Trump supporters–right wingers or whiny liberals?
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Real Time with Bill Maher
lazarillo — 9 years ago(February 01, 2017 10:15 AM)
It's a legitimate question. Consider the Wall. It could just be pure racism. Maybe some nave people think it will stop the drug trade. It won't. There are billions to be made trafficking drugs to the US and drug traffickers WILL find a way around any wall.
But I think a lot of the appeal of the Wall is the same reason Trump supporters want to tear up NAFTA and the TPP and start a trade war with China. They simply can't compete in the modern world. They're too unskilled, entitled and lazy. A lot of liberals are trying improve the lot of the working class by naively passing minimum-wage laws. The CONSEVATIVE criticism of this is that 1. it raises prices and 2. it destroys jobs when companies have to lay off workers or go out of business. I agree (to a large extent anyway) with the conservatives. What a lot of people don't seem to realize though is Trump supporters are trying to do the EXACT SAME THING as the misguided liberal whiners. But while it's relatively cheap to pass a minimum-wage law, Trump supporter are trying to raise wages by removing the illegal immigrant "competition" for jobs or tear up trade agreements so they don't have to indirectly compete with foreign workers. This is even dumber, more expensive, more economically damaging and obviously more racistthan even the most nave liberal minimum wage laws.
Most poor American don't work in, say, the steel industry. But all poor Americans buy Chinese-made products. They're going to be hurt if Trump creates a trade war with China because PRICES will go up. China is also the biggest and most dynamic potential market in the world. They provide a lot of jobs for Americans as well as "take" them. College-educated young people, for instance, can make pretty good money teaching English in China. It's pretty stupid to destroy a lot of good-paying jobs and to raise prices on EVERYBODY in some quixotic attempt to turn back the clock for the American blue collar worker. This is the kind of knee-jerk stupidity I'd expect from LIBERALS. Similarly, it's going to cost a fortune to remove every illegal Mexican and keep them out, and it will fail miserably as long as there are JOBS HERE for them.
I actually hope Trump is just using his idiot LIBERAL supporters. I can live with a CONSERVATIVE tax cut for the wealthy and the deregulation of Wall Street and some of Paul Ryan cuts to government programs. Stuff like this pften produces more inequality, but at least generally HELPS the economy. Trump, however, may just be using the GOP to bring in a Trojan horse of the most misguided liberalism imaginable mixed with a healthy dose of knee-jerk racism to appeal to right-wing reactionaries. We may be really screwed. . .
"Let be be finale of seem/ The only emperor is the Emperor of Ice Cream" -
fletcbk — 9 years ago(February 04, 2017 10:46 PM)
In a nutshell, your biggest problem has always been that you think you are a lot smarter than you really are.
Yes, you have some type of vaguely-defined "good" white collar job that allows you to travel the globe offshoring (probably something in "sourcing") putting American workers out of a job. And you might even think you've learned a thing or two about foreign affairs from this. You're full of so much confidence that you can post an illiterate, all-over-the-place rant that doesn't seem to even understand what it wants to say about liberals and conservatives. [Which is why I guess you keep putting them in all-caps so you don't get confused.]
I actually am a liberal who supports the TPPgaspand knows Trump's "plans" won't work, BUT your writing style sucks so badly that I seriously disagree with you even when I agree with you.
In one paragraph you manage to insult American workers ("entitled, lazy, unskilled"), the idea of a higher minimum wage, economic liberals, social conservatives, people who are not happy with their station in life ("whiners"), and seem to be calling pretty much anyone who's not you a racist.
I'm glad you would not consider yourself a Democrat, because your complete lack of empathy for people who are economically worse off than you and faux-sense of "enlightenment" because you support immigrants doing terrible jobs for bad pay and regulations is a big part of the problem within the Democratic Party. Some have embraced an attitude not that different from Libertarians, and I'd like to see that gone FIRST in rebuilding the party.