opinion: the futility of identity politics as an answer to the shrinking pie

POSTED BY: 1kiki
UPDATED: Saturday, July 7, 2018 17:55
VIEWED: 2211
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1KIKI

Wednesday, July 4, 2018 3:58 AM

opinion: the futility of identity politics as an answer to the shrinking pie

First of all, I wanted to say how disappointed I am the the traditionally entitled white male was the one to say NO MORE!

If I had to guess, I'd say the reason is because the 'other' categories historically haven't had the luxury of expecting fairness, and had to get work, no matter what. Still ... identity politics is a level of thinking that wouldn't have passed muster in the days of MLK, who envisioned all people living in dignity and sufficiency.

The 'shrinking pie' is one of those problems that is neither democratic nor republican.

Hourly wages plateaued sharply in 1973 during Nixon's second term.

But through both democratic and republican Presidents, and both democratic and republican Congresses, the trend has persisted unabated.

Notice that these figures are for 'production' workers, typically unionized and working full time. If we were to look at composite hourly wages, including temps, 'gig' workers, and 'independent contractors', figures would be lower. To approximate this, household income figures show that real household income has been stagnant for 60% of Americans since about 1965 under Johnson (preceded by Kennedy), and for 80% of Americans since 2000 under Clinton (preceded by Bush).

Meanwhile, the labor force participation rated has been dropping since 1996, the first year of Clinton's second term. Fewer Americans are working.

Looking at the labor force participation rate and household income, we can see that household income remained stagnant despite an increasing number of workers between roughly 1965 and 1992. That means that more people were working to keep household income the same. People were running to stay in place.

later ... called away

REAVERFAN

Wednesday, July 4, 2018 8:16 PM

Well, I'm sure a "return to traditional values," whatever that is, will fix it right up.

SIGNYM

Wednesday, July 4, 2018 9:14 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by reaverfan:
Well, I'm sure a "return to traditional values," whatever that is, will fix it right up.

Argumentative, strawmanning. Please try again.

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake

As long as you insist that everything is the Republicans'/ Democrats' fault, then you fail to grasp the REAL problem with American politics.

America is an oligarchy http://www.fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?tid=57876

REAVERFAN

Wednesday, July 4, 2018 10:05 PM

Yes. Please do.

REAVERFAN

Thursday, July 5, 2018 3:32 AM

They're all commies!

The top image was taken from protesters protesting desegregation. The bottom is the tweet Ron Paul 'accidentally' shared. Same bullshit, different decade.

1KIKI

Thursday, July 5, 2018 3:53 AM

I honestly have no idea what these are portraying. Does the top photo indicate Communism is good because it's not racist, like the people holding the signs seem to be? What is 'cultural Marxism'? What do the 4 men portray? Is the cartoon approving or disapproving?

This is a whole symphony of dog whistles that are going right past me. OBVIOUSLY I need to brush up on my racist/ race-baiting/ red-baiting/ liberal/ conservative/ rhetoric!

SECOND is a troll because it constantly misrepresents what people post, fails to address their actual positions, and resorts to personal attacks when its brain isn't working (which is most of the time).

JEWELSTAITEFAN

Thursday, July 5, 2018 5:44 AM

What shrinking pie? Dollar pie? Employment pie? Something else?

The household income generally seems a supply and demand equation. When women decided that they wanted to work at jobs, like men did, then the supply of labor doubled and the employers could then pay half as much to each. So, more and more, 2 Wage earners per family could make as much as one did previously.

JEWELSTAITEFAN

Thursday, July 5, 2018 5:48 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by 1kiki:
I honestly have no idea what these are portraying. Does the top photo indicate Communism is good because it's not racist, like the people holding the signs seem to be?

Photoshopping is so much fun. Which is why Nazis like RF spend so much time doing it.

1KIKI

Thursday, July 5, 2018 6:20 AM

"What shrinking pie? Dollar pie? Employment pie? Something else?"

The 'means of survival' pie. When you are in this country it means dollars or whatever can be exchanged for food and water, clothing, and shelter. And when you are a person who needs to work for their money (as opposed to someone who can create money out of nothing, or collect profits) it means jobs. And when you are on this planet, it means resources.

A place where money has failed, and food and water have failed:

Military Seizes Control Of Water Supplies As Venezuelan ...
https://www.zerohedge.com/.../military-seizes-control-water-supplies-v
enezuelan-infra...
6 days ago - If there's one group that has benefited from Venezuela's economic collapse, it's the country's military, which has been handed control over ...

Venezuela's army wrings profit from water as nation goes dry - SFGate
https://www.sfgate.com/.../Venezuela-s-army-wrings-profit-from-water-a
s-13023886....
Jun 25, 2018 - Venezuela's army wrings profit from water as nation goes dry ... or police, who also took total control of all public and private water trucks.

SECOND is a troll because it constantly misrepresents what people post, fails to address their actual positions, and resorts to personal attacks when its brain isn't working (which is most of the time).

6IXSTRINGJACK

Thursday, July 5, 2018 6:50 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by 1kiki:
I honestly have no idea what these are portraying. Does the top photo indicate Communism is good because it's not racist, like the people holding the signs seem to be? What is 'cultural Marxism'? What do the 4 men portray? Is the cartoon approving or disapproving?

This is a whole symphony of dog whistles that are going right past me. OBVIOUSLY I need to brush up on my racist/ race-baiting/ red-baiting/ liberal/ conservative/ rhetoric!

SECOND is a troll because it constantly misrepresents what people post, fails to address their actual positions, and resorts to personal attacks when its brain isn't working (which is most of the time).

Quote:
"Cultural Marxism" (both uppercase) is a common snarl word used to paint anyone with progressive tendencies as a secret Communist. The term alludes to a conspiracy theory in which sinister left-wingers have infiltrated media, academia, and science and are engaged in a decades-long plot to undermine Western culture. Some variants of the conspiracy alleges that basically all of modern social liberalism is, in fact, a Communist front group.

Taken from a far left biased site, obviously: https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Cultural_Marxism

I dunno. What do you think? The same guy who posted the image in question to the RWED is the same guy who posted information about over 400 attacks in this country by Trump supporters that was gathered from a reddit group called "/socialism/".

Here's a more realistic look of Cultural Marxism in the US:

Do Right, Be Right. :)

JEWELSTAITEFAN

Thursday, July 5, 2018 8:08 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by 1kiki:
A place where money has failed, and food and water have failed:

Military Seizes Control Of Water Supplies As Venezuelan ...
https://www.zerohedge.com/.../military-seizes-control-water-supplies-v
enezuelan-infra...
6 days ago - If there's one group that has benefited from Venezuela's economic collapse, it's the country's military, which has been handed control over ...

Venezuela's army wrings profit from water as nation goes dry - SFGate
https://www.sfgate.com/.../Venezuela-s-army-wrings-profit-from-water-a
s-13023886....
Jun 25, 2018 - Venezuela's army wrings profit from water as nation goes dry ... or police, who also took total control of all public and private water trucks.

SECOND is a troll because it constantly misrepresents what people post, fails to address their actual positions, and resorts to personal attacks when its brain isn't working (which is most of the time).

Water has not failed, it continues to do what it has always done. Food has not failed.
Venezuela is a spectacular example illustrating the failure of Socialism. Which Libtards gleefully proclaim is a "Republic" under their pretextual definition.

The whole purpose of Socialism, which always has been, is to prevent the populace from having Freedom and therefore independence to acquire water and food they need. The people must wait for the Socialist Government to ration it out.

SECOND

Friday, July 6, 2018 11:05 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by 1kiki:
I honestly have no idea . . .
SECOND is a troll because it constantly misrepresents what people post, fails to address their actual positions, and resorts to personal attacks when its brain isn't working (which is most of the time).

Corporate profits have increased about $600 billion per year, while median earnings have decreased about $600 billion, a decrease of $4,000 per person in annual earnings. As employees get a smaller slice of the pie, the corporation gets a larger slice. That larger slice gets passed to corporate share owners and most of those shares are owned by wealthy people. It is a beautiful capitalistic system for concentrating wealth and income into fewer and fewer hands as time goes forward in America. Only a suggestion: The American government can disrupt the logic of the system if the voters have a correct understanding of how the system works. They could learn here:

www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2018/07/workers-or-profits-american-bus
inesses-chose-a-long-time-ago/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

JEWELSTAITEFAN

Saturday, July 7, 2018 4:33 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 1kiki:
I honestly have no idea . . .
SECOND is a troll because it constantly misrepresents what people post, fails to address their actual positions, and resorts to personal attacks when its brain isn't working (which is most of the time).
Corporate profits have increased about $600 billion per year, while median earnings have decreased about $600 billion, a decrease of $4,000 per person in annual earnings. As employees get a smaller slice of the pie, the corporation gets a larger slice. That larger slice gets passed to corporate share owners and most of those shares are owned by wealthy people. It is a beautiful capitalistic system for concentrating wealth and income into fewer and fewer hands as time goes forward in America. Only a suggestion: The American government can disrupt the logic of the system if the voters have a correct understanding of how the system works. They could learn here:

www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2018/07/workers-or-profits-american-bus
inesses-chose-a-long-time-ago/

Maybe we should play a game.
When we find that Kevin Drum has driveled out another delusional rant, let's predict which unrelated thread will get hijacked by second to propagate the delusion.

6IXSTRINGJACK

Saturday, July 7, 2018 5:55 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by JEWELSTAITEFAN:
Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 1kiki:
I honestly have no idea . . .
SECOND is a troll because it constantly misrepresents what people post, fails to address their actual positions, and resorts to personal attacks when its brain isn't working (which is most of the time).
Corporate profits have increased about $600 billion per year, while median earnings have decreased about $600 billion, a decrease of $4,000 per person in annual earnings. As employees get a smaller slice of the pie, the corporation gets a larger slice. That larger slice gets passed to corporate share owners and most of those shares are owned by wealthy people. It is a beautiful capitalistic system for concentrating wealth and income into fewer and fewer hands as time goes forward in America. Only a suggestion: The American government can disrupt the logic of the system if the voters have a correct understanding of how the system works. They could learn here:

www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2018/07/workers-or-profits-american-bus
inesses-chose-a-long-time-ago/
Maybe we should play a game.
When we find that Kevin Drum has driveled out another delusional rant, let's predict which unrelated thread will get hijacked by second to propagate the delusion.

The numbers themselves aren't a delusion. They're right in the ballpark of numbers that I had researched over a year ago to dispel the myth of an economic recovery under the Obama administration, and there's zero indication that they're not still valid 2 years into Trump's administration.

Where I believe second is delusional is in thinking if we vote for Democrats that anything will change for the better.

I mean... I didn't read the article he linked, but I'm sure that's what the point of it was.

Do Right, Be Right. :)