OT: sober reading between the lines; less sober analogy

IMO a "boss" who treats longtime supporters and allies like Canada like crap and is all smiles and pats on the back to a piece of human garbage like Kim Jong Un isn't one I'd want to work for.

But it makes great "reality TV". Trump learned from "The Apprentice" what s ells to the lower end of the market, not that the Trump brand was ever all that up-market (despite its not-all-that-sincere pretensions).

Trump gets great viewing numbers. The question is whether he is fooling eno ugh of the people to get re-elected. John Larkin seems to be dumb enough to vote for him, though John Larkin claims that he doesn't vote (which is pre tty dumb).

The polls suggest that Trump isn't likely to get re-elected, and that his t actics have tarnished the Republican brand (beyond what the Koch brother an d the Tea Party faction had already done).

The people who see an advantage in having an under-informed ego-maniac as t he President of the US may again be prepared to spend enough on delivering tailored misinformation to dumb voters in crucial electorates to get him ba ck in, but that kind of trick doesn't work as well the second time around.

American "professional wrestling" knows how to fill seats too; get some jacked dudes to pretend to be angry with each other, cut a few tough-talking "promos", build hype for the "main event."

Brings in the marks like clockwork for the finale who don't care a bit that it's all about as real as a three-dollar bill.

I thought it was kind of a disgrace seeing all those American flags propped up next to the North Korean flag as if these are somehow nations of equal stature.

at sells to the lower end of the market, not that the Trump brand was ever all that up-market (despite its not-all-that-sincere pretensions).

I've been reading Naomi Klein's "No is not enough" in rather small chunks.

She tells us that Trump was involved in professional wrestling at one stage in his career, as does the Washington Post.

and shares their impression that this had a lot to do with Trump's style of campaigning for the presidency. She's less forthcoming on Trump's stye as President - the book was published in 2017 while the Washington Post articl e is dated August 25, 2017, so it's author had had rather more time to obse rve Trump being "presidential".

I seem to be reminded of the Colin Douglas novel "Hazards of the Profession" in which an unusually rude and capricious senor medico is seen to be getting worse by his staff and colleagues, who find they can't do anything about it until the symptoms of

become very obvious. In the novel the senior medico has to drive his car over a pedestrian before anybody in authority will admit that there's a problem.

Trump's enthusiasm for starting trade wars clearly falls short of that.

ome

Not just " professional wrestling " There are lots of shows that are not real, but people watch just the same. " Housewifes of xxxxxxxxxx" , "Su rvivor ", All of the western movies. All the musical comedies. It is ju st entertainment. Reality TV is not reality.

Dan

some

ot real, but people watch just the same. " Housewifes of xxxxxxxxxx" , " Survivor ", All of the western movies. All the musical comedies. It is just entertainment. Reality TV is not reality.

And Trump's presidency is a political reality show.

Naomi Klein goes a little further, and suggests that both Trump and Pence a re exploiters of her "shock doctrine" who will go in after a disaster - som etimes created by their own slab-dash antics - and sell the shattered popul ation solutions that make their friends and relatives a lot of money and do n't do much in the way of solving the population's problems.

She saw Pence in action (of a sort) after Hurricane Katrina, when Pence was chairman of the Republican Study Committee which came up with 32 "Pro-Free

-Market Ideas for Responding to Hurricane Katrina and High Gas Prices" whic h included "automatically suspend Davis-Bacon prevailing wage laws in disas ter areas" and "repeal or waive restrictive environmental regulations ... t hat hamper rebuilding".

A lot of the rebuilding after Katrina suited developers better than the peo ple who had been flooded out - the rebuilding created more expensive housin g that could be sold to people with a lot more money than those who had bee n flooded out.

That's OK, he probably won't make you an offer.

I am very skeptical of the above statement. It sounds like a statement from someone who always believes " the man " always screws the little man.

Made more suspect when said by someone who is not even in the same hemisphere as the Katrina devastation.

I especially find it hard to believe because the owners would be getting money from the insurance companies and the owners would hold the deed to the property.

So do you have a web site that supports this assertion?

Dan

It's easy, the insurance company has outside engineering firms on retainer to determine the cause of property loss after a hurricane. If a particular contracted firm starts claiming that too many homes that were clearly destroyed by what you'd technically call "a hurricane" were destroyed by wind and not flood then you fire that firm and hire one that's more accommodating.

The home is a concrete slab that's under six feet of water now, sure looks like a flood to me.

The insurance company will be sued of course by outraged homeowners it don't really matter. The litigation will take 25 years to play out, in the meantime the mortgage holder (who has a complicated back-scratching financial relationship with the insurance company via derivatives, credit default swaps, and mortgage-backed securities) sell that shit off for a nice profit and ideally the insurance company can cover the eventual litigation payouts from related financial-instrument appreciation over the intervening time from the disaster to the litigation resolution.

I'm a New Englander and there's definitely the kind of person where if they were to offer me a million dollars in exchange for being a kiss-ass vs. $0 and the opportunity to give them the finger I'd take the latter and remember the moment fondly and laugh about it every day even if it meant living on a cot in a wood shack until my dying day. Lol!

At least that way I could look at myself in the mirror in the morning and call myself a man instead of...whatever it is the kind of kiss-ass that works for The Donald calls himself.

Do you do that a lot?

and that too?

He probably wouldn't hire anyone who types

Lol!

I wouldn't.

The one thing I know for sure with floods is that the property owner is seldom adequately reimbursed for what it will cost to restore the home. It is not at all uncommon for them to end up losing the property.

Rick C.

Lol!

Rick C.

Cannot confirm or deny whether Donald Trump has or has not ever used that bit of Internet-slang himself. There are thousands of screencaps of Donald Trump tweets on a Google Image search, and thousands of screencaps of faked tweets. All completely indistinguishable from each other.

You need to be a grade-A sycophant to get offers from people like him. It would be even better if you really liked the slimeball, provided that you let it show.

people who had been flooded out - the rebuilding created more expensive ho using that could be sold to people with a lot more money than those who had been flooded out.

rom someone who always believes " the man " always screws the little man.

phere as the Katrina devastation.

I was passing on Naomi Klein's comments - as is made clear in my post, thou gh you've snipped the bits that made this clear.

She was in New Orleans as a reporter (with her husband) during and after Ka trina - and got involved in a car accident, and was treated in very well eq uipped private hospital that wasn't doing anything about the numerous medic al problems of the less well-off inhabitants of New Orleans, the kind who h adn't had the resources to get themselves out of New Orleans when the water rose.

The whole Katrina experience raised her consciousness no end, and was what got her started on writing "The Shock Doctrine" though that ended up being more about the 1973 CIA-inspired coup in Chile, and the subsequent involvem ent of the Chicago School economists with Pinochet. Katrina shows up in the book, but isn't a major component.

money from the insurance companies and the owners would hold the deed to t he property.

Owners might. Renters wouldn't. People who owned their homes on a mortgage, under circumstances where it would be difficult to keep on making the mort gage payments, wouldn't have all that much freedom of choice.

Naomi Klein's "No is not enough" and "the Shock Doctrine" are well known bo oks, well worth buying

You probably won't like her politics - like Noam Chomsky, she's an anarcho- syndicalist - but that doesn't stop her from being a brilliant reporter, th ough it may prevent you from getting the message.

My own feeling is that her political stance makes her less effective than s he ought to be, but that this is more a defect of the society she lives in than in the woman herself.