UPDATE: Tom Perkins has now published the defense of Carly Fiorina that she needed. He had to do it as a full page ad since they would not accept a response. This is the answer and puts her in place to catch the debris if Trump blows up.
“Not only did she save the company from the dire straits it was in, she laid the foundation for HP’s future growth,” reads the ad, which is signed by Tom Perkins, a member of the HP board during much of Fiorina’s tenure and the founder of California venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers. “I have no question that Carly is a transformational leader who uniquely has both vision and the expertise to implement it.”
Peggy Noonan has a column today that has lots of people talking.
I have been pessimistic about the future of the country for a while. Recently, I have been very pessimistic.
One of the arguments for the impossibility of an event is lack of previous failure. “It never failed before and thus can never fail ever”. The Washington Post’s editorial board invokes a variant of this logic to refute Donald Trump’s border policy, arguing there are so many illegal immigrants it is too expensive to deport them all, leaving no alternative but to accept more.
Naturally, the WaPo is certain they know what could happen.
A useful case study is California, whose economy accounts for about 13 percent of U.S. gross domestic product and whose 2.6 million undocumented workers include almost a tenth of the state’s workforce.
Well, guess what ? Peggy is talking to Hispanics.
Something is going on, some tectonic plates are moving in interesting ways. My friend Cesar works the deli counter at my neighborhood grocery store. He is Dominican, an immigrant, early 50s, and listens most mornings to a local Hispanic radio station, La Mega, on 97.9 FM. Their morning show is the popular “El Vacilón de la Mañana,” and after the first GOP debate, Cesar told me, they opened the lines to call-ins, asking listeners (mostly Puerto Rican, Dominican, Mexican) for their impressions. More than half called in to say they were for Mr. Trump. Their praise, Cesar told me a few weeks ago, dumbfounded the hosts. I later spoke to one of them, who identified himself as D.J. New Era. He backed Cesar’s story. “We were very surprised,” at the Trump support, he said. Why? “It’s a Latin-based market!”
What is going on ?
On the subject of elites, I spoke to Scott Miller, co-founder of the Sawyer Miller political-consulting firm, who is now a corporate consultant. He worked on the Ross Perot campaign in 1992 and knows something about outside challenges. He views the key political fact of our time as this: “Over 80% of the American people, across the board, believe an elite group of political incumbents, plus big business, big media, big banks, big unions and big special interests—the whole Washington political class—have rigged the system for the wealthy and connected.” It is “a remarkable moment,” he said. More than half of the American people believe “something has changed, our democracy is not like it used to be, people feel they no longer have a voice.”
I could not agree more. I keep recommending Angelo Codevilla’s essay in American Spectator. I even saved it on this blog because Spectator dropped it for a while. Now it seems to have become such a topic of conversation that it is back on their web site.
I have even been saying that we need a revolution, and maybe it is coming.
“It is accepted that primary schools have increasing numbers of pupils, which causes all manner of problems, but what is frequently not referred to is why we have such a boom in numbers.
“And the answer is unlimited immigration into this country. It hits some areas harder than others but there cannot be many primary schools in the country which have not been affected at all,” said Mr Nuttall, UKIP Education spokesman.
Wow ! That is Britain ! I will be in Britain in little more than a week and it will be interesting to have this conversation with my friends, a retired British Army physician and his wife. We will go to Belgium while avoiding the Chunnel to avoid rioting at Calais as “migrants” try to invade Britain though the Chunnel in search of the Dole.
This might even be the start of the West trying to save itself from the predicted Suicide.
In 1964, as today, it is very easy to see how a thinking person might see the intellectual drift to the left as a move toward societal suicide. For liberalism is a cry for the supremacy of general good intentions over the practical application of common sense. Burnham said that liberals are often driven by “profound non-rational, often anti-rational sentiments and impulses.” Ideas like the welfare state and leniency on criminals to facilitate rehabilitation may have sounded good coming out of the mouth of a liberal, but they were disastrous in practice.
Burnham’s book, “Suicide of the West”, was in effect a warning that leftward drift would ultimately destroy all affluence and freedom in the world. Fortunately, many of the readers of his book heeded Burnham’s cry and helped stem the leftward movement of policy and ideas in America.
Is it ending ?
Somebody paying attention to Enoch Powell finally?
To Mrs. Davis – It is very unfortunate that Enoch Powell was not heeded in his time. If he had been the problems he foresaw could have been avoided easily and peacably. Now it is probably too late for that.
“I will throw in here that almost wherever I’ve been this summer, I kept meeting immigrants who are or have grown conservative””more men than women, but women too.”
Because of where I live – the Chicago area – I encounter a lot of different ethnic groups and immigrants. There’s no avoiding Latinos because they fill the majority of entry level jobs, blue collar and pink collar jobs. The ones I meet – not the criminal or gang types but working class people – are Catholic and socially conservative and have families, often supporting extended families. They’ve been politically captured by the local Chicago Democratic Machine, but they certainly diverge greatly from the national platform’s ideology. I know it’s a different story in California, but in Chicago their religious and community ties and their work ethic don’t fit the Democratic narrative. Obviously Trump isn’t going to swing the Illinois Hispanic vote to the GOP anytime soon, but he’ll make it much more interesting around here than anyone thinks.
The other big immigrant groups you see are South Asians, Poles, and Assyrians. They’re all mostly at the far end of conservative, both socially and politically. Through some clever gerrymandering and neighborhood re-configuring they’ve all been politically marginalized and neutralized. In the short term, it’s worked to silence any potential opposition, but in the long term I see a lot of changes brewing. Especially Assyrians. My God, they fled catastrophe and genocide in the their homeland only to come to the US and see a naive Muslim-centric leader elected. Their not happy about it.
In terms of European immigration I wonder how many have seen this video of hungry Muslims refusing Red Cross assistance as they perceive it as being Christian. This is a truly bizarre video showing what a substantial cultural clash that is occurring. In the meantime Europeans are converting their churches into museums or coffee shops.
https://www.facebook.com/240638706109428/videos/479634978876465/?pnref=story
>>hungry Muslims refusing Red Cross assistance as they perceive it as being Christian.
Looked pretty well fed to me. Tell ’em to go back to where they came from.
“Rigged the system for the wealthy and connected”….the Democratic strategy is to try to focus this feeling on the “wealthy” part while distracting from the “connected” part.
Even the NY Times is starting to notice the crisis in Europe.
The United Nations refugee agency report said the number of refugees and migrants crossing the Mediterranean to reach Europe had reached 310,000 this year, up from 219,000 in 2014.
Close to 200,000 people have landed in Greece this year and around 110,000 more have reached Italy, Melissa Fleming, a spokeswoman for the refugee agency told reporters in Geneva.
Why we cancelled our trip to Greece.
hungry Muslims refusing Red Cross assistance as they perceive it as being Christian.
Then wrap it in bacon and tell them eat it or starve. I’m well beyond caring about muslims any more.
The Left will never surrender without a bloodbath. Just look at the blood they loosen when they win.
I feared a bloodbath would be necessary to overturn this lawless regime. Trump is certainly stirring up both sides. If Democrats also support him, the revolution might be avoided. An attempt to impeach Obama would certainly have led to a bloodbath with the demagogues of the left leading it.
“The Left will never surrender without a bloodbath. Just look at the blood they loosen when they win.”
Then give it to them.
hungry Muslims refusing Red Cross assistance as they perceive it as being Christian.
Whence comes pride?
I don’t claim any special expertise on Carly Fiorina. This quote:
paints her one way. I know of her from two things. First, as head of HP, she bought Compaq and promptly laid off 30,000 people. Which may or may not have been justified in a business sense. But which will certainly be brought up in any general election. After that, HP stock fell 50%, and the board fired her. Which is not a particular endorsement.
As far as HP itself, I disposed of my last HP printer with an 8 lb. splitting maul, and will never have another. But I don’t know whose tenure it was made in.
Second, she ran for US Senate in California. Granting that the Republican party in California is moribund, but it was not an inspiring campaign.
I would like to see her promoted from the kiddie table at the debates to see what she can do, but I do not start from any high expectations.
As far as the wave of invasions by Muslims of European countries, there may be the beginning of a resistance, but this is Europe. It will be either too little, too late [modern history shows that to be more likely] or it will be man on horseback time. Draw your itinerary carefully, even in Britain.
Subotai Bahadur
Trump’s tone – one I find grating – has an energy that the evasive political class doesn’t; that’s energizing. Bombast isn’t leadership but then the lengthy squid ink bursts of Obama weren’t evidence of thought, either. I can see why people are attracted to Trump – and surely few must appreciate his lack of political honesty (I have my doubts that it is honesty – but it seems only transparently manipulative) more than legal immigrants often coming from cultures in which the consequences of a break with political correctness are harsher than ours. And those of us long here find it more “our” way of speaking than the vocabulary of the local diversity czar. But his “solutions” to health care, immigration, entitlement reform, Iran, the Ukraine are about as thin as his skin.
I suspect Americans retain a sense of survival. We had a huge influx between 1880-1920. That, too, pushed the limits of assimilation. And so the country closed its borders. Income disparities increase during those periods: economically as well as culturally assimilation takes time & effort. It is discouraged by a welfare state and diversity programs. Closing the borders now seems overdue. Controlling the legal influx would help as well – overstayed visas are also contributing to the problem. I’m unclear whether controlling visas necessarily means limiting legal immigration.
Some of the worries about Common Core and the AP history standards comes from the sense that our government retards rather than encourages identification with America, national pride, and assimilation.
My husband spends a lot of time on ethnic projects; they aren’t my ethnicity and I can tire of them, but meetings that always open with a pledge of allegiance to America, if often the singing of both national anthems indicates an appreciation and pride in this country that is accompanied with a sense of fellowship and identity. That can work. This attitude grew out of the assimilation that happened in mid-20th century. It was intensified, I suspect, by WWII and Korea where the 2nd & 3rd generations of those massive groups served together. Not that we really want to replicate that experience.
And if anyone doubts that the left has no trouble with bloodbaths we can look abroad to attitudes toward Castro and Iran or domestically toward Baltimore and Chicago (and that’s not even mentioning the idle speculations of Bill Ayers as well as Stalin).
Mike – you are a long term Californian – I forget the prop # but it was an initiative to deny state funds to people here illegally – it won convincingly – including a large block (don’t remember if it was a majority) of Hispanics.
As is typical, the losers went to the 9th circuit and got them to overturn it.
I am ambivalent on Trump. I like the fact that he isn’t afraid to say things not “PC” but if actual record suggests we might get someone we didn’t bargain for.
Trump appeals to ones knee jerk reaction to illegals but Carly seems to make the most (doable) sense.
It was Prop 187 and passed with 2/3 vote.
I would leave in a New York minute but my kids and grandkids are here, except my youngest who is smart enough to move to South Carolina and loves it.
I would much rather live in Tucson. I don’t sail anymore and the housing prices are 1/3 of Orange County. I know it well and like it better.
I am respecting Trump more but I still think he may implode. Carly looks good to me. Walker is my favorite but needs to up his game.
“But which will certainly be brought up in any general election. After that, HP stock fell 50%, and the board fired her. Which is not a particular endorsement.”
Tom Perkins pretty much answered those questions.
HP is still in business and I am told the server business is mostly a remnant of Compaq’s DEC line. Remember that she started just before the dot com collapse.
I am off to Europe in a week and am so glad we decided not to go to Greece. The change cost a couple of thousands but it looks like nightmare,