Neo

Autos ... we learned. It was hard. We changed. We're better.

I agree. What would Romney's outsourcing do to the economy?

I'd have guessed welder before singer!

Observation without a solution. When you import a country's goods, you import its cost structure. When you import its cost structure, you import its standard of living. Frictions arise with regard to choices. Choices are individual (consumer, laborer, investor) and choices are collective (representation and national policy). As an individual, I own a Sony television. As a citizen, I vote for free trade. Both bring friction to my life. I have to compete. Competition is hard. Globalization is inevitable. My path is hard. Its boundaries are set by both my individual and our collective choices. You may read that into many of the philosophies I share regarding personal choices, the aims and effectiveness of collective choices, and the consequences of both categories of choice. Markets are the clearing house of all choices, regardless of the pleasantness of the consequences. Markets, like everything, have anomalies and are not perfect. Controversy alert: I view conservatism as the optimistic approach to the human condition. I find it relies on the only reliable variables in all of the equations. That is, it relies on the individual's yearning and capacity for best solutions, subject to consequences. My view is that relying on what's generally good for me is generally good for us all. The human commonality of interests will express itself. Individuals striving will achieve and get bruised with all outcomes unequal. Economics is the science of human behavior. We struggle, we live.

Report card to Crystal Beach ...

Slingshots and BB guns ... and out to play with them without supervision. Imagine that, today! To say nothing of plinking cans with a .22. Candy cigarettes. Anyone remember kerbonkers?

If you say me, I'll scalp my tickets to the three drunkest Leaf fans I find outside the arena.

GI Joe and Stingrays! How about Keds and PF Flyers .... "make you run faster and jump higher" Tiger in your tank ...

Milk delivered to our door ... Aluminum box on the porch. The Milkman (my kids thought that was crazy ..) I remember him well. Wore an army jacket and gloves with the fingers removed, if I recall ...

Awesome reads! Sixties ... Getting out of bed to watch the first moon walk. We lived on Culver Road. PS 67 Goodnight, David ... goodnight, Chet and Walter Cronkite. Men came to the house and fixed the television. Saturday morning cartoons; Go, Speedracer, Mr Peabody and the Wayback Machine, Bugs and friends. Bicycles, everywhere. Playing Army and Cowboys and Indians Acme and A & P. Super Duper, Loblaws, and The Park Edge McDonalds and over 1 million served. OJ at USC and in Buffalo; the Rock Pile and parking, walking and climbing to sit behind a column. Andy Griffith, Bewitched, Gilligan's Island ... Samantha and Mary Ann made me, um, fidgety. I didn't know why. Danny moves your fanny ... In the morning .. Listening to the radio on snowy school days, fingers crossed ... "Albion Central Schools, Arcade ... All Buffalo Public and Parochial ...." Caz Park and fishing at the Botanical Gardens

Luddite - early favorite for my spectacular and contextually perfect word of the month.

When Claude arrives with Gary Johnson, idealism moves up a couple, and pragmatism down a few .... Thoughtfully, that's likely my play.

To TBPHD: I understand and thoughtful. Synthesizing a few posts - worst case scenario is that a Cruz emerges. I see this as doubling down with a bad hand. Is the DNC only one election removed from this with a tired, but more palatable, candidate from yesterday? Is she the Dem "Romney" in terms of what she represents, if not in who she is? I'm staring into the same abyss with a coward's special pain. The result is inevitable and my friend bravely jumped first.

What's the GOP's next act? The "elephant" in the room. As Trump continues to self destruct, I've moved to your same place, D4rk. With all the intrenched powers involved, I'm watching Paul Ryan most closely. If the GOP has one winner I can see today, it's him. History tells me the winner is a man or woman I don't see today.

I do digital. Op-Ed: The Week They Decided He Was Crazy

You're a prose man.

NOW I get it ... a mirror WOULD be helpful.

To: K9 .. Just for clarity, my elder respected friend ... "Bring a camera" wasn't snidely directed at you ... my clumsy implication was "they're gonna explode". Inter webs: Plenty of opportunity for snark makes it uneccessary to rely on inadvertently delivered same!

I'm not sure I went off the rails. I did, and do, disagree with the policy implications he was advancing, clumsily or inarticulately, regardless of the words. If I came close to a rail, it was before, during and after the platitude's clean-up. I'm not here to debate that, today. I'm here to recognize our new bunker group's response to that set of policies. Pre-emptively: I'll not re-litigate the moment. Go to a Trump rally and ask the view of Joe the Plumber. The response is my interest, Mitt Romney references notwithstanding. If don't like what you hear in response, tell them the President just misspoke. Bring a camera. I know it's behind a paywall, but if any of you can get your hands on the WSJ today, find Peggy Noonan. She's awesome.

All I want is liberal, open minded, Progressives looking at Trump supporters with the same eyes that they look at any other group. Most strongly ... Trump is a symptom, not a cure. Trump is a response, not a cause.

I don't have the full text of the exchange. I'm comfortable with the "you did/you didn't build that" construct as it relates to political parties. Replace plumber with any profession and speak to the idea and I'll be more interested. "It wasn't Toledo, it was Columbus" may be true. If the point is "you didn't get there on your own", I'll say "well, duh" to the platitude and add no one claims they did.

I know none of those people. I'm sure people like that exist in all races. Maybe I need to get out more.

I like this post. It IS a bunker mentality. I ask, though, if Trump supporters are building bunkers because they're just plain racist (I don't believe so) or in response to the dozens of bunkers being built around them (I do believe so). It IS more than the economy. Sometimes you go off the deep end when you've been walked to the end of the plank. A Republican figured out you can be successful pandering to fear. Alert the media. I imagine Joe the Plumber. One party tells him he didn't build anything. Another says I'll help you take back what you built. He takes his calloused hands into his dark circled and tired eyes and asks himself "who am I going to vote for?".

Awesome work here, TBPHD. There is a constituency being squeezed. I'd add that telling that constituency that it's privileged doesn't help. A political system that promises, creates and funds programs to subsidize everyone else, doesn't help. Blaming the constituency's history for today's problems doesn't help. There's an emotional reason for a Trump beyond the economics. Here's where I'm sympathetic. It's not just fear of globalization and change, it's belief and anger that the system's stacked against them. Ironic, huh? They're not just scared, economically, they're resentful and angry. Trump's a politician pandering to a constituency. We're shocked because this is the constituency we'd never before thought to pander to. Wait, they're not supposed to be the victims, they're the bad guys. Don't like Trump supporters? Why'd we create them?

Awesome stuff and thank you. I hope you're well, soon. My son did two weeks at a summer camp in Petincton. I'm sure you know it well. Beautiful, beautiful ...