Trump

[Treetop]

I know ron paul doesnt agree but this is one of the reasons I like Trump. The "deep state" as Ron Paul calls it hates Trump. I dont think it is as much any specific policy of his but rather that he appears to be his own man rather then bought of and an "insider". It is possible we are seeing a coup of sorts in favor of Trump. The shape of these hacks have ripped a bigger hole in the deep states front runner and platform then most anything. More are coming we are told that prove illegality. It was hinted the media is in bed with these forces in a provable way in upcoming hacked documents. If there are those within our government trying to stand against it this seems to me to be one of the last chances to flip it another direction.

All that said it is very hard to see the full shape of these things with limited data. We are left filling in our own holes in what we know and being called conspiracy theorists, lol. Even if homeland security swoops in and helped fake the election, we are also in an unprecedented age of hackers revealing things AND whistle blowers.

What does a third party vote or a protest vote for a party that cant win do in the face of this? Vote for whatever you like of course but imo the fact there is a chance Trump could upset this paradigm is more than worth the gamble. I would vote for him even if I hated most of his stances, although I made it clear I like several of them. Even if the election was stolen since we have enough data to know past ones were tampered with it is likely this could help along the process of people waking up to the "deep state" whatever full scope it has is irrelevant. So even a Trump loss if he had enough support to win could be a kick to the nuts for those types. Hobbling their efforts.

[johnbrickner]

we are also in an unprecedented age of hackers revealing things AND whistle blowers.

God bless those who work both anonymously by passive aggressively hacking and those who stand on principle, are recognized by the act of speaking out, and place themselves at risk to make change. These are the contemporary heroes and patriots of our days. They need to be acknowledged with their behavior promoted and honored by every man jack of us.

[aloneibreak]

we are also in an unprecedented age of hackers revealing things AND whistle blowers.

God bless those who work both anonymously by passive aggressively hacking and those who stand on principle, are recognized by the act of speaking out, and place themselves at risk to make change. These are the contemporary heroes and patriots of our days. They need to be acknowledged with their behavior promoted and honored by every man jack of us.

hopefully a release of emails/information on both candidates is what's at the end of the badselfeater countdown

[Treetop]

we are also in an unprecedented age of hackers revealing things AND whistle blowers.

God bless those who work both anonymously by passive aggressively hacking and those who stand on principle, are recognized by the act of speaking out, and place themselves at risk to make change. These are the contemporary heroes and patriots of our days. They need to be acknowledged with their behavior promoted and honored by every man jack of us.

hopefully a release of emails/information on both candidates is what's at the end of the badselfeater countdown

Who knows what else is out there, but as far as wikileaks Assange said he has info on trump and republicans as well, but nothing is any worse then anything Trump said publicly already, whereas he claims a range of criminal acitivity from the democrats and hillary.

[hobo finds]

[frugi]

71675752.jpg (217.5 KiB) Viewed 1639 times

[IdahoCopper]

The USA has been a one party State for a long time. Long-term things in politics rarely change quickly. There is a good probability that Trump is one of the two puppets propped up for the sheeple to approve with their vote. As is always the case.

[TXSTARFIRE]

I guess I am a Trump guy. I took the isidewith poll and it showed:
Evan McMullin 98% (Never heard of him)
Donald Trump 95%
Darrell Castle 93%
Gary Johnson 57%
Hillary Clinton 3%
Jill Stein 1%

Very interesting info on that site.

[natsb88]

Still can't take people seriously when they declare that Johnson isn't libertarian enough to be the LP nominee, but then support Trump as the Republican nominee. You can make one argument or the other, but not both. Trump isn't a Republican. He isn't even conservative. He's a populist. He has bounced from party to party (with far more time as a Democrat) and his positions have changed with public opinion, they aren't consistent or principled. He knew Hillary had the 2016 Democratic nomination locked up eight years ago so he targeted the right for his big presidential run. It's really as simple as that. I get that Johnson isn't libertarian enough for some libertarians, but when they argue that Trump is a better choice for libertarians than Johnson, they lose all credibility. If you really have libertarian values and Johnson's policies aren't libertarian enough, then I can totally understand voting for Darrell Castle (or nobody at all, though that doesn't do any good).

Unbiased America is working on an interest series of posts regarding the rise of populism in this election and the support for protectionist policies.

2016 has seen the rise of populism in American politics. Populism is the political tactic of embracing majority beliefs in order to gain popular support. Both current presidential nominees have taken populist views, and Bernie Sanders’ candidacy was perhaps the most populist left-wing candidacy in American history.

But populism fails, and sometimes dangerously so, when it embraces popular yet flawed beliefs for political gain. The Russian Revolution was arguably the most damaging populist movement in history. It ended up costing the lives of millions and plunging half the world into a century of poverty.

Almost as damaging was the African continent's embrace of protectionism from the 1970s onward and America's ill-advised protectionism early in the Great Depression. The United States suffered so much under its own tariffs that ever since, protectionism has been essentially left for dead... an economic test that failed real world parameters.

Yet here we are, on the verge of a return to the same policies, due largely to the passage of time, the public's short memory, and a retreat away from economic education.

This is one of those subjects that we at Unbiased America know will piss off a lot of people when we write about it. That's because many in both major parties (as well as libertarians) have come to believe the populist political narrative that free trade is damaging our economy. Yet economists, on the left AND the right, have shown unequivocally that free trade has brought more people out of poverty, both here and abroad, than any force in history.

We'd be remiss, as economists, if we didn't attempt to sway opinion away from the populist views taking hold. So over the next few days, we, along admins from Being Classically Liberal and We Are Capitalists, will be offering several posts on this issue. All we ask of you is an open mind, critical thought, and good discussion. Thank you once again for being the most intelligent followers on Facebook!

There is nearly universal agreement among those who study the issue that tariffs are harmful. Economists from Milton Friedman to Paul Krugman and everyone in between have warned against the siren song of protectionism.

The reason tariffs hurt the economy so much is because they effectively subsidize corporations at the expense of consumers, who must now pay substantially more for products being tariffed. They hurt the people, ESPECIALLY the poor, by acting like a regressive tax: people pay more for goods, in order to give more to corporations. And while wealthy individuals might be able to afford this, the poor and working class are hit hardest when the cost of goods rises. And all this just to prop up an uncompetitive company. Good businesses don't need to be protected. It's the ones that are failing that typically call for tariffs. This is why protectionism is a notion that exists chiefly among special interests and lobbyists for failing corporations.

One of the last times a major tariff law was passed in the U.S., it destroyed our economy. The Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act was passed despite overwhelming opposition from economists. President Hoover signed it into law in 1930 because people believed it would promote domestic industry. Turns out, all it promoted was a trade war with the rest of the world. Exports fell by 66%. GDP fell by 50%. And unemployment rose from 8% to 25%. America plunged further into the Great Depression.

The harm of protectionism has been so decisively proven that currently "93% of economists agree that tariffs and quotas reduce economic welfare".
From http://www.realclearmarkets.com/charts/ ... ve-44.html

Also: "Economists overwhelmingly favor free trade— apparently, the freer the better. The overwhelming majority (87.5%) agree that the U.S. should eliminate remaining tariffs and other barriers to trade." From http://ew-econ.typepad.fr/articleAEAsurvey.pdf

Sadly, protectionism sounds appealing to large numbers of voters, and will likely always be used by politicians to gain their support. We'll delve further into the nuts and bolts of this issue in our next post.

Part of a related article:

In fact, the expansion of capitalism and freer international trade has coincided with an era of slow economic growth, high unemployment, increased child labor, skyrocketing inequality, and grinding poverty.

Just kidding, that’s not what happened at all. In fact, as the world has become more capitalist and more globalized, the quality of life for the average person, and especially for the average poor person, has increased substantially. In 1990, 37% of the global population lived on less than $1.90 per day. By 2012, that number had been reduced to 12.8%, and in 2015 it was under 10%. The source of this progress isn’t a massive wealth redistribution program; it’s massive wealth creation — that is, economic growth.

Economists David Dollar and Aart Kraay found that, in a global sample of over 100 countries, changes in the income growth of the bottom 40% of the world’s income earners are highly correlated with economic growth rates. On the other hand, changes in inequality contributed relatively little to changes in social welfare of the poor over the last few decades.

There is good reason to believe that the expansion of free trade, facilitated by international organizations like the World Trade Organization (WTO) and its predecessor, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), have had a considerable impact in accelerating the economic development of developing countries.

In the 1990s GATT facilitated reforms which moved 125 countries towards freer trade by reducing the burden of government imposed trade barriers like tariffs. This was the first serious attempt at trade reform for most developing countries at the time, and arguably presents a unique natural experiment on the economic effects of trade reform.

In fact, a paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), specifically examined how trade reforms facilitated by GATT affected the economic development of the reforming countries. In the paper, the authors compared the trends in economic growth before and after trade reform in the reforming countries. Then they compared those results to trends in economic growth of a control group of countries which didn’t undergo trade reform.

What they found was very encouraging for proponents of free trade. Prior to reform, the economic development of reformers and non-reformers was practically identical, but after reform, the economic development of reforming countries accelerated while non-reforming countries saw their economies stagnate and decline. The results suggest that the reforms towards freer trade lead to an increase in income per capita of around 20% in the long-run, an effect so large that it almost certainly had a positive and non-trivial impact on poverty reduction.

Similarly, other research has shown that more free market trade policies result in lower rates of extreme poverty and child mortality in developing countries. There are other benefits as well. One study on trade reform in Indonesia found that reductions of import tariffs led to an increase in disposable income among poor households, which allowed them to pull their children out of the labor force, leading to “a strong decline” in the incidence of child labor.

Unfortunately, many activists have reflexively taken up the cause of opposing the expansion of global capitalism, for a number of reasons. Western anti-sweatshop activists, for example, will often argue in favor of government imposed barriers to trade with poor countries because their working conditions are terrible in comparison to those in developed Western nations. In their view, western consumers should not be promoting a cycle of capitalist exploitation by buying products made in Vietnamese sweat-shops.

But satisfactory working conditions aren’t the natural state of mankind; they are a consequence of decades of economic development. Erecting barriers to trade with poor countries is surely a large impediment to their development, in fact, research suggests that existing developed world tariffs depress economic growth rates in the developing world by 0.6 to 1.6 percent per person, a considerably large effect.

Moreover, the sweat-shops which produce clothing for Westerners are often much better than alternative forms of domestic employment. In poor countries like Bangladesh, China, and Vietnam, the apparel industry consistently pays more than most other domestic industries. According to research by economist Ben Powell, in poor countries “most sweatshop jobs provide an above average standard of living for their workers.”

More at the link below.

http://quillette.com/2016/01/16/how-cap ... ter-place/

I will not vote against anyone. I agree with Castle and his party, but I am thinking a vote for Johnson will do more good.

That's pretty much where I'm at too.

we are also in an unprecedented age of hackers revealing things AND whistle blowers.

God bless those who work both anonymously by passive aggressively hacking and those who stand on principle, are recognized by the act of speaking out, and place themselves at risk to make change. These are the contemporary heroes and patriots of our days. They need to be acknowledged with their behavior promoted and honored by every man jack of us.

+1. Don't forget Trump from three years ago: Snowden is a traitor, we should make an example of him, we used to execute people like this. "Unless the retribution is swift and really strong, you're going to have other people coming out with more information than he's got."

For someone who bills himself as an "outsider," he sure is worried about protecting the (illegal) secrets of the Washington machine. Anybody who is a real threat to the establishment (like Ron Paul was) gets totally blacked out and ignored by the media. Trump has been the polar opposite of that, with 24/7 coverage for over a year now. They may love to hate him, but mostly they just love that people tune in to see the latest controversy. Trump has been a savior to the media, giving them plenty of things to talk about instead of Hillary's problems. And he thrives on the attention, no matter that it's largely negative. His career for the better part of the last decade has been getting his face on TV, no matter the context.

Some more Trump signs have popped up around here in the last two weeks. A handful of Clinton signs as well. I've put up some Gary Johnson signs and I noticed one other house on a main street with a Johnson sign too. We get together with some extended family for dinner every few weeks. They are mostly republican, but Grandma was a die-hard Hillary supporter going into this election. Without me prompting the conversation at all (I overheard it from the next room), all of the republicans said there is no way they are voting for Trump. One of them asked if anybody knew about the third party candidate (they couldn't remember his name), they had just heard that he was going to be on the ballot in all 50 states, the first time that has happened in over 20 years. They then quizzed me about it and I gave them some background on Gary Johnson, the good and the bad. They all want to see him in the debates, sounds like at least two or three will vote for him since they don't like Hillary or Trump. The next day my die-hard Hillary supporting grandmother called and asked if I could get a Gary Johnson sign for her yard . These are mostly older folks with no internet, with their news coming only from the TV and newspaper, but who vote every time. All it took was the mention of a third option they didn't know existed to get them interested in the election again. Johnson getting onto the debate stage in front of a large TV-only audience...I think it could really shake up the poll numbers if it happens.

All of these disaffected democrats and republicans getting behind the libertarian candidate is certainly some new territory. I am not sure how it will play out for the liberty movement in the long run, but it is certainly getting the LP on the map this year. There are a wide range of disagreements on the details when it comes to the liberty movement and there has always been infighting within libertarians and the LP. Trump supporters talk about Hillary being a known evil and Trump being a wildcard worth taking a chance on. Well, I don't think Trump is really that mysterious, I think it's pretty clear who he is, and I'd much rather gamble on Gary Johnson than Donald Trump, if that is the strategy we're resorting to in this election.

The last time I did the iSideWith poll was about two months ago, I expanded every category and question to answer as precisely as possible.

isidewith.JPG (82.46 KiB) Viewed 1622 times

I'll check back on this thread again next week sometime. I spend too much time here if I look at it every day

[Treetop]

The Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act was passed despite overwhelming opposition from economists. President Hoover signed it into law in 1930 because people believed it would promote domestic industry. Turns out, all it promoted was a trade war with the rest of the world. Exports fell by 66%. GDP fell by 50%. And unemployment rose from 8% to 25%. America plunged further into the Great Depression.

Milton friedman mentioned in the same section as this quote didnt think that tariff caused the great depression.

I get that Johnson isn't libertarian enough for some libertarians, but when they argue that Trump is a better choice for libertarians than Johnson, they lose all credibility.

Didnt exactly argue that. I pointed out nothing in johnsons record and many current stances are simply not libertarian at all, especially his "co president". That is a separate topic then why I want Trump to win. I kept making a case for Trump and protectionism and you kept telling me I wasnt a libertarian. LOL Either is johnson who agrees with the "populist" Sanders 73% of the time. You kept arguing Trump isnt a real republican, but johnson isnt a real libertarian by his record or even most current stances. So np if you dont agree, but it makes perfect sense why I pointed out that johnson isnt libertarian and why I dont care what label he has, I like Trump the best in this race.

Just kidding, that’s not what happened at all. In fact, as the world has become more capitalist and more globalized, the quality of life for the average person, and especially for the average poor person, has increased substantially. In 1990, 37% of the global population lived on less than $1.90 per day. By 2012, that number had been reduced to 12.8%, and in 2015 it was under 10%. The source of this progress isn’t a massive wealth redistribution program; it’s massive wealth creation — that is, economic growth.

Interesting way to frame this. This is a global based stat, domestically however we lost a large segment of our middle sustainable middle class. Instead we use debt and fractional reserve banking and essentially hide the massive hole these policies left in our economy. Without that few would be arguing any of this was good for the first world. Even a decent segment of our industry an production we still have is either behind protectionist policy still or subsidized or supported by the other inflations in our economy. Fractional reserve banking and the rest of the things inflating us.

During this same period they talk of greater global "equality"??? They forgot to mention that the nations that built middle classes in this period ALL used protectionist policies. As did all the nations that built a middle class (now inflated with debt) before this period. You always see your side of the argument portrayed the same way with the same talking points but they ignore the actual world we live in. Yes taking mostly first world industry to the third world and paying very low wages by first world standards brought alot of work to the third world. Where would WE be however if not for our debt based economy we have now? I think what isnt clicking for you is you grew up i a heavily subsidized and inflated paradigm. Just step back for a minute and imagine we werent inflating our economy in all the ways we do, 30-40% smaller overall? I mean you posted links acting like there are no examples of protectionism building an economy, but Ive given several in a bit of detail so why the disconnect? In fact out of the all the emerging markets all those rising the fastest use protectionism, mostly to their benefit, although there are a few poor examples as well. So clearly these quoted sources are not looking at it honestly, or they are selling an idea for a reason I guess. We have less people in the workforce then any time since the late 70s even though the population is much bigger today and a higher percentage of both sexes are seeking work. This is the case even IN our inflated economy.

In fact, a paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), specifically examined how trade reforms facilitated by GATT affected the economic development of the reforming countries. In the paper, the authors compared the trends in economic growth before and after trade reform in the reforming countries. Then they compared those results to trends in economic growth of a control group of countries which didn’t undergo trade reform.

What they found was very encouraging for proponents of free trade. Prior to reform, the economic development of reformers and non-reformers was practically identical, but after reform, the economic development of reforming countries accelerated while non-reforming countries saw their economies stagnate and decline. The results suggest that the reforms towards freer trade lead to an increase in income per capita of around 20% in the long-run, an effect so large that it almost certainly had a positive and non-trivial impact on poverty reduction.

Okay lets put some of this in laymens terms. They used gross generalizations to sell their case. This is the type of thing the IMF will tell you, but in the many countries I looked into, the actual shape of this is often the first world getting cheap factory labor or mining or foods etc. The countries the IMF used the debt of a nation to force into the "freest" trade deals suffer the most and while they may have work they arent building much real capitol. I will be posting examples here eventually. The nations using protectionism however grew much more then this listed 20% the last few decades. I have spent a fair amount of time tracing out the actions of the IMF in the past. Looking at individual nations economies was a big part of that. I do honestly think when/if I get around to doing this topic justice I might actually convince you. Gross generalizations like the above arent giving the full picture of how what they said has played out in the real world, and where it leads. In a very real way these things have put much of the third world on the plantation. All under the banner of trade liberalization. Me just saying this means little without examples, I will get to that here eventually.

[IdahoCopper]

Hillary supporters got great news this week. Her medical records show she is on Coumadin! It is prescribed as a blood thinner to prevent blood clots. It started out as rat poison.

This is proof positive that Hillary cannot be a rat! If she was, she would be dead.

We should soon hear shouts from the rooftops, "Hillary is not a rat!" as her supporters gleefully spread this important proof.

[Treetop]

It is also worth noting that the same type of economists telling us how great it is to exploit the resources and cheap labor of the third world because it gives them a boost to their economy, while ignoring and glossing over the myriad of nations that built real and actual wealth and a middle class with protectionism are the same type that will tell you we are CURRENTLY growing instead of debt and inflation based growth. They single out the few times protectionist mindsets hurt the economy and ignore it is the only way any nation built a middle class in the global industrialized economy. (if you know of a nation that built a middle class without protectionism it is the extreme outlier and please post it so I can study them) They are the same type to insist the first world benefited from gutting industry because of cheap goods and look the economy is still growing!! lets us ignore that it would be shrinking sharply without all the debt, embedded inflation and fractional reserve banking which simply isnt sustainable at the current levels. You can safely use fractional reserve banking to a certain degree but not the current level. So forgive me if I dont put much stock in much these types of authority figures say. They have to ignore vast swaths of reality to make their case.

I mean they essentially argued above, "hey look the part of the third world that opened itself up to exploitation of resources and labor grew 20% free trade works!!". While as I said literally ignoring that the part of the third world that protected their industries built real wealth if they had an industrious population and embraced free market/free enterprise. Well beyond 20% growth. Obviously the socialist end of this spectrum with protectionism without free enterprise fails horribly, that isnt what I am talking about. History will judge these so called "experts" on the economy as mostly crack pots with very short term mindsets. The founders of the US got it right. If we had stuck with their mindset on international trade, and division of power (states rights etc) and control of money supply we would be in a much better place for the longterm.

I basically already said it, but it is baffling to see you insist because of his past stances Trump is not a republican (historically republicans/conservatives were more protectionist) Yet as I pointed out nothing in Gary Johnsons actual record as a politician hints at libertarian ideals at all. Not even legalizing pot, the libertarian stance is generally legalize all drugs as Trump has said in the past. His biggest claim to it would be vetoing many things and pushing for tax breaks. Which in the end rose the debt faster here in NM then any governor before or after him here and most other states. This isnt just an attack on johnson, but supporting johnson imo clashes with much of your stance about Trump. It seems your main reason to like him would be a few speeches that his actual history doesnt support and the fact he has a L next to his name on the ballot. That is great and all, I want trump to win but wont fault anyone for their vote for anyone whatever their reasoning. It rings a bit hollow though given the way you talk about Trump.

Our trade imbalance is not something to be taken lightly. It would already be crushing us if not for machinations that are also not sustainable and will crash around us in time. The same type of economist insisting protectionism is always bad (while ignoring when done right it works much better then the trade liberalization they champion) are the same ones insisting real wealth is growing in the US when we are actually bleeding out wealth at astonishing rates and can gloss over it because of the ways we manipulate the economy and dollar.

All this said, Im NOT going to say and never have that every brand of protectionism works well in all cases, but the results are clear the more nations economic histories I look at, it clearly works. Most libertarian ideals are spot on, but they are simply wrong on free trade between nations and open borders. Assuming you dont want to live in the third world for the sake of freedom. Imagine if we cut off all the foodstamps so many rely on and other welfare which supports tens of millions currently as libertarians wanted, and totally open borders, with no restrictions at all (keep in mind we are STILL rather protectionist by international standards) on trade. I personally see it as obvious if we got those three things right now wed be brazil in half a generation if we were lucky. Except with way more riots and gang violence.

The founders of the US got protectionist mindsets right. Obama put tariffs on specifically one nation for tires and solar panels. That isnt the right way to do it. It is interesting how proponents of free trade point mainly to a handful of times protectionism caused issues while just ignoring it works. It is what kick started the american industrial revolution and then buffered it so we had a much higher pay and quality of life then the other industrial nations of that era. Many people dont realize this but even in our early industrial era with many factories being close to sweatshop conditions the US workers made much more then their european counter parts in most cases. We wont be able to live on debt and ride on the back off a dollar that is reserve currency to the world forever though. We have a long way down to go yet, but if done well protectionism can ensure we dont have to meet the third world close to the middle.

[Thogey]

Still taking bets. Even money.

A RAYSIS will be elected president.

They, I think, have finally worn it [racist] out.

Trump's boot is on her neck (don't freak, it's an expression). But anything could happen.
Hillary might find Trump's teenage illegal mexican lover.

[Country]

I just did the iSideWith poll, and I expanded every category and question to answer as precisely as possible. A long while back, I was an ardent Obama supporter. I see that my viewpoint has drastically changed over recent years. I think more than anything is my distaste for the establishment and how evil it can be.

I got an 87% for Gary Johnson. I voted for him last time. Do you think he'll ever appear as the third debater? Last third debater that comes to my mind was Ross Perot awhile back. I think he got 20% of the vote when he ran for President in 1992.

[Treetop]

Yeah perot got close to 20%, was polling around 40% though before he dropped out then rejoined. He was in the lead.

[Treetop]

I wonder how accurate the Isidewith questioning could be. All three candidates (meaning trump, clinton and johnson not sure with the others) have discrepancies with their recent stances versus their records. It didnt really cover the major core platforms of most of the candidates either.

[Treetop]

For someone who bills himself as an "outsider," he sure is worried about protecting the (illegal) secrets of the Washington machine. Anybody who is a real threat to the establishment (like Ron Paul was) gets totally blacked out and ignored by the media. Trump has been the polar opposite of that, with 24/7 coverage for over a year now. They may love to hate him, but mostly they just love that people tune in to see the latest controversy. Trump has been a savior to the media, giving them plenty of things to talk about instead of Hillary's problems. And he thrives on the attention, no matter that it's largely negative. His career for the better part of the last decade has been getting his face on TV, no matter the context.

Of course he is an outsider. You couldnt not cover the republican candidate. Most of this media is ignoring a range of very damaging things for clinton, and making huge deals out of often nonsense about Trump. Even "establishment" republicans have turned on him, which the same media made a huge deal out of when in poling trump actually pulls more democrats support then hillary pulls republican support. If Ron Paul had won the republican nomination theyd be making the case he was whacky or whatever else as they always do with him when they have to cover him. Just like they raked johnson over the coals for not knowing what aleppo was. Hillaries whole platform in running has been to stay out of the media as much as possible, never answer questions, and raising lots of cash. I know lots of people who think state secrets should stay secret, none of them are insiders. Anyone who knows a few military people does. This isnt new either, "loose lips sink ships" was an idea pushed during ww2.

He is literally NOT getting the massive donations from all the lobbyist type sources as EVERY other candidate from a major party has done for many decades. So none of the insiders seem to think Trump is an insider. Or if they consider him an insider they sure dont think he is willing to play their game, or else theyd hedge bets like they always didnt in the past and support him as well. Did you see how much they spent trying to crush Trump in the primaries? I forget the numbers but it was recording breaking. Jeb bush started the nomination process with 150m from insider types which is like 3x more then trump spent at all.

and Trump being a wildcard worth taking a chance on. Well, I don't think Trump is really that mysterious, I think it's pretty clear who he is, and I'd much rather gamble on Gary Johnson than Donald Trump, if that is the strategy we're resorting to in this election.

I think it is obvious as well. Still a gamble though. He has publicly talked of cleaning house in washington since I was a child, even as he took advantage of it. He has complained about our crony capitalist trade deals since it became a thing. No reason to pretend they have anything to do with free trade. We know johnson as well, who ran a state horribly. Who couldnt even run a libertarian ticket campaign in the black. We also know he has no problem signing over national sovereignty for the sake of a crony capitalist trade deal sold as "free trade". You were right when you said there is lots of speculation on what this trade deal means, but no speculation as to whether or not it signs away national sovereignty to international courts, that is key in the document. Heck the dude wont even say illegal immigrant, which means if he won it would continue and florida will soon go from being a swing state to blue and texas will go blue and republicans wont be winning at all unless they really change their platforms far beeyond Trump wanting social programs that work.

To each their own though.

[Treetop]

http://blogs.wsj.com/moneybeat/2016/08/ ... their-own/

Along with his comments about the dollar, Mr. Trump has expressed appreciation for the gold standard, and mused about reinstating a gold-backed currency. “Bringing back the gold standard would be very hard to do, but boy would it be wonderful. We’d have a standard on which to base our money,” the Republican nominee told The Scene, a property of Conde Nast Entertainment.

[johnbrickner]

http://blogs.wsj.com/moneybeat/2016/08/30/in-donald-trump-gold-bugs-see-one-of-their-own/

Along with his comments about the dollar, Mr. Trump has expressed appreciation for the gold standard, and mused about reinstating a gold-backed currency. “Bringing back the gold standard would be very hard to do, but boy would it be wonderful. We’d have a standard on which to base our money,” the Republican nominee told The Scene, a property of Conde Nast Entertainment.

Reminds me of Harry Brown who used the word "imagine" in a memorable speech. Imagine this, imagine that, while painting a libertarian culture and society here in America and what a LP presidential candidate would do. Faneuil Hall was packed with the Party Loyal and Harry was a great speaker. Later donations were collected and that day was the largest single day fundraiser in Party history. A very proud moment for the activists involved who made it happen. When all said and done with, donors were left wondering how the money was spent. Harry only said "imagine".

But imagine "boy, would it be WONDERFUL"

Don't buy into the dream planted seed. Don't let it sprout in your mind. It's only a dream planted into your brain by a guy trying to get your hard money values vote. Vote for him if you choose to, but don't let the seed take root it's the kind of planting politicians do.

[hobo finds]

https://youtu.be/FECIYlo3KRY

[Treetop]

Kind of a strange response there John, imo. It wasnt a dream planted seed. He said outright we couldnt really pull it off which is pretty obvious. It is interesting that he has such a mindset though. You would have to crash the current paradigm to get to a place something backed our currency I think. Or do it after this paradigm falls under its own weight.

We all know a president cannot do most of what they want anyway, although I think Trump might have more success at getting things done then most leaders. Or not, time will tell. I still think it is his election to loose even more then when I worded it that way a few weeks back. If I mis read Trump? oh well, I know how corrupt hillary is and that she can be bought and sold, taking orders from the likes of soros even.

[Treetop]

http://graphics.latimes.com/usc-preside ... dashboard/

This is pretty interesting and will be amazing if it holds until election day. According to this poll (which is always within a few points of others I have tracked) Trump is now pulling in 20% of the african american vote. (hillary at 71% instead of 90+) This shift happened over a few days.

[johnbrickner]

Kind of a strange response there John, imo. <snip>

It's possible you might be missing the psychological subtlety implied in his words. When he says "boy wouldn't it be wonderful" those who are unaware (or might I say blind followers or those who would respond without thinking, the click whirrrr goes the brain types?) would be prone to imagining how wonderful it would be if for no other reason than Trump said the words that would make someone wonder how wonderful it would be. We being the hard money types might find great pleasure in being back on the gold standard. Especially given our stacking behavior.

It is no stretch that hard money Trump followers (or even not yet followers) would then associate those pleasant feelings with Trump. Perhaps then even feeling or thinking that Trump is pro-gold standard and promotes it. A pretty good reason to cast a vote that direction one might think.

A closer look at the article and his words show nothing of the sort. He has appreciation for the gold standard and some musing about it. When he says "boy wouldn't it be wonderful" it could be "boy wouldn't it be wonderful?" or even "boy wouldn't it be wonderful" (in your eyes/to you).

Once any person responds by wondering or even imagining of what it would be like to be on the gold standard as a result of Trump's words "boy wouldn't it be wonderful" the seed is planted. How it takes root depends on how fertile the soil of the person's brain it falls on, is. Or perhaps how flexible their minds are to suggestion.

I at no time, infer you are one of the above I describe. I have way to much respect for you to think so.

[Treetop]

I dunno. The guy has a long history of liking gold but never acted like it was part of his policy platform at all nor has any source Ive seen portrayed it as if he did. Ive watched a good majority of his speeches as well never saw him mention it. It would take a rather special kind of person to both be capable of reading, and also think trump was pushing for it just because he said our currency backed by something would be good.

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/poll-donald ... nd-states/

According to this Trump is tied across 13 "battleground" states. Several of these are not generally battleground states at all though.

[IdahoCopper]

Actively promoting a gold/silver standard for US money will get you shot ala Kennedy/Dallas style.