have any restrictions on late-stage abortion? — praxis

This is false. (Although it should be mentioned that MadWorld 1 didn't say that there were no restrictions).

For some reason this isn't a hot topic in any Nordic country (I could be wrong, but I haven't heard about abortion clinics set on fire or the thing...)

Sweden:
Women can freely opt for abortion before 18th week. After that they have to have permission from the authorities and after 22nd week it isn't allowed.

Finland:
Abortion requires the signature of at least one physician (and in some cases, two), and in some cases additional permission from Valvira (the National Supervisory Authority for Welfare and Health). One doctor's signature is enough in the case of terminations 0-12 weeks when the applicant is under 17 years old or has passed her 40th birthday. Above 20 weeks, a threat to the physical life of the mother is the only valid reason for terminating a pregnancy.

Denmark:
Women can also freely opt for abortion before 12 weeks. An abortion can be performed after 12 weeks if the woman's life is in danger and even in cases where the woman has mental health problems. A woman may also be granted an authorization to abort after 12 weeks if certain circumstances are proved to be present (such as poor socioeconomic condition of the woman; risk of birth defects to baby; the pregnancy being the result of rape; mental health risk to mother)

Norway:
Women can have abortion on before 12 weeks, by application up to the 18th week, and thereafter only under special circumstances until the fetus is viable, which is usually presumed at 21 weeks and 6 days.
Abortion on request is legal until the end of the 22nd week of pregnancy

Iceland:
Abortion on request is legal until the end of the 22nd week of pregnancy. The request can be done for many reasons. Medically, an abortion is lawful if a pregnancy threatens a woman's physical or mental health, if the fetus has a serious congenital defect, or if the woman is deemed incapable of caring for a child because of her age or mental disability. Social grounds for allowing abortion include: if the pregnancy is the result of rape or incest; if the woman has had several children already with only brief periods between pregnancies; if the woman lives in a particularly difficult family situation; or if the woman's or her partner's ill health prevents them from being able to care for a child.

And if people don't know it, abortion laws in the US are actually more lax than in the Nordic countries. Alaska, Colorado, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, and Vermont don’t limit abortion by gestational age at all. I think Roe vs Wade puts the limit to 28 weeks. It can be argued that state by state, a nearly uniform consensus has emerged in America: After roughly two dozen weeks, women should not be able to get an abortion for non-medical reasons.

Denmark works for the interest of ethnic Danes inside Germany. — Congau

And you think Denmark interferes in German elections?

Iceland has lobbied to secure its fishing right with the EU. — Congau

And has this lobbying raised complaints in the EU?

I’m not saying that all criticism is good. — Congau

but since I believe that the principle of free speech is healthy, I just have to accept it all. — Congau

I think freedom of speach is very important and the society has to be robust enough to hear even crazy talk. Yet as the saying goes, democracy demands a lot from it's members. Perhaps the problem is that many are ignorant and we take too many things as granted. Still, I believe at least at my fellow citizens to have enough knowledge and understanding to elect politicians that don't destroy our democracy, even if many of them don't agree with me.

Oh yes, and we should remind ourselves that a Republican President has earlier gone against state authorities, a Democrat governor back then, and deployed the US military and combat troops when he saw it necessary.



So to remind us of history, listen to this Banno.


But I guess for you the American military is more of a threat to American people or something. In truth, it's a different thing for an armed forces to go and fight an enemy than you have when you have an instance where deadly force is used. And National Guard is a bit separate from US Army troops or Marines, which should be clear to people here (as you were referring to Kent State massacre).

What I'd use as a the "canary in the coal mine" is when Democrat politicians starting from Joe Biden start saying that "the state has to deal with domestic terrorism". Then things would be bad. We are not anywhere close to that. We are more closer dealing to something similar as "The Caravan" of 2016 here.

That's a good thing! Rarely Trump does something good, but this is one of those cases.



(Another reason why health care is so goddamn expensive in the US.)

I think I would start fighting if it came to a civil war type scenario. Say Trump refuses to leave office -- I think at that point we'd have to band together against the military. That's not too far fetched anymore. — Xtrix

Of course it is. There's no way US military will fight against US citizens. Trump isn't popular worthy the military. — Benkei

I would emphasize this, what our favorite Dutchman is saying here.

The US military will surely not put itself to the side of Trump in this kind of scenario. We already can see this as this has already happened. Do not underestimate the importance of the Chairman of the Joints Chiefs of Staff sending this letter to the chiefs of the various branches of military when Trump cleared Lafayette Square to stand with a Bible in his hand. Army troops were withdrawn from Washington DC and now Trump has to rely on private contractors hired by the Department of Homeland Security, which is lead by ONLY BY AN ACTING Secretary, a lobbyist WITH NO background in the judicial sector or the military. The amount of former Homeland Security secretaries that have opposed the use of the department in this way is telling. Yet you still cannot make lobbyists generals in the US.

Hence to think that American people have to fight their own military is as utterly bonkers as the idea that rednecks of the fly-over-USA pose a threat with their shotguns to the latte-drinkers in New York or California. In fact such ludicrous ideas just flame the "culture wars" more and wage the ideological gap between Americans even more.

He's actually very hard to understand. — Michael

I really disagree.

He gives the preferable answer at the moment when he is asked something and if this isn't in line what he has said earlier, doesn't really matter. If someone tries to pin him on this, he or she is just a Trump-hater. Besides, opposing mail-in ballots and yet having his campaign promote it is exactly the type of answer that Donald Trump gives. Elections are rigged if he loses and honest if he wins. He has improved ties with Russia, but on the other hand according to Trump nobody has taken such a hard line against them. This is classic Trump.

It can't be that he's being deceitful and is just concerned that he'll lose the election if every voter uses them but wants his supporters to use them because some of them might not be able to or want to vote in person, right? That would be very dishonest, and we all know the President wouldn't lie about something as important as the foundation of democracy? — Michael

:grin:

Has Trump ever lied? :halo:

Trump is a simple mind to understand. And responds to events like the George Floyd killing in a predictable way.

You know what Trump desperately wants — NOS4A2

Yes, just look at Donalds own approved adds now.

I think the fact is that COVID-19 will surely be a focus of research even after the pandemic, hence there will be a lot of scrutiny about it. Hence I think this question can be answered. Simply too many labs are focusing on COVID-19 now. Yet unfortunately the answer won't make everybody happy, so it can remain quite vague as many things do at the present and you have to know your biology.

Be very wary of those who see no issue in forcing people to part with their wealth in search of a 'perfect' system'. It's indicative of the totalitarian mindset, and sadly it is well-represented here. On a philosophy forum, paradoxically(?). I guess that can be attributed to the arrogance of intellect, even though any real intellect seems to be lacking. — Tzeentch

There's no paradox, Tzeentch. This has been the normal for a long time, it's just pops up from time to time to be observable.

Many philosophers are idealists and believe that the only answer to present problems is a radical depart from the norm, from what we have now, and believe in radical change of the society and it's institutions as the only answer. Hence in a liberal democracy, the other seems interesting. They fall in love with the ideology, be it whatever it is as just what is the cool ideology changes.

It's funny how some people can't realize that "be glad you aren't living 200 years ago" is an extremely stupid defense of present day conditions. — Maw

And so is to believe that 200 years old leftist economics that has been tried for the last 200 years and has utterly failed is an answer to the problems of the present.

And I have to say it’s satisfying watching the feds kick around these privileged twerps. — NOS4A2

That's the image the election campaign of Trump wants to show for his devoted followers like you, NOS. Of course those that are actually US Citizens, it should be added. And who cares if the "feds" are just private contractors, right?

Trump desperately wants the riots to continue, because he hasn't anything else going on than the "Law & Order" thing. Basically he's totally clueless about anything else and the campaign team likely has understood that there's no need to take up policy issues as Donald doesn't care a shit about policies, he get's tired of anything that isn't personally about himself. Heck, Trump campaign team should hire people as "antifa/blm-people" to topple monuments of George Washington, there's many statues of him in every state! Of course, knowing what a inept leader he is this kind of cunning plot would be immediately be leaked out to the media probably by Trump bragging himself about it.

Meddling means espionage and manipulation, and all countries engage in those activities — Congau

So how has Denmark meddled in other countries domestic policies? Or Iceland? Or Jamaica?

What makes you think that because they are open about something, they are open about everything? — Congau

Because the US is totally incapable of keeping secrets for a longer time. Their policies are well known especially on the level of

Remember how it was revealed that even the German chancellor had been spied on by the Americans. — Congau

You shouldn't confuse spying to active measures. It's one thing that countries spy on each other, it's another thing to go actively to meddle in elections. Great Powers do it of course, some like France especially in the politics of their former colonies, but usually the vast majority is open, public and done by diplomats.

The Russians apparently wanted Trump to get elected and if you say his election made the political situation worse, I’d say you are right. — Congau

This is the thing that many Americans simply cannot fathom. That yes, Russians aided Trump, but so did they aid JFK and obviously as we had the Cuban Missile Crisis, JFK wasn't a Russian stooge. The other thing nearly impossible to understand seems that Trump indeed got elected (as Hillary was a horribly bad candidate), and it wasn't the Russians that created the polarized environment that the US has. That Americans have done themselves. Let's see what Putin had on Trump, but Trump duly seems like a willing agent of Russia, if you just listen to him in the famous press briefing in Helsinki where he next to Putin says he believes more Putin than his own intelligence services.

. No, healthy criticism can ever go too far — Congau

Yes it can, and then it becomes simply unhealthy...

German Red Army Fraction terrorists were hell bent on that West Germany was totally similar to Nazi Germany and they had to fight it and their actions would light the turmoil of a proletariat revolution in West Germany in the 1970's. Talk about societal criticism.

Now that kind of criticism is extreme, but criticism can easily create also apathy and withdrawal, not engagement and trying to improve things.

I don't necessarily have to lose a dollar for you to gain a dollar, but it is still possible that you can gain a dollar at my expense. — Pfhorrest

Yet the basic fact is that wealth is created. If you produce something of value, then the World is that product richer as it was earlier. If you sell it and someone buys it, notice that the amount of money stays the same, but that product is more than before.

Just as NOS4A2 above mentions that the richest man in the World couldn't get earlier services like medical treatment that is rather cheap now. If we'd be living in the 19th Century, I'd be already dead. The fact that wealth isn't distributed equally is another issue.

I genuinely fear how much ill this Trump fiasco will do to the US, because this train wreck will get only worse until it ends. In the end a lot of Americans will be really disappointed in their country and will have little belief in their country, which is sad.

Btw, do note that the picture above is from a game Arma III, which actually goes well with the Trump fakeness, but Triple Canopy is indeed now looking for people to work as "Top Secret Protective Security Officers" among other positions. For example in California.

Triple Canopy and Constellis' Top Secret Protective Security Officers provide general armed security for building patrons and the general public at federal buildings requiring a Top Secret Clearance throughout California.

RESPONSIBILITIES:

Provide security for various federal buildings within the contract limits by conducting perimeter security, internal security, monitoring screens, etc.
Protect personnel and property in a professional manner
Meet and deal tactfully and politely with general public and visitors
Effectively and efficiently screen and process visitors
Identify, report, delay or detain persons who violate rules and regulations
Conduct internal and external roving foot patrols

And the list goes on...

Just look at careers at https://constellis.com/careers .

Besides, if you break things like the Constitution and deploy "federal troops" against the will of the local authorities, then do that with private contractors!

What has not been reported widely in the media, however, is the fact that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) unit that is coordinating the “crowd control” effort — an agency called the Federal Protective Service (FPS) — is composed largely of contract security personnel. Those contractors are being furnished to FPS by major private-sector security companies like Blackwater corporate descendant Triple Canopy as well as dozens of other private security firms.

In fact, FPS spends more than $1 billion a year on these contract security guards who are authorized to conduct crowd control at federal properties, such as those in Portland. And, based on available photographic and document evidence, it appears those private contractors are now part of the federal force arrayed in Portland and are likely to be part of the federal response President Trump has promised to stand up in multiple other cities, including Chicago, Detroit, New York, Philadelphia and other urban centers led by Democratic mayors across the country.

See article The Lead Federal Agency Responding to Protesters in Portland Employs Thousands of Private Contractors

Everyone is meddling. — Congau

And usually that "meddling" is called diplomacy and done by an ambassador. This "meddling" is usually done openly with a straightforward agenda which normally is things like strengthening political and economic ties. Not by creating fake accounts in social media and with the objective just to create polarization. Creating polarization is something that the Russians do.

Of course the Russians try to influence elections, just like the Americans do all over the world. — Congau

Sure, Americans have had this ideas like promoting democracy, for example with Reagan's National Endowment for Democracy (NED), and especially during the Cold War were afraid of political parties that reeked socialist. But in truth the US is quite open about these issues. Especially if it is overtly hostile towards some countries: Iran, North Korea, Syria and prior Libya, Nicaragua etc.

s that any worse than having filthy rich oligarchs from inside your own country manipulating elections? I — Congau

Oligarchs typically want something from the government: either protection for their position or simply favorable treatment. But they rarely if ever take the position of their objective being "let's make the political situation worse in the country so that it cannot operate well abroad".

Don’t blame the Russians for learning to play the game the West already knows so well. Blame the system that allows it to happen. Blame the long tradition of money and power and electoral manipulation. — Congau

Remember that the objective is to create an environment where people in the West don't trust their governments at all. Healthy criticism of our system can go too far you know.

Maybe in a way it’s good that the Russians are doing it. We seem to be blind to our domestic meddlers, but maybe now the scales can fall from our eyes we can clearly see the ugly face of manipulation — Congau

The Russians definately want people in the West to see the elites and ruling political parties as "domestic meddlers" that do everything for just their own personal wealth and power. As if no political party or entity can do or has everything something for the greater good. The more we don't trust anything in our form of government, the better are the objectives of the Russian active measures fulfilled.

It is curious though in the UK that the obvious goal of Putin in influencing UK politics is to divide it from Europe and break up the Union of the United Kingdom. All part of his anti EU strategy. — Punshhh

What is curious about this?

The logic is very simple: Russia is militarily stronger than any individual European country and even economically larger than most of the smalller European countries. In bilateral negotiations it simply rules, but confronted with EU, it is negotiating with a far larger entity.

The less there is integration in Europe, the better for Russia. If the US decides that NATO can go the way as CENTO and SEATO, Putin's Russia would be the true victor. And lastly, let's remember that Putin needs the threat of the US and the West. It's the basic reason that he can push for centralized power and for huge defence and security establishment. In Russian military doctrine the threat of NATO enlargement is the 1. threat, then come other threats and I think at number 9. or 10. international terrorism.

And that this strategy alines with the goal of the UK government, which is to leave the EU, to snub the EU in the process and inadvertently break up the United Kingdom. — Punshhh

Boris doesn't want the UK to dissolve. And old school Thatcherites don't want to break ties with Continental Europe and are all for NATO, for example. The federalist agenda is what they absolutely don't like. Simply put it: the federalist cause is driven by Germany and France and there's no place for the UK in that equation. That's the British problem: Britain is big enough and separate enough both physically and historically from the continent, that they don't posses a genuine drive for a unified Europe. UK isn't ruled by the Angevins anymore.

Trump hopes desperately that he can incite more riots!

And also it's great training for how to handle the situation when Trump declares that the elections were rigged and he will not leave office. That will be so much fun.

It's going to be a wonderful fall in the US after the summer.

Is there any Russian meddling in your part of the world and what are we going to do about it? — Punshhh

Lol.

There's even a term in political theory named after the meddling in my country called Finlandization: the process by which one powerful country makes a smaller neighboring country abide by the former's foreign policy rules, while allowing it to keep its nominal independence and its own political system. As a neighboring small western country, it's obvious that the Soviets and now Russians want to keep taps on us.

With this history of Russian meddling, it is easy to see the long term play that Russia has continued well after the fall of the Soviet Union. As a career spy and the former director of the FSB, Putin has made the intelligence services and Active Measures (aktivnye meropriyatiya) a cornerstone of Russia foreign policy and has well understood that in a post-truth World, blatant attacks will go unpunished.

Is Johnson, the UK prime minister, in the pocket of the Russians? — Punshhh

Not remotely. Even in the US administration other people than Trump aren't in pocket of the Russians. Do notice that the people that were in the pockets of the Russians did go to jail in the US only to be let free by Trump now.

What that fair share is, is crux of the problem. Always has been.

And if the company posts losses should the workers forfeit their pay? — BitconnectCarlos

Bankruptcy laws and procedures are a result of a long historical learning, just as is limited liability.

In Antiquity there wasn't limited liability, hence if you couldn't pay up to your financiers, they literally owned you. Hence the risk of possible slavery didn't incite people to invest. This of course was a problem in a time when shipping was a hazardous enterprise, so it's no wonder that the commenda, a passive partner, who's risk was limited emerged in 11th century Italy.

You don’t think that means anything? — NOS4A2

Lol.

Obligatory mask use everywhere hardly is the rule anywhere. The reason why we use masks is that one can be spreading the virus without symptoms, for starters.

Just what the WHO wants is quite simple:

Benkei, profit comes after paying your employees.

Profit describes the financial benefit realized when revenue generated from a business activity exceeds the expenses, costs, and taxes involved in sustaining the activity in question.

Labour costs I think are in the category of expenses and costs.

Thanks for the names of the books and the given links!

Perhaps there was need of a reminder. — Banno

Surely there is a need!

Institutions matter and market mechanism doesn't work without societal institutions, starting from things like nobody can put a gun to your head and then say that the "transaction" was voluntary. Besides, back then Historical institutionalism was the vogue in Economic History and I remember reading then for example Douglass North.

The problem is that we often take as an example a corrupt, inefficient kleptocracy and call it "the natural state of capitalism".

Seems like you are talking about franchising or simply what banking does. Besides, if a philosopher gets his or her income by writing books, that is entrepreneurship. However the smug philosopher usually has tenure in an university today and writes articles to a journal of fellow minded people, so you could call him or her an employee.

Enabling producers to actually produce and fulfill the needs of customers is incidental: they’ll do as little of that as they can get away with, only as much as they have to in order to achieve their goal of multiplying their capital. — Pfhorrest

That's why you need competition and why monopolies tend to suck big time.

The problem that Kaarlo Tuomi is on about, that you disagreed with, and that I’m now supporting, is that in the actual world more often than not that isn’t how and why entrepreneurship gets done. There are people with needs and people who would be able to fulfill those needs (i.e. to produce) if only they had the means (of such production, i.e. capital) to do so, which they don’t, because almost everyone is poor and struggling even to meet their own needs. Then you’ve got the tiny fraction of people who control all that capital and want to use it to extract more of it so that they can keep paying other people to satisfy their own needs without ever running out. — Pfhorrest

But that's not in any way what Kaarlo Tuomi is saying:

I was refuting. the claim was, "Entrepreneurs create wealth, they put ideas into practice, They make the world a better place for everyone." — Kaarlo Tuomi

1. I claimed that the wealth entrepreneurs create benefits no one but themselves. — Kaarlo Tuomi

wealth does not trickle down and benefit anyone other than its creator or owner — Kaarlo Tuomi

neither a service nor a utility are wealth. — Kaarlo Tuomi

What you are saying somebody cannot be an entrepreneur because they cannot start their business endeavor. That's totally different what Tuomi is saying. In his answer to actually he argues that the entrepreneur doesn't create any other wealth than for himself, which obviously misses totally the issue of the entrepreneur producing something, a service or a good. Kaarlo thinks this isn't wealth, as if produced goods aren't equivalent to money, which is just a medium of exchange, a value of account and store of value.

In your own answer first you said:

But beyond keeping the business itself going, what the business does can be anything. It doesn't have to be creating new wealth, or making the world a better place. It can just be funneling wealth to its owner. — Pfhorrest

The entrepreneur likely creates a service or a product that you aren't forced to buy to live, so the transaction between you and an entrepreneur is voluntary. Guess then there has to be a reason just why you would give some of your hard earned money to someone else.

Well, if you want to hear the statement, please then listen to the whole event brought to you by the US Department of State and put aside the leftist Guardian's take on it. Here's the whole issue, Pompeo starts his speech at 11.25:

Gregory, I would also love to know more about Charles Sanders Peirce and pragmatism and the few quotes that the professor at the history of philosophy lecture at the university gave decades ago left me wanting to know more about Peirce and pragmatism. There isn't much about him in the local library.

As an "amateur" philosopher, if any have good articles, talks, lectures etc. that can be linked about Peirce, I would also love them. I have heard the problem is that he didn't publish much.

Besides, Peirce is one of those philosophers that the USA has contributed to the World.

But that's simply wrong.

An entrepreneur can make a good, and some person can make a transaction with him or her, meaning the person can buy it from the entrepreneur. Now the person has something that is relatively scarce and that can be viewed as an asset.

So if a artist paints paintings and people buy them, the people have paintings. The entrepreneur, the artist, has created wealth. Hence the simple fact is that wealth is created by entrepreneurs, just as in generel wealth is created. (A thing that many people don't understand)

Absurdly parochial, ssu. The pandemic is not an issue only for 'mercans. It's just that they have been, tragically, the least able to deal with it. — Banno

And the reason why have they been so unable is an important question.

Other countries, including mine, could find a political consensus on how to deal with the pandemic. In the US it just used a political campaign tool.

And let's say we had now a Clinton administration. Think the consensus would have been found then? Would all those Republican governors gone with what Hillary would have declared with Fauci standing next to her? Even if the fight against the pandemic would have been better, I think still even without the inept and utterly incapable Trump this wouldn't have been an outstanding success for the US.

will there still be a political demand to emphasize covid over other problems affecting American society. — Hanover

I raised this question because I don't see the partisanship going away. In fact partisanship is just incited more and more and every decision made by the political leadership is made to be an ideological decision.

Still sounds like the economics & economic history taught in my university 25 years ago. But that seems not to matter. Better market things as new!