President Biden and Vice President Harris just now heading down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House.
Seventy-two years ago, back in 1949, my father was part of the US Marine Corp honor guard at the inauguration of President Harry Truman.
My Daddy Dearest was 19 years old, and thus not old enough to vote in 1948. If he HAD voted, almost certainly he'd have voted for Republican Tom Dewey NOT "Give Em Hell" Harry. Who
Which didn't matter diddly squat to him on that day. For him, it was a proud day - for himself AND for America.
A day like today.
I still think that, flawed though he was, Truman was probably the best President of the 20th century.
FDR says Hi!
How about Ike. Presided over the final ascent of America to hegemony. Oversaw (I believe, I haven't checked) an unprecedented surge in American personal prosperity. Generally avoided wars. Genial.
I miss the America that benignly ruled the world. We can already see what the future, non-American world is like, where China is entirely ascendant (which it is, already). It is not good
Korea says "hi!"
Actually reinforces my argument. Ike stood up to China. With actual guns. And got at least a decent score draw, arguably a narrow win (given the history of the Koreas ever since)
OK. It is a tiny bit harder when China is the predominant power, economically, and America is secondary and weaker, but Trump managed to combine the worst aspects of appeasement and hostility in one. Derrrrr.
God, I hate to agree with you, but you're spot on in your last line.
Trump folded on China tariffs. He tore down the institutional framework meant to constrain China (the TPP), and he refused to sail a carrier group down the Taiwan strait when he was asked.
He antagonised China, and abetted its rise. And because he never stood up over things that mattered, he jeopardized both Hong Kong and Taiwan.
Harris is the daughter of a Stanford academic, where I suppose she grew up. Quite privileged I'd say, whatever her skin colour color.
She grew up in the flatlands, which was predominantly a black area.
Plus her parents divorced when she was seven, thus Harris has said that when she and her sister visited their father in Palo Alto on weekends, other children in the neighborhood were not allowed to play with them because they were black.
But I love how white dudes in the UK like to say they no so much about how Kamala Harris was privileged and has no experience of racism.
I get the horrible feeling this is going to turn into the new 'Birtherism' of the next few years. Harris is not poor enough and oppressed enough to be considered a proper Black.
Yet more pointless arguments.
Sadly, it is over here as well.
I've been told on more than one occasion that I cannot call myself an ethnic minority because
1) I'm upper/middle class
2) Privately educated/went to a top university
3) Married a white person
4) Have a high income job
5) Father had a high income job
So because of that I cannot experience discrimination, which is nice to know, if only someone had told those EDL supporters in Manchester 2009 who shouted 'You fucking Paki' at me that I'm not a minority.
A very heavy burden of a list. Don't worry though I'll happily continue to discriminate against you because you're TSE. Actually especially so. In emergencies the whole pineapple thing can be visited, but for emergencies only.
Hope that helps
PS. I'm always a little jealous of those of us that have insights through their heritage into other cultures. A friend of mine's grandmother was a proper Zulu when Zulus were Zulus- how cool is that! Unfortunately my Scottish lowlander ancestry is lost to the past. Not sure it'd have been that interesting anyway, but I'd liked to have known.
I know virtually nothing of my heritage, such as it is, as one one side the parents hated the grandparents, and the other the grandparents hated the great grandparents. Made it hard to ask about info.
I'm told I had an alcoholic irish gypsy as a great grandfather, and another great grand relative changed their name from Schwartz to Black and that's it.
That sounds like a joke, but it's actually true. Maybe an ancestry site is the way to go.
That's how I found out that one of my great-grandmothers was Irish. Still plan to visit the stately home where she was born*.
I liked Joe's dialled down speech and the occasionally informal moments in the pomp. They did a very good job today. Lovely to see everyone coming together.
A new era.
If only you were right. I fear it is bollocks.
The Democrats are totally captured by Woke-ism. eg Kamala Harris is now described, even by the BBC, as "Black" (with a definite capital b). In what universe is she black? Seriously. Does it now refer to anyone who is non-white? She is clearly brown. Sorry, Brown.
Frankly, if I were African-American, descended from slaves, I would deeply resent this woman "appropriating" my ancestry of real and terrible suffering. She's Indian and went to Harvard. Yes, she's from a tough-ish background, but it really does not compare to slavery.
How does this nonsense square with the tens of millions of minimum-wage white Americans in Ohio or Arkansas or Lousiane? The Trump voters? Answer: it doesn't
The father of Kamala Harris is a black dude from Jamaica.
Perhaps you should acquaint yourselves with some facts before you embarrass yourself once more.
Or, alternatively, learn something yourself
"Born on August 23, 1938 in Brown's Town, St. Ann Parish, Jamaica, Donald J. Harris is the son of Beryl Christie (Finnegan, through her second husband[citation needed]) and Oscar Joseph Harris, who were of Afro-Jamaican heritage"
Her "Blackness" is pretty tenuous. Unless everyone with black ancestors can claim Blackness?
If anyone who has any Black blood is by definition Black then that includes trillions of Americans. Indeed all of us, as we are all descended from Africans
Hyper race-awareness is a species of madness, a modern possession by demons.
Her father was a black Jamaican, born to other black Jamaicans. What is the chance that her paternal ancestors were slaves? Close to 100%, I would think.
To say she is not Black is absurd. Of course she has Indian heritage too.
It's a completely different experience to being born into a segregated America where you grow up having to sit in coloured seats on buses or use different entrances to buildings. The experience of black Americans is a really horrible story of persecution, I don't think she will have had the same experiences in her life. She will have had a life more along the lines of what a black or brown person experiences in the UK, not comfortable and awful individual encounters with some nasty people but overall one of acceptance and, frankly, indifference to skin colour.
I tend to be very anti-woke, but you are absolutely spot on that the US has a very different experience of race to the UK. And segregation is much more recent than people think.
Martin Luther King was not shot in the distant past; he was shot in 1968. There were seats on buses reserved for whites in the lifetimes of most PBers. And as recently as the 1980s, elite US universities and schools had official "caps" on the number of African America, Jewish and Asian American students they accepted.
America, right now, has a cap on Asian Americans in Ivy League universities (and maybe others, I dunno) for fear that high IQ east Asians will crowd out white and blacks. Sorry, Blacks.
I am directly descended from the estimated 20,000 Homo sapiens - the population of Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire - who crossed from Africa to Europe many years ago. I am therefore black. Soz. I mean, Black
But you say I am not BLACK like Kamala Harris. How do you know? Perhaps you could check me against a colour chart, or put a pencil in my hair? I have no idea.
Because I've seen what you look like.
You couldn't be any more white if your name was Whitey McWhiteface.
I can't believe we're discussing what "proper black" means. How did we get here?
Sadly a reflection that politicalbetting is not immune to ridiculous
It was the same on the night that the capital was stormed. Leon seems incapable of discussing any major political event without turning toward his ignorant cod racism.
I liked Joe's dialled down speech and the occasionally informal moments in the pomp. They did a very good job today. Lovely to see everyone coming together.
A new era.
If only you were right. I fear it is bollocks.
The Democrats are totally captured by Woke-ism. eg Kamala Harris is now described, even by the BBC, as "Black" (with a definite capital b). In what universe is she black? Seriously. Does it now refer to anyone who is non-white? She is clearly brown. Sorry, Brown.
Frankly, if I were African-American, descended from slaves, I would deeply resent this woman "appropriating" my ancestry of real and terrible suffering. She's Indian and went to Harvard. Yes, she's from a tough-ish background, but it really does not compare to slavery.
How does this nonsense square with the tens of millions of minimum-wage white Americans in Ohio or Arkansas or Lousiane? The Trump voters? Answer: it doesn't
The father of Kamala Harris is a black dude from Jamaica.
Perhaps you should acquaint yourselves with some facts before you embarrass yourself once more.
Or, alternatively, learn something yourself
"Born on August 23, 1938 in Brown's Town, St. Ann Parish, Jamaica, Donald J. Harris is the son of Beryl Christie (Finnegan, through her second husband[citation needed]) and Oscar Joseph Harris, who were of Afro-Jamaican heritage"
Her "Blackness" is pretty tenuous. Unless everyone with black ancestors can claim Blackness?
If anyone who has any Black blood is by definition Black then that includes trillions of Americans. Indeed all of us, as we are all descended from Africans
Hyper race-awareness is a species of madness, a modern possession by demons.
Her father was a black Jamaican, born to other black Jamaicans. What is the chance that her paternal ancestors were slaves? Close to 100%, I would think.
To say she is not Black is absurd. Of course she has Indian heritage too.
It's a completely different experience to being born into a segregated America where you grow up having to sit in coloured seats on buses or use different entrances to buildings. The experience of black Americans is a really horrible story of persecution, I don't think she will have had the same experiences in her life. She will have had a life more along the lines of what a black or brown person experiences in the UK, not comfortable and awful individual encounters with some nasty people but overall one of acceptance and, frankly, indifference to skin colour.
I tend to be very anti-woke, but you are absolutely spot on that the US has a very different experience of race to the UK. And segregation is much more recent than people think.
Martin Luther King was not shot in the distant past; he was shot in 1968. There were seats on buses reserved for whites in the lifetimes of most PBers. And as recently as the 1980s, elite US universities and schools had official "caps" on the number of African America, Jewish and Asian American students they accepted.
Yes, and if Harris has experienced these things then black America finally has a representative at the top of government. It really was such a horrific life for so many black people who we wouldn't consider old and the parents of people we would consider young. Harris, more than Obama IMO given the issues America is facing, has got a huge weight on her shoulders. I hope she's up to the task.
President Biden and Vice President Harris just now heading down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House.
Seventy-two years ago, back in 1949, my father was part of the US Marine Corp honor guard at the inauguration of President Harry Truman.
My Daddy Dearest was 19 years old, and thus not old enough to vote in 1948. If he HAD voted, almost certainly he'd have voted for Republican Tom Dewey NOT "Give Em Hell" Harry. Who
Which didn't matter diddly squat to him on that day. For him, it was a proud day - for himself AND for America.
A day like today.
I still think that, flawed though he was, Truman was probably the best President of the 20th century.
FDR says Hi!
How about Ike. Presided over the final ascent of America to hegemony. Oversaw (I believe, I haven't checked) an unprecedented surge in American personal prosperity. Generally avoided wars. Genial.
I miss the America that benignly ruled the world. We can already see what the future, non-American world is like, where China is entirely ascendant (which it is, already). It is not good
Korea says "hi!"
Actually reinforces my argument. Ike stood up to China. With actual guns. And got at least a decent score draw, arguably a narrow win (given the history of the Koreas ever since)
OK. It is a tiny bit harder when China is the predominant power, economically, and America is secondary and weaker, but Trump managed to combine the worst aspects of appeasement and hostility in one. Derrrrr.
God, I hate to agree with you, but you're spot on in your last line.
Trump folded on China tariffs. He tore down the institutional framework meant to constrain China (the TPP), and he refused to sail a carrier group down the Taiwan strait when he was asked.
He antagonised China, and abetted its rise. And because he never stood up over things that mattered, he jeopardized both Hong Kong and Taiwan.
The most catastrophic leader in the history of the democratic Western World? I cannot think of a rival. And he came at the worst time, when America was already tipped towards swift relative decline. Which he speedened.
My worry is that Biden/Harris are almost exactly the wrong team to slow this evolution (they cannot reverse it). I fiercely hope I am wrong.
Not true, but if you like not true things then great.
Fairly easy to see why.
Why?
Well, actually I was just about to post an edit to say that the "If they voted like the majority of their age group" is actually fair enough.
But suppose you vote randomly and the elections have been 50/50 then it's unlikely that as a 33 year old you'd have managed to not be with the winning side. It's even more unlikely that a 66 year old would have managed to avoid disappointment.
So it's clear that the claim is questionable. Now consider correlations - this raises the chance that a voter might have been on the winning side hugely if they've always voted one way and that side has always won. Now we know that voters pretty much vote one way, but we certainly know that one side hasn't always won.
So I suspect you will find a lot of 33 year olds that have never voted for the winning side (my guess would be around 40% - just because the Tories have won every election since 2010), but you'll find it quite hard to find 66 year olds that have always been celebrating on election night - I'd be a seller at 5%.
Hopefully, we've seen the last of Trump. But who knows, he may go back to being a reality TV "personality"!
In other news, Mum got her first dose of the AZ vaccine this evening, though the surgery only gave her five hours' notice. Anyway, it was all over in about 5 minutes. Three months' wait for the second dose though.
President Biden and Vice President Harris just now heading down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House.
Seventy-two years ago, back in 1949, my father was part of the US Marine Corp honor guard at the inauguration of President Harry Truman.
My Daddy Dearest was 19 years old, and thus not old enough to vote in 1948. If he HAD voted, almost certainly he'd have voted for Republican Tom Dewey NOT "Give Em Hell" Harry. Who
Which didn't matter diddly squat to him on that day. For him, it was a proud day - for himself AND for America.
A day like today.
I still think that, flawed though he was, Truman was probably the best President of the 20th century.
FDR says Hi!
How about Ike. Presided over the final ascent of America to hegemony. Oversaw (I believe, I haven't checked) an unprecedented surge in American personal prosperity. Generally avoided wars. Genial.
I miss the America that benignly ruled the world. We can already see what the future, non-American world is like, where China is entirely ascendant (which it is, already). It is not good
Korea says "hi!"
Actually reinforces my argument. Ike stood up to China. With actual guns. And got at least a decent score draw, arguably a narrow win (given the history of the Koreas ever since)
OK. It is a tiny bit harder when China is the predominant power, economically, and America is secondary and weaker, but Trump managed to combine the worst aspects of appeasement and hostility in one. Derrrrr.
God, I hate to agree with you, but you're spot on in your last line.
Trump folded on China tariffs. He tore down the institutional framework meant to constrain China (the TPP), and he refused to sail a carrier group down the Taiwan strait when he was asked.
He antagonised China, and abetted its rise. And because he never stood up over things that mattered, he jeopardized both Hong Kong and Taiwan.
The most catastrophic leader in the history of the democratic Western World? I cannot think of a rival. And he came at the worst time, when America was already tipped towards swift relative decline. Which he speedened.
My worry is that Biden/Harris are almost exactly the wrong team to slow this evolution (they cannot reverse it). I fiercely hope I am wrong.
With respect to Trumpsky, agree completely. Which is precisely the reason that Putin sponsored his rise.
As for Biden, think that Joe Biden, product of Scranton AND Wilmington - in other words, manufacturing AND free trade - is perhaps uniquely poised to make serious progress with & on China. Just perhaps.
Also sounds like a totally bollocks one. The average 66-year old? What is that when it comes to binary outcomes?
I presume it is based on who the majority of the age group the person was in at each vote voted for.
So in 1997 thr majority of 42 year olds voted for Blair. Last year the majoriry o 65 year olds voted for Boris etc.
So, what it is say is that:
In 1974, the majority of 20-year-olds voted Labour In 1974, a small majority of 20-year-olds voted Labour again In 1979, the majority of 25-year-olds voted Conservative In 1983, the majority of 29-year-olds voted Conservative In 1987, the majority of 33-year-olds voted Conservative In 1992, the majority of 38-year-olds voted Conservative In 1997, the majority of 43-year-olds voted Labour In 2001, the majority of 47-year-olds voted Labour In 2005, the majority of 51-year-olds voted Labour In 2010, the majority of 56-year-olds voted Conservative/Lib In 2015, the majority of 61-year-olds voted Conservative In 2017, the majority of 63-year-olds voted Conservative In 2019, the majority of 65-year-olds voted Conservative
I guess someone could check that. It may indeed be correct (although both 1979 and 1992 look very iffy to me), but even if it is, it tells you nothing really, except perhaps that baby-boomers were an outsize group in the population and bothered to vote.
Also sounds like a totally bollocks one. The average 66-year old? What is that when it comes to binary outcomes?
I presume it is based on who the majority of the age group the person was in at each vote voted for.
So in 1997 thr majority of 42 year olds voted for Blair. Last year the majoriry o 65 year olds voted for Boris etc.
So, what it is say is that:
In 1974, the majority of 20-year-olds voted Labour In 1974, a small majority of 20-year-olds voted Labour again In 1979, the majority of 25-year-olds voted Conservative In 1983, the majority of 29-year-olds voted Conservative In 1987, the majority of 33-year-olds voted Conservative In 1992, the majority of 38-year-olds voted Conservative In 1997, the majority of 43-year-olds voted Labour In 2001, the majority of 47-year-olds voted Labour In 2005, the majority of 51-year-olds voted Labour In 2010, the majority of 56-year-olds voted Conservative/Lib In 2015, the majority of 61-year-olds voted Conservative In 2017, the majority of 63-year-olds voted Conservative In 2019, the majority of 65-year-olds voted Conservative
I guess someone could check that. It may indeed be correct (although both 1979 and 1992 look very iffy to me), but even if it is, it tells you nothing really, except perhaps that baby-boomers were an outsize group in the population and bothered to vote.
Presumably @Leon has so absorbed woke culture that he recognises that Harris senior had become culturally white through absorption into Western academic culture, and that his skin colour was irrelevant to his whiteness.
(In case of doubt, I am taking the piss, and I believe Harris senior has done extensive work for Black causes)
One thing that gets missed over here is that, because of the race laws in the US, people who may be 1/8 or 1/16 Black are actually considered part of the Black community as they were subject to the same laws.
Is this not the point that Leon is trying to make. In this country, we do not define people as "black" anyway - do we? Not really! -especially if only one sixteenth of their ancestors were African.
Presumably @Leon has so absorbed woke culture that he recognises that Harris senior had become culturally white through absorption into Western academic culture, and that his skin colour was irrelevant to his whiteness.
(In case of doubt, I am taking the piss, and I believe Harris senior has done extensive work for Black causes)
One thing that gets missed over here is that, because of the race laws in the US, people who may be 1/8 or 1/16 Black are actually considered part of the Black community as they were subject to the same laws.
Is this not the point that Leon is trying to make. In this country, we do not define people as "black" anyway - do we? Not really! -especially if only one sixteenth of their ancestors were African.
Have to admit I haven't followed the whole debate from Leon vs Anyone Else but was just pointing out how it's perceived in the States. My wife is black (as I have said on here a few times) but she has relatives that are whiter than I am but who are still considered black because they suffered the same prejudices as the black community because their blood was deemed to be "tainted" by the "stain" of blackness. That's why all the points disagreeing about Obama being the first Black President and the fact his mother was white missed the point.
And, yes, we have a different view over here because we never had the same laws as in the US
President Biden and Vice President Harris just now heading down Pennsylvania Avenue to the White House.
Seventy-two years ago, back in 1949, my father was part of the US Marine Corp honor guard at the inauguration of President Harry Truman.
My Daddy Dearest was 19 years old, and thus not old enough to vote in 1948. If he HAD voted, almost certainly he'd have voted for Republican Tom Dewey NOT "Give Em Hell" Harry. Who
Which didn't matter diddly squat to him on that day. For him, it was a proud day - for himself AND for America.
A day like today.
I still think that, flawed though he was, Truman was probably the best President of the 20th century.
FDR says Hi!
How about Ike. Presided over the final ascent of America to hegemony. Oversaw (I believe, I haven't checked) an unprecedented surge in American personal prosperity. Generally avoided wars. Genial.
I miss the America that benignly ruled the world. We can already see what the future, non-American world is like, where China is entirely ascendant (which it is, already). It is not good
Korea says "hi!"
Actually reinforces my argument. Ike stood up to China. With actual guns. And got at least a decent score draw, arguably a narrow win (given the history of the Koreas ever since)
OK. It is a tiny bit harder when China is the predominant power, economically, and America is secondary and weaker, but Trump managed to combine the worst aspects of appeasement and hostility in one. Derrrrr.
God, I hate to agree with you, but you're spot on in your last line.
Trump folded on China tariffs. He tore down the institutional framework meant to constrain China (the TPP), and he refused to sail a carrier group down the Taiwan strait when he was asked.
He antagonised China, and abetted its rise. And because he never stood up over things that mattered, he jeopardized both Hong Kong and Taiwan.
I've wittered on about it before, but Taiwan is strategically critical to any hope of slowing Chinese hegemony. It's a small, otherwise insignificant island, but holds about half of the world's advanced semiconductor manufacturing - a critical area of technology in which China still lags by around a decade.
Comments
Trump folded on China tariffs. He tore down the institutional framework meant to constrain China (the TPP), and he refused to sail a carrier group down the Taiwan strait when he was asked.
He antagonised China, and abetted its rise. And because he never stood up over things that mattered, he jeopardized both Hong Kong and Taiwan.
America, right now, has a cap on Asian Americans in Ivy League universities (and maybe others, I dunno) for fear that high IQ east Asians will crowd out white and blacks. Sorry, Blacks.
https://time.com/5546463/harvard-admissions-trial-asian-american-students/
https://theedge.com.hk/ivy-league-sat-scores-for-asians-chinese-and-whites/
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2018/oct/18/harvard-affirmative-action-trial-asian-american-students
Als
So in 1997 thr majority of 42 year olds voted for Blair. Last year the majoriry o 65 year olds voted for Boris etc.
My worry is that Biden/Harris are almost exactly the wrong team to slow this evolution (they cannot reverse it). I fiercely hope I am wrong.
But suppose you vote randomly and the elections have been 50/50 then it's unlikely that as a 33 year old you'd have managed to not be with the winning side. It's even more unlikely that a 66 year old would have managed to avoid disappointment.
So it's clear that the claim is questionable. Now consider correlations - this raises the chance that a voter might have been on the winning side hugely if they've always voted one way and that side has always won. Now we know that voters pretty much vote one way, but we certainly know that one side hasn't always won.
So I suspect you will find a lot of 33 year olds that have never voted for the winning side (my guess would be around 40% - just because the Tories have won every election since 2010), but you'll find it quite hard to find 66 year olds that have always been celebrating on election night - I'd be a seller at 5%.
https://twitter.com/ElectionMapsUK/status/1351942400449650692
Hopefully, we've seen the last of Trump. But who knows, he may go back to being a reality TV "personality"!
In other news, Mum got her first dose of the AZ vaccine this evening, though the surgery only gave her five hours' notice. Anyway, it was all over in about 5 minutes. Three months' wait for the second dose though.
The worry must be the surge in cases worldwide. eg Spain: 40,000 cases and rising. That speaks of many deaths to come
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries
2006 18
2010 first election
2015 second election
2016 referendum
2017 election
2019 election
It said polls not elections
As for Biden, think that Joe Biden, product of Scranton AND Wilmington - in other words, manufacturing AND free trade - is perhaps uniquely poised to make serious progress with & on China. Just perhaps.
In 1974, the majority of 20-year-olds voted Labour
In 1974, a small majority of 20-year-olds voted Labour again
In 1979, the majority of 25-year-olds voted Conservative
In 1983, the majority of 29-year-olds voted Conservative
In 1987, the majority of 33-year-olds voted Conservative
In 1992, the majority of 38-year-olds voted Conservative
In 1997, the majority of 43-year-olds voted Labour
In 2001, the majority of 47-year-olds voted Labour
In 2005, the majority of 51-year-olds voted Labour
In 2010, the majority of 56-year-olds voted Conservative/Lib
In 2015, the majority of 61-year-olds voted Conservative
In 2017, the majority of 63-year-olds voted Conservative
In 2019, the majority of 65-year-olds voted Conservative
I guess someone could check that. It may indeed be correct (although both 1979 and 1992 look very iffy to me), but even if it is, it tells you nothing really, except perhaps that baby-boomers were an outsize group in the population and bothered to vote.
25-24 and 35-44 went Con.
And, yes, we have a different view over here because we never had the same laws as in the US
It's a small, otherwise insignificant island, but holds about half of the world's advanced semiconductor manufacturing - a critical area of technology in which China still lags by around a decade.