Daily Archives: May 20, 2018

The Birth of the New American Aristocracy: The 9.9 Percent Is the New American Aristocracy – The Atlantic

New-Arist-Yale

The class divide is already toxic, and is fast becoming unbridgeable. You’re probably part of the problem.

See:

The 99% Is a Myth—Here’s How It Really Breaks Down

 

The Aristocracy Is Dead …

For about a week every year in my childhood, I was a member of one of America’s fading aristocracies. Sometimes around Christmas, more often on the Fourth of July, my family would take up residence at one of my grandparents’ country clubs in Chicago, Palm Beach, or Asheville, North Carolina. The breakfast buffets were magnificent, and Grandfather was a jovial host, always ready with a familiar story, rarely missing an opportunity for gentle instruction on proper club etiquette. At the age of 11 or 12, I gathered from him, between his puffs of cigar smoke, that we owed our weeks of plenty to Great-Grandfather, Colonel Robert W. Stewart, a Rough Rider with Teddy Roosevelt who made his fortune as the chairman of Standard Oil of Indiana in the 1920s. I was also given to understand that, for reasons traceable to some ancient and incomprehensible dispute, the Rockefellers were the mortal enemies of our clan. Only much later in life did I learn that the stories about the Colonel and his tangles with titans fell far short of the truth.

At the end of each week, we would return to our place. My reality was the aggressively middle-class world of 1960s and ’70s U.S. military bases and the communities around them. Life was good there, too, but the pizza came from a box, and it was Lucky Charms for breakfast. Our glory peaked on the day my parents came home with a new Volkswagen camper bus. As I got older, the holiday pomp of patriotic luncheons and bridge-playing rituals came to seem faintly ridiculous and even offensive, like an endless birthday party for people whose chief accomplishment in life was just showing up. I belonged to a new generation that believed in getting ahead through merit, and we defined merit in a straightforward way: test scores, grades, competitive résumé-stuffing, supremacy in board games and pickup basketball, and, of course, working for our keep. For me that meant taking on chores for the neighbors, punching the clock at a local fast-food restaurant, and collecting scholarships to get through college and graduate school. I came into many advantages by birth, but money was not among them.

…(read more).

See also:

And related:

On Our Watch – The Hijacking of America

Bush-Rushmoreas well as:Orwell-5

and

Noam Chomsky – A Perfect Storm

Chomsky-storm

President Trump has made 3,001 false or misleading claims so far – The Washington Post

Trump-facts1a

In the 466 days since he took the oath of office, President Trump has made 3,001 false or misleading claims, according to The Fact Checker’s database that analyzes, categorizes and tracks every suspect statement uttered by the president.

That’s an average of nearly 6.5 claims a day.

When we first started this project for the president’s first 100 days, he averaged 4.9 claims a day. Slowly, the average number of claims has been creeping up.

Indeed, since we last updated this tally two months ago, the president has averaged about 9 claims a day.

Our interactive graphic, created with the help of Leslie Shapiro and Kaeti Hinck of The Washington Post’s graphics department, displays a running list of every false or misleading statement made by Trump. We also catalogued the president’s many flip-flops, since those earn Upside-Down Pinocchios if a politician shifts position on an issue without acknowledging that he or she did so.

…(read more).

Requiem for the American Dream

YouTube Movies
Published on Feb 25, 2016

REQUIEM FOR THE AMERICAN DREAM is the definitive discourse with Noam Chomsky, widely regarded as the most important intellectual alive, on the defining characteristic of our time – the deliberate concentration of wealth and power in the hands of a select few.

Why humans are so bad at thinking about climate change


Vox

Published on Apr 19, 2017

The biggest problem for the climate change fight isn’t technology – it’s human psychology.

Natural Cycles: Climate Change, Lines of Evidence: Chapter 7


The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
Published on Jul 2, 2012

The National Research Council is pleased to present this video that explains how scientists have arrived at the current state of knowledge about recent climate change and its causes. This is part seven of a seven-part series, available on the National Academies channel.

Global Warming – Natural vs. Manmade Causes Compared By NASA


VideoFromSpace

Published on Nov 7, 2016

When you compare possible natural causes (orbital, solar and volcanic activity) over the course of the last 100+ years, to possible manmade causes (aerosols, deforestation and greenhouses gases), the winner is clear. Greenhouse gases directly correlate to an increase in Earth temperature. Credit: NASA/GSFC GISS

The Truth About Trump and Global Warming


Bloomberg

Published on Nov 11, 2016

Nov. 11 –Bloomberg’s Eric Roston discusses Trump’s mysterious approach to climate change and what we know about his policies so far.

A Trump Presidency And The Future Of Climate Change | TIME


TIME

Published on Nov 15, 2016

Donald Trump has repeatedly indicated that environmentalism is not his priority. Now, Climate scientists, policymakers and diplomats are questioning how his presidency will shape the future of climate change policy.

Trump Got Climate Change Pretty Wrong in His Paris Speech (HBO)


VICE News

Published on Jun 2, 2017

Donald Trump pulled the United States out of the most comprehensive climate deal in the history of the planet on Thursday, taking with it the world’s best hope of limiting continued global warming. In a speech in the White House Rose Garden, President Trump announced the United States would walk away from the landmark agreement, signed in late 2015 by 195 nations, calling it a bad deal that prioritized foreign countries’ success at the expense of American workers. Trump spent the majority of his 28-minute speech talking about economics, but when he did talk about the Paris agreement, he was almost entirely wrong. VICE News fact-checked some of his claims. Read the full fact check here: http://bit.ly/2rz32AS

Put aside the law for a moment. Trump’s lying is just plain wrong. – The Washingto n Post

Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), as unexceptional a conservative lawmaker as you will find and a generally pro-Trump voice, said something extraordinary on Sunday. Asked on CNN’s “State of the Union” whether President Trump’s lying wasn’t a problem, Blunt served up a tutorial in moral relativism and postmodern thought:

JAKE TAPPER: Does it bother you — does it bother you when President Trump is not honest? Does it bother you when he says things that are clear, demonstrable falsehoods to the American people?

BLUNT: You know, he communicates differently than I do or than almost anybody else ever has.

I will tell you, though, I was in Missouri all week. I did news conferences in 10 different cities all over the state. I saw virtually every TV camera in the state during that — those 10 cities. …

And President Trump’s part of that. But I think people are much more concerned about the economy and job preparation. And there are plenty of chances for every reporter to ask a question about President Trump. Nobody did. And …

TAPPER: Well, I will make up for it. … Let me ask you this.

Does it matter if the president of the United States lies to the American people? The majority of the American people do not find him honest and trustworthy. That is a problem.

Doesn’t that get in the way of the agenda? And, as an American, wouldn’t you prefer to have a president who you don’t have to worry that what he says is just demonstrably false, such as when he says two of the hostages that were taken were taken — that are in North Korea were taken under [President
Barack] Obama, when two of the three were taken while he was president?

BLUNT: Well, you know, that Trump persona has not changed since the campaign.

TAPPER: Does it bother you, though?

BLUNT: It would bother me less if we weren’t getting things done.

What the regulators are doing, I think the tax package, better than I would have expected. I think the foreign policy, the president was left with lots of problems. We had about eight years where we acted like the United States of America was basically any other country in the world. And a lot of things got off track during that eight years.