War on Cops: Just another lost war

A growing wave of unrest is pushing back silently against the campaigns for defunding police departments based on blaming the police for the growing violence against black lives and black communities based on charges of "systemic racism" that cancel any possible request for confrontation with actual data.

Scholar Heather McDonald has been for decades publishing such data, which reveals that over 80 percent of black lives are taken by black-on-black crime and -more critically- than most black community members want more and not fewer police to keep them safe from shootings and looting.

The last piece of evidence was provided by the parents of an actual victim of police abuse, Jacob Blake, who denounced publicly the looting and property destruction that destroyed Kenosha, Wisconsin property and businesses 

This self-defeating campaign of protests during the pandemic has handed President Trump a winning card in the coming elections. Polls show that protests that work as a perfect cover for looting are overwhelmingly unpopular and play in the hands of President's Trump "law & order" campaign theme. Black voters are mostly moderates (43%). Also, white suburban voters are increasingly worried about the looting, arson, and violence of street protests.

Systematic violence against property across all major cities in the United States is the perfect argument for re-electing the current incumbent.  

New York and Chicago are already reeling from looting, violence that challenges the rationalizations and denial of progressive rhetoric and fuel a mass exodus of millennials and tired liberal taxpayers to "law & order" cities.

War on cops is another self-defeating form of cultural wars. Reality will correct those who engage in them harshly.

US After Trump: Millenials Coming of Age (Part 2)

Millennials are reaching homeownership age, that stage beyond college politics and free-spirited idealism to enter the realities of paying off student debt and family home mortgages. In five more years they will be also paying for their children's education.

Much has been said about the M generation, and most could be wrong or at least outdated. Coming of mortgage age has taken longer -thanks to the many tankings of boomers' roller coaster  economy- than the two generations before. But as older millennials hit their 40s, financial responsibility, taxes and jobs become priorities.

The view from this perspective is certainly sobering: record student debt maturing right when the economy rolls down in a likely record recession; low rate-mortgages fueling a binge of homeownership and a forced flight from overtaxed, overpriced and overcrowded coastal "liberal blue" urban centers to affordable and safer "conservative red" small(er) town-America.

This migration will likely have several consequences that should be the basis for realistic assessments instead of rosy or gloomy projections of the past.

1. Millennials will become more tax-conscious and government-averse
2. Blue cities will lose population and political and economic power, turning red
3. Red cities will turn "bluer" in social and cultural politics but will remain "red" in economics
4. Multicultural happy talk will be replaced by realistic nationalism and protectionism
5. Left-wing populism might swing to right-wing populism

Progressives used to consider the party of the future as much as conservatives were the party of the past. There is a role-reversal going on already, as small businesses and cities struggle with unintended consequences of protest rallies -so popular in college years- run in their own hard-paid backyards and shops.

Conservatives used to spell "doom and gloom" and fear for the future but might now have to deal with a more positive message for a new generation dealing with debt, poor economy and broken government.

It's time to look to the present with the perspective of a new generation.

US after Trump - Millennials coming (part 1)

For those taking the long view perspective -that of generational changes in voters and workforce- the 2020 elections have a different meaning. Both candidates are over 70 years old -well into retirement age-. Both are white, anglo Saxon men raised in the urban states of the East Coast. 

Trump's "base" is a dwindling, less mobile, non-college-educated sample of what was the majority of America around 1950. They have been pictured in countless books since "Hillbilly Elegy"

and in many documentaries like 'American Factory, that explain how China took over jobs and even companies from the Rust Belt during the past 20 years, killing middle-class "union jobs" by way of technological revolution and global supply chains.

The reality is -or shall we better say will be- that the United States has become more diverse in the past 20 years and will become even more multicultural and multi-ethnic in the coming 20.

No matter how much (some) Trump supporters howl "they will not replace us" or wear MAGA hats, their hope for a return to 1950 is as futile as the fixation of equal old-timers in the Left with the politics of the 1970s.  

Neither 78-year-old Bernie Sanders nor 74-year-old-Donald Trump will be inactive roles within the next 5 years. 

Progressive governors and mayors have left the "blue" states with such heavy levels of taxation, public and student debt that a solid migration of millennials is changing the demographics -and politics of formerly known "red states" such as Utah, Arizona, and Texas.

Some move for increasing costs of living

Pandemics and remote work have made other Millenials more mobile and eager to escape expensive urban decay and stressful levels of social conflict

Progressives can't claim victory either: millennial migrants are turning more conservative as they become financially strapped with student debt and start their own small businesses away from the corporate rat race tracks.

It's time to look at how 2030 or 2040 US will look like rather than imagining that Donald Trump or Bernie Sanders' "retro" politics will dictate the future.

And those are indeed the good news.

Post -Pandemics II: A Long View Approach (2)

The Munk Dialogues and Debates produced a series of high-interest interviews to explore Post-Covid scenarios.  Financier Mohamed Al-Erian,  foreign affairs expert Fareed Zakaria, "big picture" writer Malcolm Gladwell, economic historian Niall Ferguson, China experts Victor Gao, David Li, and Henry Kissinger produced a variety of valuable insights from different angles.

Mohamed Al-Erian emphasized the long-lasting effect of the pandemic over the global economic system and the re-globalization or reconfiguration of global value chains as a result of the pandemic experience. In Al-Erian's view, the re-globalization will involve nearshoring to reliable partners with higher health and communication standards and reciprocal trust.

Malcolm Gladwell points to a different but critical angle: the key importance of looking to the weakest link in the world and local societies and economies instead of focusing on the "competitive advantages". The weakest links such as healthcare capacity and prevention, poverty, and welfare networks are likely to stay front and center.

Ian Bremmer added a critical insight regarding the relocation of global value chains: "just-in-case" criteria will not be sustainable. Stronger links based on mutual agreements and reliable partnerships will have priority over mere cost-cutting or universal coverage plans.

Fareed Zakaria pointed out the rise of China as a global factor but also with increased pressure and challenges to meet health and trade requirements

Niall Ferguson, Henry Kissinger, Victor Gao, and David Li debated the role of China, with the Chinese defending the strong points and the Brit and American pointing to China's weaknesses.