Category Archives: Trump

Alan Greenspan on Trump and globalism

globalization is a very major source of forward motion

Video clip starts at 3:15:

Published on Nov 9, 2016 Evan Davis spoke to the former president of the Federal Reserve, Alan Greenspan. What’s his reaction to the result of the US presidential election – and Donald Trump’s victory?

Evan Davis: Do you think looking back on the last 30 years, globalism… for want of a better word, went too far?

Alan Greenspan: No, I do not. I think that globalization is a very major source of forward motion.

At the Conference on Bank Structure and Competition, sponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois May 6, 2004 Remarks by Chairman Alan Greenspan Globalization and innovation

Entitlements

Greenspan agrees with the President of the “Council on Foreign Relations” about entitlements.

Social Security alone consumes nearly a quarter of the federal budget. [1]

“The soaring costs of entitlement programs, including Social Security and Medicare, must be reined in. If we don’t bring that under control, everything else we’re doing is irrelevant.” [2]

Advice to Congress

Dr. Haass, President of “Council on Foreign Relations”, is the author or editor of twelve books on American foreign policy and one book on management. His next book,  A World in Disarray: American Foreign Policy and the Crisis of the Old Order, will be published in January 2017 by Penguin Press. His advice to Congress:

United States public debt is fast approaching $14 trillion. It is now equal to roughly 75 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) and in a decade will reach between 80 and 90 percent of GDP. Depending on spending and revenue assumptions, it is a matter of when, and not if, debt comes to exceed GDP. This could well happen by 2030.

The mounting debt problem will not only not fix itself but will grow worse. To help relieve the debt burden, the United States will need to reform entitlements including Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security; avoid “false solutions” from Congress, such as the sequester and failing to raise the debt ceiling; and increase economic growth in the United States through education, infrastructure, immigration, and tax reforms.[3]

Score card on US debt and consequences by “Council on Foreign Relations”

The U.S. government faces an unsustainable long-term debt trajectory. The danger zone for U.S. debt is in the long term. At its current rate, the U.S. debt-to-GDP ratio will be higher than all G7 countries except Japan by 2040.

While other large wealthy countries have been cutting their entitlement programs, the United States has left Medicare and Social Security mostly untouched. Recent U.S. budget cuts have instead focused on discretionary spending, which goes toward areas such as education, infrastructure, and research and development—all of which constitute investments in future economic growth.

…entitlements will account (along with interest payments) for nearly all new federal spending in the future.

Getting U.S. public debt on a sustainable path will require more sacrifice from the American public. Ideally, the debt-reduction burden would be shared by all Americans. But one thing is certain—less generous entitlement programs and tax increases will need to be part of any balanced solution.

The politics of reform may be easier to manage if a crisis hits. But the public will be better off if the tough, long-term debt-reduction decisions come sooner rather than later and are guided by prudent planning rather than reaction to a crisis.

Coal communities are dying

Res communes

Mankind is together on our planet circling the sun. We share resources in common. Globalism has a goal of protecting the “res communes” of our planet.

“Res communes”: things owned by no one and subject to use by all :  things (as light, air, the sea, running water) incapable of entire exclusive appropriation [1]

A global scientific consensus has decided that our planet’s climate is being changed from the effects of man. The climate change of a “greenhouse effect” from man-made carbon pollution will raise the global temperature, “global warming”, resulting in disrupted weather patterns and rising sea level.

Graph showing human vs natural influences on rising global temperature on the climate

Human vs Natural Factors in Global temperature change (Environmental Protection Agency)

The globalists have had a push for controlling carbon emission for decades. Dire predictions are forecast if humanity fails to rally behind this cause to save our planet. The published scientific research consensus states that failure to address global warming quickly will result in catastrophic consequences for our planet. Goals have been set and countries have met in global meetings to sign agreements.

President Barack Obama in his State of the Union Address on January 20, 2015 declared…

“No challenge–no challenge–poses a greater threat to future generations than climate change”

Anyone not convinced by this rhetoric or the data are chided and called “climate deniers” or “climate change skeptics”. The argument is to trust quickly followed by dire warnings for failure to do so.

“The best scientists in the world are all telling us that our activities are changing the climate, and if we do not act forcefully, we’ll continue to see rising oceans, longer, hotter heat waves, dangerous droughts and floods, and massive disruptions that can trigger greater migration, conflict, and hunger around the globe.”

“Trust us”

The new President-elect, Donald Trump, is not convinced nor is the Republican Party of the United States.

At  1:15 PM – 6 Nov 2012 Donald Trump tweeted:

The concept of global warming was created by and for the Chinese in order to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive.

Trump says that was a joke, but has continued into 2016 to use the word “hoax” when discussing global warming and considers requirements to limit carbon emissions as a form of economic tax that harms the US ability to compete in the world market. Compliance is changing the choices and economics of energy usage.

Coal: dirty energy source

“The Union of Concerned Scientists” says that coal plants are a “dirty energy source” contributing to global warming and must be phased out. About 25% of the nation’s coal comes from Appalachia.

Burning coal pollutes our environment with toxins, produces a quarter of U.S. global warming emissions, and accounts for a whopping 80 percent of all carbon emissions produced by power generation nationwide.[2]

Donald Trump, denier and skeptic, during his campaign promised to bring back coal miner jobs in the United States and to open up coal mines and remove regulations on carbon emissions. “We’re going to bring back the coal industry, save the coal industry”. This “promise” helped the Republican party win 2/3rd of the votes in the state of West Virginia, which is actually majority Democrat.

Donald Trump holds up miner's helmet at rally in Charleston, WV May 5, 2016 - miner's holding up signs

Charleston, WV May 5, 2016 Charleston Civic Center – ABC News video screen grab

The coal miners want jobs and not hand outs, but coal is a declining industry worldwide and coal mining jobs are being lost across the country.

Coal is a lost cause

Joe Romm, Founding Editor of Climate Progress describes coal industry as a lost cause for the United States.

“There is zero chance Donald Trump or anyone else can reverse the multi-decade decline in coal jobs” [3]

The global warming push dictates that failure to recognize the continued reliance of fossil fuels, coal in particular, will only accelerate an Armageddon from climate change.

“we will be leaving the majority of coal reserves in the ground simply to avoid catastrophic global warming” [3]

American coal miners are losing to other energy sources as “U.S. coal output has declined steadily since 2008, with production in 2015 expected to be at its lowest level since 1986.” [4] Coal still fuels 32% of American’s power production, but is quickly declining and there is a glut of coal stockpiles. [4] Natural gas and shale, wind power and solar are competing with coal. The pressure by “res communes” on global warming puts all fossil fuels in the cross hairs. Environmentalists want coal-fired electricity plants phased out by 2030, saying they are too costly to operate and too harmful to the environment.[4]

“community is not only suffering, it’s dying”

The recent U.S. election showed lies and bias in the media and private meetings by elites presenting agendas contrary to what was presented to the public. Those trying to put food on the table today and distrustful of the veracity of media and their own government or the globalist elites may not be ready to sacrifice themselves for an unknown future. Global warming may flood the coasts and create weather changes in the future. In the present their “community is not only suffering, it’s dying.” [5] as described by an old miner. Donald Trump listened to the out cries of the left-behind US workers with no replacement industry or livelihoods. This “America First” view helped put him over the top in voter turn-out to become the next President of the United States to the chagrin of many globalists. Unfortunately too little too late for the Appalachian coal mining communities and their “way of life”.

[1] Merriam Webster free on-line dictionary

[2]Union of Concerned Scientists – coal power: air pollution

[3] Donald Trump Says He’ll Bring Back Jobs For Coal Miners But He’s Just Blowing Smoke May 2016

[4] “Scientific American” – Is there a future for coal? April 2016

[5] CQ Researcher “Coal Industry’s Future” Vol 26, No 23 June 2016

Video on YouTube: Donald Trump rally at Charleston, WV May 5, 2016 Charleston Civic Center – ABC News May 2016

Graph source: Environmental Protection Agency – “Causes of Climate Change”

Video and Transcript: President Barack Obama State of the Union speech January 20, 2015

Other:

Teach Coal

Coal and climate change Worldcoal.org

Business Insider: “Death of Coal” April 2016

“The Atlantic” – Coal Mining is a way of life by Joe Biden April 2015

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_scientists_opposing_the_mainstream_scientific_assessment_of_global_warming

Additional link – added 12/2/2016

NYT’s Misleading Tale on Lost West Virginia Mining Jobs 11/28/2016

west virginia mining

Coal Mining Jobs in West Virginia (Bureau of Labor Statistics) from article link

 

 

Kissinger appeals to give Trump a chance

“appeal to people to give him a chance”

Published on Nov 11, 2016

The BBC’s Andrew Neil speaks to Henry Kissinger about Donald Trump’s election.

Reality will impose certain requirements, as it does on every President. I’ve been in the Oval office now in 10 administrations and I’ve yet to see the President who escapes the fact that he is part of a continuum and that he cannot reinvent history.

Election result … totally unexpected

Transcript of video – only Kissinger remarks:

Does he have a general direction that he has expressed? I’d say yes.

Does he have a sense of tactical decisions of how he is going to reach these objectives?

The world has been undergoing a huge change even from the period which I had formal responsibility and that change would work itself out regardless of whose President of the United States and who is the leader in Europe. This will have to be faced.

It is compounded by the fact that for about a year now foreign policy has been on hold in the sense that every country has been waiting for the result of the American election and the result being so totally unexpected and now they will have to go back to the drawing board including “we”, so that is a fundamental challenge that any new President would have faced. Trump will face it in an especially acute way, but at the same time you could say there are a number of issues that have not been looked at. Namely how Russia adjusts to an international system in which it has lost a big part of its traditional empire. What the rise of China signifies, so the whole shift of the center of gravity of the world from the  Atlantic towards the Pacific. A situation in the  Middle East  which is characterized by the absence of  any agreed legitimacy for settling. This would have been on the agenda.

Trump has not engaged himself in foreign policy discussions up to now. It is at least one should hope that the magnitude of the problem should lead to reflections that are not the same of those of a day to day election campaign.

You can look at if from 2 points of view. You could say the terror groups may have an incentive to get into a negotiation with the United States which I think would be a bad mistake. But they may so. You can imagine a surprisingly soft line from the terror groups. The more likely reaction will be to do something that will evokes a reaction that the terror groups will widen the split, whatever it is, between Europe and United States and America’s image in the world. I’d lean towards that as my belief.

He is now the President of the United States and he will have to make the key decisions on which a great part of the future of the world depends.

I would say the outlet observers, including people like myself, owe him the opportunity to develop a concept that is related to the questions that you put. I really would appeal to people to give him a chance to develop in relation to a kind of foreign policy that he has not had to consider before. I don’t claim that I have any special insight into what will in fact be the decisions.

A lot of it will depend on the advisers

Old fart Henry Kissinger leaning on a cane coming out of elevator at Trump Tower

Henry Kissinger visits President elect Donald Trump in Manhattan November 17, 2016 – screen grab ABC News

A lot of it will depend on the advisers, but after all the linkage of Europe and the United States grew out of a historical experience. It wasn’t the personal idiosyncrasies, you see, of individual Presidents and so the elements by which that security link was evolved will be given, must be given, consideration.

And all I suggest is that Europe doesn’t approach it with a  preconceived notion.

Reality will impose certain requirements, as it does on every President. I’ve been in the Oval office now in 10 administrations and I’ve yet to see the President who escapes the fact that he is part of a continuum and that he cannot reinvent history. And so, I hope and expect that a dialogue will develop that fulfills, at least, that’s what we should all work for.

http://www.henryakissinger.com/

Who is Henry Kissinger?

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New World Order can be created.

It is a great opportunity, it isn’t just a crisis.

President Barack Obama and Henry Kissinger sitting at a table

President Obama and Henry Kissinger, former Secretary of State. Photo credit: Dennis Brack/Pool/Sipa Press/secpotusipa.004/1011190005

What advice did Henry Kissinger give newly elected President Barack Obama?

Jan. 5, 2009: Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger talks to CNBC’s Mark Haines and Erin Burnett on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange.

Original video on CNBC: New World Order can be created

“The President elect (Barack Obama) is coming into office at a moment when there are upheavals in many parts of the world simultaneously. You have India, Pakistan. You have jihadist movements. So he can’t really say there is one problem that is the most important one.

He can give new impetus to American foreign policy partly because the reception of him is so extraordinary around the world. I think his task will be to develop an overall strategy for America in this period when really a New World Order can be created. It is a great opportunity, it isn’t just a crisis.”

Working together improves globalization

Globalization is not a zero sum game

Jack Ma gives advice to Donald Trump

Andrew Stevens of CNN asks Jack Ma, Chinese billionaire founder and executive chairman of Alibaba Group, what advice he would give to 2016 President-elect Donald Trump.

Video clip begins at 1:12 (1:12 – 1:41)

Quote from 1:12 – 1:41 in video.

“Focus on trade, improve globalization, and improve the relationship and understanding between China and America. We are in 21st century. Working together improves globalization. Working together improves trade. That will help both countries to create more jobs.”

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“trade deals that caused the manufacturing base to go overseas”

Working together with more trade may improve globalization and create more jobs, but more opportunity and jobs in one country may mean losing an industry and jobs in another.

Katie Razzall of BBC visits Federal Mine Number 1 in the Trump heartland of West Virginia. Voting for Trump was a vote for survival and “the last fight, the last stand” for their way of life in coal country. Many feel that “our voices mean nothing” to the globalists.

Video clip begins at 3:19:

Quote from 3:19 – 3:59 in video.

Mike Caputo “International District 31 Vice President” United Mine Workers of America. Democrat, WV House of Delegates

“Let’s be honest, when someone comes in and promises you that they’re going to open factories up again, and they’re going to close trade deals that caused the manufacturing base to go overseas, and they are going to open coal mines again, and you are hurting then you are going to hang onto that ray of hope. So you know, as they say, the truths is in the pudding. We’ll find out in a couple of years whether that comes to fruition or not.”

 

President Trump: How? Now what?

November 9 – 10 / 2016 Some “Council on Foreign Relations” (CFR) member responses – Say what?

Southpark tv cartoon of Hillary Clinton losing election

http://southpark.cc.com/full-episodes/s20e07-oh-jeez

CFR Presidential 2016 transition page – Trump

Goodbye to All That? World Order in the Wake of Trump

Stewart M. Patrick , Senior Fellow and Director of the International Institutions and Global Governance Program – “Internationalist” blog

“Trump won because he recognized and tapped into deep public anxieties about the direction of the United States and its role in the world. Specifically, he understood that a growing number of Americans mistrust globalization, are weary of overseas commitments, and are determined to reassert sovereign control over U.S. borders. The U.S. political and economic establishment consistently underestimated the strength of Trump’s populist appeal, in part because elites (including this author) were not looking in the right places or listening to the right people.”

Special Dispatch from Ian Bremmer: A Trump Presidency

Ian Bremmer – also CFR, founder of “Eurasia Group”

“To say I’m surprised by Donald Trump’s victory doesn’t begin to cover the drama of last night’s upset victory.”

“I thought Trump was going to be defeated”

“a populist surge against the most establishment candidate that could be fielded (Hillary Clinton) combined with even lower democratic party turnout; blossoming mistrust of entrenched leaders and institutions; and yawning inequality impacted only marginally by the recent economic rebound”

The President’s (Economic) Inbox

Robert Kahn, Steven A. Tananbaum Senior Fellow for International Economics, CFR – on blog “Macro and Markets”.

“In any scenario, we are taking U.S. economic policy in uncharted directions. The results are likely to be consequential for the economy for some time to come.”

The President’s Inbox: Building a Government – podcast

Hosts: James M. Lindsay, Senior Vice President, Director of Studies, and Maurice R. Greenberg Chair, CFR
Robert McMahon, Managing Editor, CFR.org
Elizabeth N. Saunders, Visiting Fellow, CFR

Should the world get ready for Secretary of State Bolton?

“The Journal” – Emily Tamkin, Foreign Policy’s John Hudson and Reid Standish contributed (about John Bolton, member CFR,  August 2005 to December 2006, he served as the U.S. permanent representative to the United Nations. 2001 to 2005, he was under secretary of state for arms control and international security.)

“Several names keep popping up on the list to become the top U.S. diplomat in the wake of Donald Trump’s victory Tuesday. They include Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the House and European history buff; Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee; Richard Haas, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations and a former State Dept. official in the George W. Bush administration; and John Bolton, U.N. ambassador under Bush.

Obviously, any one of these men – all veterans of the D.C. swamp Trump said he would drain – could be tapped.”

Behind subscription firewall:

Why a Trump Presidency Might Not Be as Awful as We Fear (Op-Ed)

Max Boot, Jeane J. Kirkpatrick Senior Fellow for National Security Studies, CFR on Foreignpolicy.com (see excerpt) – pay wall

“I can barely believe that I am actually writing those words: “President Trump.” I never thought he was remotely qualified for the highest office, and I never thought he would win. I was obviously wrong about the latter. Now I have to pray that I was wrong about the former.”

What a President Trump Means for Foreign Policy

Elizabeth N. Saunders, Visiting Fellow, CFR on “Washington Post” (see excerpt) – a few free / month

“Donald Trump is the president-elect of the United States. Among many other things, this means he will take charge of U.S. foreign policy. Trump will not manage foreign policy alone, but presidents have a lot of power nonetheless. Here are three things we know about leaders, advisers and foreign policy.”

 

Trump Apocalypse

“Use Your Brain”

Democrats don’t think that Republicans used their brains on November 8th, 2016.

Political sign for voting straight ticket Republican vandalized

All rights reserved (C)

Many are reacting as if Frankenstein’s Monster was elected. They are storming the Trump gates waving signs, crying and chanting “Not My President”.

Others hide in fear and prepare to “fight” perhaps thinking we are in a Zombie Apocalypse. They wonder “Do Republicans have any brains?”

Republicans: Senate – check

Republicans: House – check

Republicans: President – check

Republicans: Supreme Court replacements – check

“Deplorables” – 4

“Social Justice Warriors” – 0

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Trump owes nothing to globalists

Senator from Virginia, Richard Black, holding up newspaper with President Trump election headline

Screengrab from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BsbtFuOIUng

Senator Richard Black, (Republican / VA) on November 10, 2016 interviewed by RT.com

“unlike any president in my lifetime Trump owes nothing… to all these globalist forces”

“tremendous for world peace”

“The main stream media has totally censored our voices. I think now we are going to have a big voice that Trump is going to be in the White House.”

The following text is transcribed from the RT video starting at the 5:23 time stamp.

“The amazing thing about President Trump is that he will assume office and unlike any president in my lifetime he owes nothing to the Republican establishment, to the global oligarchics who rule the world, to the European Union, to NATO, to all of these globalist forces. He doesn’t owe them anything. He doesn’t owe anything to the Wall Street bankers. He doesn’t owe anything to the CEOs of major corporations.

The only people he really owes things to are ordinary people. He has a handful of political figures, like myself, who have supported him from the outset. So it is a totally different dynamic and instead of seeing him immediately pulled into the globalist orbit, you are going to see him set his own course in world affairs. I think that is tremendous for world peace. He will be someone… he is not going to be interested in regime change, overthrowing Libya, Syria, Egypt, Yemen, all of these other places.

Hillary Clinton was bought and paid for by Saudi Arabia and through the Clinton Foundation whatever they said was what she was going to do. She traded on her power as Secretary of State basically sending American troops off as mercenaries to fight for the Saudi Arabians and some of these other people. That is going to be finished.”

Video will start at 5:23 time stamp:

Screen grab from MSNBC on 11/09/2016 Presential election coverage

It’s globalism, stupid!

Remember when Bill Clinton’s 1992 Presidential campaign coined the phrase “It’s the economy, stupid!“? Well, this 2016 Presidential election surprise Donald Trump win over Hillary Clinton has a lot to do with globalism and how globalism has left many Americans behind. Again, it is the economy and disenfranchisement of many hard working Americans. Much of the media seems completely clueless at the outrage and concern for America and the world that spurred on the vote yesterday. There are fundamental philosophical differences of world view and many blame racism and sexism, which I think is an inaccurate opinion of what motivated people to get out and vote. It is about “globalism“.