Showing posts with label J. D. Vance. Show all posts
Showing posts with label J. D. Vance. Show all posts

Monday, July 27, 2026

If Paul Gottfried is going to abopt Marxist categories like Joel Kotkin does, he could at least refrain from conflating the middle class with God's chosen people, the workers and the proletariat, and make up his mind about who's who and what's what

Paul Gottfried never speaks the truth that J. D. Vance is the technocratic class' boy beyond the wildest dreams of Donald Trump for himself.

Vance has no solutions to repair the broken ladder of socio-economic progress. It's his job not to.

Contempt for America’s Middle

... our vice-president has taken note of the stagnant wages and job insecurity of American workers 

... the United States has had a mixed economy, one that the urbanologist Joel Kotkin characterizes as “democratic capitalism,” since the last century

... the present left does not care about workers at all

... It has been left to the populist right to take up the cause of the proletariat, which, whether or not one agrees with all his proposed policies, Vance is at least trying to do

... Kotkin is understandably concerned that “democratic capitalism” is no longer working and that the wages and living conditions of our working class have declined as a result of outsourcing, cheap foreign labor, and treating workers like expendable commodities. In Kotkin’s view, the technocratic class, with both governmental and vast financial connections, is sitting atop the socio-economic pyramid, and both workers and what used to be America’s thriving middle class have suffered from this imbalance of power

... Shapiro mocks Vance for stating that workers should find “spiritual” satisfaction in their labor ...

Colonel Saito couldn't agree more with J. D. Vance. 

 


 

Wednesday, July 8, 2026

Wednesday, July 1, 2026

What was the blockade for then, kicks?

 They haven't got a clue what they are doing.


Sunday, June 28, 2026

J. D. Vance wants you to believe white people got Reagan elected in 1984 but not Nixon in 1972, among other fantasies

In any case he's going with "we're more like Nixon than Reagan".

Alrighty then.

I think they'll be a LOT more like Nixon after November.

Some call this knowing how to get in the headlines, others call it dog-whistling.

Monday, June 22, 2026

Trump's tech-bro tyranny is censoring Trump's critics

Musk Suspends X Accounts Criticizing JD Vance...

I can confirm from personal experience this weekend that this is true after being unaccountably disconnected multiple times just out of the blue and forced to log back in, only to have that process throttled as well. 

AMAZON, GOODREADS restrict reviews of Vance book after savage critiques...

Wednesday, June 17, 2026

What we want is the truth

Can you imagine a Vance presidency?

I can't. 

Vance: Iran Deal Critics "Want This To Go On Until Every Bomb Has Been Dropped Or Until Every Iranian Is Dead" 

Three Iranian tankers exit U.S. blockade as shipowners eye Hormuz in ‘wary disbelief’ 

 ... The U.S. and Iran signed a Memorandum of Understanding on Monday to end the nearly four-month war, with a formal signing ceremony to take place on Friday in Geneva. The pact, whose details have not been disclosed, is expected to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and waive sanctions on Iran’s oil sales. ... 

Update 12:10pm 

Read the 14-point draft agreement between the US and Iran

... The 14-point memorandum of understanding has not yet been officially released but a copy of it was obtained by CNN from a US official.

... A White House spokesperson said the text did not reflect the actual memorandum. 

... The US official told CNN that the text reflects the agreement signed digitally by President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance and Iranian parliamentary speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf on Sunday. 

... Bloomberg earlier published a version of the draft. ...                                          

Update 5:20pm

The CNN story above now contains the official agreement, as of 38 minutes ago.  

Tuesday, June 16, 2026

It's a giant con: They signed a nothingburger with Iran, that's why they're not showing it to us


 
 
It is another desperate ploy to jawbone oil prices down in a world hurtling toward tank bottom.
 
Meanwhile, why did Vance have to sign?
 
Is Trump on his last legs?
 
And we're still dealing with Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf? I thought Trump said all this took extra time because they were trying to find a more moderate faction?
 
It's all BS, MS, Piledhigh and Deep. 
 
 
 
... “Both camps know exactly what is at stake,” said one industry official who frequently interacts with the administration. “The industry folks are intent on making sure that if the worm turns, the White House does not point fingers that the industry did not do enough.”

“Everyone everywhere fully appreciates that the standoff cannot go on for another 30-45 days without the political calculations changing,” the official said.

“The White House knows and understands the severity of the potential situation. … They are politically constricted from saying that publicly.” ...

 

... Both President Trump and Vice President Vance electronically signed a memorandum of understanding with Iran on Sunday, while Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, speaker of the Iranian Parliament, signed for the Iranian side, senior U.S. officials said Monday. ...

 

 Vance: Iran Deal A "Very General Document," We'll Figure Out The Details In The "Technical Negotiation Phase"

Vice President Vance acknowledged that the preliminary U.S.-Iran memorandum is only "about a page and a half" and described it as a "very general document. ... what the MOU does is set up a framework ..."                                   

 

Trump is a terrible judge of character. Ghalibaf is an IRGC fundamentalist.

 


 

Thursday, May 21, 2026

It's amazing that the answer of Donald J. Trump and now J. D. Vance to Senator John Cornyn of Texas is a crook

 

 

... Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) said she couldn’t understand Trump’s thinking, given that Paxton was charged with felony securities fraud and faced a lengthy prison sentence that he managed to avoid by reaching a deal with prosecutors to pay nearly $300,000 in restitution and complete 100 hours of community service.

“I don’t understand. He is an ethically challenged individual,” Collins said of Trump’s support of Paxton, who was charged of defrauding investors in a Dallas-area tech startup. The charges were later dropped after he agreed to a pretrial diversion program. ...

More


Saturday, April 11, 2026

Monday, April 6, 2026

My favorite phrase from this essay: "To the extent that there’s an intellectual foundation for Trumpism . . ."

Very amusing.

There's a lot riding on the outcome of the Hungarian elections for certain "conservatives" next week. 

 Meet the MAGA Intellectual on Hungary’s Payroll: A political theorist who once prophesized a Queen Melania is Viktor Orbán’s envoy to the court of Trump

It's mostly about Gladden Pappin, but is useful for describing the connections between Hungary and other American figures like J. D. Vance, and also the Danube Institute bankrolling Rod Dreher (unmentioned), helmed by National Review veteran John O'Sullivan:

Another English-speaking member of this species is John O’Sullivan, a former speechwriter for Margaret Thatcher. O’Sullivan is the founder and president of the Danube Institute, which receives funding from Orbán’s government and stays relentlessly on message. Last year, the institute put on an event called Is Transgenderism Dying?” With nearly two weeks to go before the election on April 12, the institute hosted a summit featuring a video address by the deputy U.S. secretary of state, Christopher Landau, and in-person remarks from one of his advisers. Weeks earlier, Secretary of State Marco Rubio had traveled to Budapest and told Orbán, “Your success is our success.” The Danube Institute event reinforced that message by giving U.S. diplomats pride of place in the program. “It’s very comforting to know that we have allies like you,” an institute employee told the Americans at the conference’s conclusion.  

Monday, March 30, 2026

J. D. Vance: Republicans have to break the Senate filibuster and destroy the country in order to save it

Remember when W said to CNN's Candy Crowley in December 2008 that he had abandoned free market principles in order to save the free market system?

We got Obama, a foreclosure crisis for six million, banks failed by the hundreds, and jobs didn't recover for six years and five months.

Why is it always the Republicans with these paraprosdokians?