tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19305198.post6277937499946641403..comments2024-03-27T03:19:11.216-04:00Comments on Assistant Village Idiot: Brexit, Racism, Trump, Part IAssistant Village Idiothttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01978011985085795099noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19305198.post-14835139168796913272016-07-10T18:59:20.152-04:002016-07-10T18:59:20.152-04:00I grew up in a pretty homogeneous suburb. The ver...I grew up in a pretty homogeneous suburb. The very earliest cultural shock I can ever remember getting was at girl scout camp. A fellow camper (she was from Louisiana, practically a foreign country) didn't share the assumptions about how to set the silverware on the communal table that I had previously assumed were universal to mankind. I just couldn't fathom it. It's not that I thought the silverware was important; it's only that I had never previously considered the possibility that that kind of thing wasn't fixed and universal. It didn't become a rainbow-coalition celebration-of-diversity moment or anything, but I suppose it was a healthy development even though I remember disliking the experience intensely.Texan99https://www.blogger.com/profile/10479561573903660086noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19305198.post-14433901555469779782016-07-10T09:13:07.706-04:002016-07-10T09:13:07.706-04:00Just some random thoughts on Brexit. So I am goin...Just some random thoughts on Brexit. So I am going to go off on my own riff re: globalization and regulation. It seems to me that government and big business work in tandem to the greater benefit of the multinational megacorps and the inadvertent disadvantage of small local, regional, and national businesses. <br />Big business is a factor in driving big government and the emergence of international authorities for legitimate reasons. The government has to be large enough to have leverage over the business or industry, otherwise a multinational can extort concessions and play one jurisdiction against another. International governing authorities enable and facilitate trade, ie standardization of paperwork et al. The dilemma is how to balance the conflicting agendas and to protect the public’s interest (health and safety) and not strangle innovation, investment, and growth?<br />So here's the gist: Consider that these decisions are less and less local, by people who have skin in the game and hands on in the trenches knowledge, as opposed to a remote book learned technocrat in another state, country, and on another continent. These bureaucrats have been accused of putting their own class livelihoods and Big Business first over the citizenry. Even this maybe inadvertent, since Big Business can control the debate and is the source of their information. It is always fair to ask "cui bono?<br />As an example, here is a comment from the time of the circular firing squads over the mortgage meltdown but some of the underlying issues may apply. It’s about the disconnect that occurred between the borrower and the lender. What at one time was relatively local (face to face by known entities) link has stretched out across the globe (the lender may live anywhere in the world and has no connection to the borrower). This has over the decades become increasingly true of businesses. The business shareholder has no connection to the community where the plant(facilities) are located and is not a stakeholder. Multinationals to the degree that they are unethical or irresponsible are disconnected from their suppliers and their customers and in a position to do a great deal of local harm without any blowback. Thus, a business decision that creates a disaster for a locality is not a factor. <br />I am just musing on trustand how far it can stretch, I don’t have an end game here. Maybe tribalism is the dominant force in Brexit, not that I think either side is Monolithic. Or, I wonder if the folks who manage our lives from afar would be more trustworthy, if they were from the same tribe? Or, maybe not. Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02288007567973279023noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19305198.post-49239063223949154252016-07-09T17:01:14.562-04:002016-07-09T17:01:14.562-04:00Don't Californicate Oregon! was a bumper stic...Don't Californicate Oregon! was a bumper sticker I read about, in the '70s IIRC. Part of Oregon was, though, and that part controls the big population area, and the state as well, from what I read about it.Sam L.https://www.blogger.com/profile/00996809377798862214noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19305198.post-74264371777135637582016-07-09T16:06:34.643-04:002016-07-09T16:06:34.643-04:00Wow good luck with this, you have your work cut ou...Wow good luck with this, you have your work cut out for you. Just off the top of my head, you seem to focus first on cultural flux, vis a vis immigration, vrs the political flux. That’s understandable since it most readily comes to mind, gets the most media attention, and is the more visceral. But, is Brexit and the like some sort of ethnocentrism run amok, or is it resistance to the decisions regarding daily life being made by remote, unaccountable, and UNKNOWN faceless bureaucrats from afar. Of course, it can be both. And, what happens, when the Globalists and Financialists over promise benefits, that don't pan out for regular folks, despite all the statistics? Is that a factor?Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02288007567973279023noreply@blogger.com