THE MORNING RANT: The Slippery Slope to (Re)Normalizing American Slavery Keeps Getting Slipperier

In my post earlier this week I expressed my concern that Principled Free Traders pretty much openly express their support nowadays for the use of overseas slave labor in the manufacture of consumer goods imported into the U.S., and what this situational tolerance for slavery portends.

The disturbing end point for this “libertarian” passion for the elimination of labor expense, despite the ongoing need for human labor, is a return to the “peculiar institution” that western nations finally abolished in the 19th century. Principled Free Traders are already quite open about their enthusiasm for the use of overseas chattel labor in the name of increased corporate profit and lower consumer prices. What is the principle that allows free trade libertarians to be comfortable with foreign slavery but not domestic slavery? It seems like a slippery slope.

I also noted how those most passionate about offshoring American industrial jobs tend to be the same people most enthusiastic about opening the U.S. border to an off-the-book, in-the-shadows workforce for those jobs which cannot be offshored. The common denominator is that there is a passion to reduce labor expense to as close to $0 as possible, be it with overseas slaves or with domestic illegal labor.

Isn’t it puzzling that “free market libertarians” who do chest-bumps and grave dances to celebrate American industrial workers losing their jobs are also passionate about importing off-the-book labor to do “the jobs that Americans won’t do.”

It’s all coming full circle now. Slavery is back in the American South, and it’s the perfect confluence of the libertarians’ ideal labor forces – foreign slaves serving as unregulated domestic labor…

“Three arrested in wake of ‘massive’ labor trafficking bust in Georgia” [Atlanta Journal Constitution – 4/12/2025]

Employees were Chinese nationals who had been recruited through a temporary visa program and promised high salaries. Instead, they were allegedly required to work 12-hour shifts, and they were not allowed to leave the factory or their residence. [Assistant District Attorney] Waldo said there were several calls to authorities reporting slave labor-like conditions, WBHF reported.

Libertarians and Principled Free Traders swoon at the idea of being able to control Chinese nationals who work 12-hour days and are prohibited from even leaving their apartments without their ~~master’s~~ employer’s consent, which coincidentally enough was not given. It’s funny how slave owners don’t like to give their chattel any passes from 24-hour control.

The authorities’ arrival at Wellmade Industries in Cartersville, roughly 40 miles north of Atlanta, was the culmination of what an official described as a “massive” labor trafficking investigation. At an April 4 news conference, Steven Schrank, special agent with a division of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), said law enforcement encountered 60 victims of “horrific” forced labor.

Who owns Wellmade?

These sweeps yielded two arrests: Wellmade Industries’ owner, Zhu Chen, and his nephew, Jiayi Chen. A third person connected to the company, Jian Jun Lu, was arrested April 5. All three face felony charges of “trafficking of persons for labor or sexual servitude.”

The operation that Wellmade ran in Georgia is exactly what Principled Free Traders advocate for when they celebrate American jobs being replaced by Wellmade-style slaves in China and elsewhere.

Again, if slavery is wrong when practiced in the state of Georgia, how can we condone the exact same slavery being used to produce goods being sold on American shelves so long as the slaves are located in foreign lands. If re-shoring slavery would result in lower consumer prices, how could libertarians object? They already embrace and endorse slavery, at this point we’re just talking about its geographic location.

As I said, it’s a slippery slope that’s getting slipperier. And to be clear, slavery is an abomination before God that should not be tolerated anywhere. It is beyond despicable that there are “respectable” voices on the right who advocate for the exploitation of slave labor in the name of “free trade” and “lower consumer prices.”

[buck.throckmorton at protonmail dot com]

Posted by: Buck Throckmorton at 11:00 AM

Comments

(Jump to bottom of comments)

1 1

Posted by: Skip at April 18, 2025 11:00 AM (ypFCm)

2 This point needs to be driven home hard to get through to people.

Posted by: NR Pax at April 18, 2025 11:01 AM (jjoN6)

3 Massa!

Posted by: Commissar of plenty and festive little hats at April 18, 2025 11:02 AM (kXFFr)

4 'Libertarians and Principled Free Traders swoon'

The only principle they have is F-ing over conservatives whenever an important vote is needed.

Posted by: Dr. Claw at April 18, 2025 11:02 AM (3wi/L)

5 Who owns Wellmade?

These sweeps yielded two arrests: Wellmade Industries’ owner, Zhu Chen, and his nephew, Jiayi Chen. A third person connected to the company, Jian Jun Lu, was arrested April 5. All three face felony charges of “trafficking of persons for labor or sexual servitude.”

Once again, the Amish are at the heart of things.

Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 11:03 AM (s8j++)

6 As posted sometime this past week, slaves need jobs too

Posted by: Skip at April 18, 2025 11:03 AM (ypFCm)

7 The driving force for running slaves is Yankee Land has collapsed.

Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:03 AM (pZ64F)

8 Willowed:

Not a shock at all, but-

For your edification-

The White House Presents the Origin and Many Failures Associated with COVID-19:

https://www.whitehouse.gov/lab-leak-true-origins-of-

covid-19/

Posted by: naturalfake at April 18, 2025 11:03 AM (iJfKG)

9 "Again, if slavery is wrong when practiced in the state of Georgia, how can we condone the exact same slavery being used to produce goods being sold on American shelves so long as the slaves are located in foreign lands."

Sorry, but I don't care about slavery or the treatment of workers in foreign lands. That's their problem, not mine. We have enough problems here in USA that are far more deserving of my attention.

Posted by: Elric Blade at April 18, 2025 11:04 AM (iFTx/)

10 As I said, it’s a slippery slope that’s getting slipperier. And to be clear, slavery is an abomination before God that should not be tolerated anywhere.

But the Apostle Paul approved of it!!!! REEEEEEE!!!!
-- Stupid, religiously ignorant leftists

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:06 AM (77rzZ)

11 9
'Sorry, but I don't care about slavery or the treatment of workers in foreign lands. That's their problem, not mine. '

I don't really either but it becomes a problem for me when China's slave factories drive our domestic factories out of business.

Posted by: Dr. Claw at April 18, 2025 11:06 AM (3wi/L)

12 Thx Buck. The Libertarian Party lost one of its main issues when marijuana became legal. Now their flopping around for other issues. Or they're stoned. Most who described themselves as libertarian couldn't enunciate a trade policy let alone argue about it

Posted by: Smell the Glove at April 18, 2025 11:07 AM (6TePA)

13 All three face felony charges of “trafficking of persons for labor or sexual servitude.”

Sexual ...Wut?!

The lid is blowing off.

Posted by: t-bird at April 18, 2025 11:07 AM (KtPtl)

14 9 Sorry, but I don't care about slavery or the treatment of workers in foreign lands. That's their problem, not mine. We have enough problems here in USA that are far more deserving of my attention.
Posted by: Elric Blade at April 18, 2025 11:04 AM (iFTx/)

=======

But there's injustice in this one place far away. Look at this one place far away.

Now, care about this one place far away. Care about it a lot. Scream about it.

You can not calm down until this one place far away is utopia.

Oh wait...have you heard about this injustice in another far away place?

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, looking for laughs with Ivan Reitman at April 18, 2025 11:07 AM (GBKbO)

15 "Again, if slavery is wrong when practiced in the state of Georgia, how can we condone the exact same slavery being used to produce goods being sold on American shelves so long as the slaves are located in foreign lands."

Sorry, but I don't care about slavery or the treatment of workers in foreign lands. That's their problem, not mine. We have enough problems here in USA that are far more deserving of my attention.

We can't force the Chinese government to treat their workers humanely, but we CAN refuse to buy their products, or tariff them highly enough that they are uncompetitive. We can walk and chew gum at the same time.

Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 11:08 AM (s8j++)

16 I think the term is slave quarters not apartments.

Posted by: Beartooth at April 18, 2025 11:08 AM (dJimA)

17 10 As I said, it’s a slippery slope that’s getting slipperier. And to be clear, slavery is an abomination before God that should not be tolerated anywhere.

But the Apostle Paul approved of it!!!! REEEEEEE!!!!
-- Stupid, religiously ignorant leftists
----------------
I will remind the audience that everyone is born a slave.

Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:08 AM (pZ64F)

18 Sorry, but I don't care about slavery or the treatment of workers in foreign lands. That's their problem, not mine. We have enough problems here in USA that are far more deserving of my attention.
Posted by: Elric Blade at April 18, 2025 11:04 AM

I vaguely care, to extent that eradicating it might be in our national interest, or in my case, Christian solidarity but, we are not the World or the Children(tm).

Posted by: toby928 at April 18, 2025 11:08 AM (jc0TO)

19 Posted by: TheJamesMadison, looking for laughs with Ivan Reitman at April 18, 2025 11:07 AM (GBKbO)

When is Ben R. gonna show up to explain your "meat popsicle" comment from the last thread?

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:09 AM (77rzZ)

20 FIRST!!!!!

Posted by: Sponge - F*ck Cancer at April 18, 2025 11:10 AM (Zz0t1)

21 Austin Metcalf's parents were SWATted last night.........

Posted by: Sponge - F*ck Cancer at April 18, 2025 11:10 AM (Zz0t1)

22 I mentioned this the the morning thread, but essentially, the American taxpayer is subsidizing corporate America. All of the millions of people permanently unemployed by moving industry to slave labor countries are getting paid via welfare programs.

You don't see it in the price tag, but it is in your 1040.

Posted by: Thomas Paine at April 18, 2025 11:10 AM (lTGtQ)

23 IT'S FUNNY BECAUSE I ONLY EXPLAIN THE OBVIOUS.

Posted by: BEN ROETHLISBERGER at April 18, 2025 11:10 AM (jc0TO)

24 19 When is Ben R. gonna show up to explain your "meat popsicle" comment from the last thread?
Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:09 AM (77rzZ)

=======

You said one of God's Frozen People.

I made a reference to a well-known line from The Fifth Element where Bruce Willis calls himself a meat popsicle.

It was hilarious. People laughed. We ate Robin's minstrels. There was much rejoicing.

Posted by: TheJamesMadison, looking for laughs with Ivan Reitman at April 18, 2025 11:10 AM (GBKbO)

25 This type of crap isn’t isolated in the south. It’s quite live and well up here in the north too. Last year, the owner of a three-story hotel with a huge waterpark in Dundee Michigan was charged with trafficking illegals to his hotel as workers. He sent a bus over to a shelter for illegals in Chicago and brought them over with a promise of good jobs, housing, etc. When none of that happened, they revolted and the police ended up being called, which is how his little operation was discovered. To this day now, the hotel sits empty. The waterpark is not open and I’m not sure exactly what has happened with this guy.The illegals were sent back on a bus to Chicago. Their status is unknown, but is example again of what the Trump administration is trying to stop.

Posted by: Jen the original at April 18, 2025 11:11 AM (VHO8+)

26 In the absence of moral codes that value humanity, all systems and ideologies lead inevitably to the same result: Hell on Earth.

Posted by: Brother Tim sez at April 18, 2025 11:11 AM (JpKE2)

27 New look at a Revised Chinese Exclusion Act?

Posted by: Bitter Tea at April 18, 2025 11:11 AM (G5+As)

28 I made a reference to a well-known line from The Fifth Element where Bruce Willis calls himself a meat popsicle.
Posted by: TheJamesMadison

Ah, so a "meat popsicle" is just a cold-hearted person, then.

I've seen you use that term before, and was confused by it.

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:12 AM (77rzZ)

29 27 New look at a Revised Chinese Exclusion Act?

TL

R

No yellow!

Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 11:12 AM (s8j++)

30 All of the millions of people permanently unemployed by moving industry to slave labor countries are getting paid via welfare programs.
----------------
Which, BTW, enslaves them.

Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:13 AM (pZ64F)

31 Elric & James Madison: Are you ok with Americans losing their jobs because the work has been outsourced to foreign slaves?

Posted by: Buck Throckmorton at April 18, 2025 11:13 AM (p6zRz)

32 When is Ben R. gonna show up to explain your "meat popsicle" comment from the last thread?
Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:09 AM (77rzZ)

-------------------

IT'S FUNNY BECAUSE I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT HE'S TALKING ABOUT!!!

Posted by: BEN ROETHLESSBERGER at April 18, 2025 11:14 AM (2UnvF)

33 Maybe oddly I do care if people are held in slavery, bondage or the Russian word barshchina, work without compensation., no matter where in the world it happens.
Yes humans are weak and will somewhere always enslave others but we shouldn't condone it and stop it if we can.

Posted by: Skip at April 18, 2025 11:14 AM (ypFCm)

34 Slippery slopes? That's racist!

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Soldier of the Persistence at April 18, 2025 11:15 AM (L/fGl)

35 The noticable lack of awareness in this discussion is precious. The GOP did this. Not powerless Libers.

If weed made the Libertarians dunces, what is the GOP excuse?

Posted by: Francis at April 18, 2025 11:15 AM (bbuBP)

36 So Ted Williams head is a meat popsicle?

Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:15 AM (pZ64F)

37 "Again, if slavery is wrong when practiced in the state of Georgia, how can we condone the exact same slavery being used to produce goods being sold on American shelves so long as the slaves are located in foreign lands."

Sorry, but I don't care about slavery or the treatment of workers in foreign lands. That's their problem, not mine. We have enough problems here in USA that are far more deserving of my attention.

We can't force the Chinese government to treat their workers humanely, but we CAN refuse to buy their products, or tariff them highly enough that they are uncompetitive. We can walk and chew gum at the same time.
Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 11:08 AM (s8j++)
____

Well, yea. But that's an economic problem for us, not a moral one. The same is true of third-world countries that don't use slaves, but where the prevailing wages are so low they can manufacture shit on the cheap.

I do care about maximizing America and American interests using whatever tools we have. I don't care about probably 20-25% of the world's population that are slaves are very nearly so. I ran out of fucks long ago.

Posted by: Elric Blade at April 18, 2025 11:16 AM (iFTx/)

38 This is no different than the NIMBY's who want EV's etc. That care nothing about the environmental impacts because it's not in their backyard. Same for the slave labor to harvest it. Take for instance northern MN. There's a vast array of minerals that can be mined for the things they demand we use. Yet they will all chain themselves to trees to not have it happen here. they come up from the cities (citiots) once or twice a year for vacation and then demand that they shall tell us how to live.

Posted by: Minnfidel at April 18, 2025 11:16 AM (ewjUl)

39 By the way, you're no longer allowed to use the word "slave." It's now "enslaved person."

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:16 AM (77rzZ)

40 For cold fiscal reasons, there are costs to everything. Including people displaced from the job market will inevitably adopt become slaves to government via welfare. And if the wealthy do not want to pay for bread and circuses, eventually revolt and take what the wealthy have at gunpoint.

Essentially for 'free trade' to work, over time, it requires 'free movement' of workers from around the world to equalize wages and that presupposes that their workers will be content with their lot and not try to impress their culture eventually on the existing one.
---
Ultimately, people forget that Adam Smith was not a doctrinaire free trader of the modern libertarian stripe. He saw his book, the Wealth of Nations as a corrective to the widespread mercantilism that was hurting the average person in 1776 and was not an ideologue like others after him--Ricardo and Mills. It is based, in part, on his little read now but influential at the time, Theory of Moral Sentiment.

That attempted to show how even selfish interests can be channeled into the market for doing good. But not that unfettered trade nor selfish interests should dominate the political discussion of issues.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 11:16 AM (ctrM5)

41 So why do Liberians like pot so much? Do they grow a lot of it there?

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:17 AM (77rzZ)

42 Austin Metcalf's parents were SWATted last night.........
Posted by: Sponge - F*ck Cancer

The left has reached rock bottom and is using dynamite to blast the hole deeper.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Soldier of the Persistence at April 18, 2025 11:18 AM (L/fGl)

43 Dec 20, 2002 — Ted Williams was decapitated by surgeons at the cryonics company where his body is suspended in liquid nitrogen, and several samples of his DNA are missing.

Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:18 AM (pZ64F)

44 I just started reading a series of fantasy novels where the main character is charged with ending slavery within the fantasy world. He's from OUR world, so he has a base level of knowledge for ending slavery.

He decides to take an economic approach to the problem, making it more difficult and costly to own slaves than to simply pay people what their labor is worth.

We'll see how it works out. Lots of blood and gore required, though, as slavers don't like to give up their slaves without a fight.

Posted by: "Perfessor" Squirrel at April 18, 2025 11:18 AM (7fElN)

45 By the way, you're no longer allowed to use the word "slave." It's now "enslaved person."
Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:16 AM

Person of Bondage

Posted by: toby928 at April 18, 2025 11:19 AM (jc0TO)

46 I do care about maximizing America and American interests using whatever tools we have. I don't care about probably 20-25% of the world's population that are slaves are very nearly so. I ran out of fucks long ago.
Posted by: Elric Blade at April 18, 2025 11:16 AM (iFTx/)

Do people really believe that the US manufacturers outsourcing to forced labor countries will not be willing to enslave American workers including children so that they can have more billions? By importing it here in Atlanta, the elites have made it clear that their wealth trumps everyone else's trivial concerns, like life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Posted by: Night lifted.... at April 18, 2025 11:19 AM (FZn/N)

47 Dec 20, 2002 — Ted Williams was decapitated by surgeons at the cryonics company where his body is suspended in liquid nitrogen, and several samples of his DNA are missing.
Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:18 AM (pZ64F)

The Yankees are cloning him and using him as a test subject for their new pelican bat.

Posted by: Sponge - F*ck Cancer at April 18, 2025 11:19 AM (Zz0t1)

48 Dec 20, 2002 — Ted Williams was decapitated by surgeons at the cryonics company where his body is suspended in liquid nitrogen, and several samples of his DNA are missing.
Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:18 AM

Someone is cloning a race of super soldiers.

Posted by: toby928 at April 18, 2025 11:19 AM (jc0TO)

49 The complaint is made that Americans won't do the labor work in this country for the wages paid; that suggests that the wages are too low. For thirty years or more, we exported our inflation to the rest of the world by outsourcing.

Now, wages will have to rise in the absence of actual slavery or the overrunning of the country by illegals.

Pay the true price of the goods and services, or pay them via taxes for welfare and additional policing needed.

Posted by: Thomas Paine at April 18, 2025 11:19 AM (lTGtQ)

50 If weed made the Libertarians dunces, what is the GOP excuse?
Posted by: Francis
======
Cash.
However, the point that Libertarianism as a formal theory is utopian no less than Marxism in nature and seeks to impose top down theory on a very complex society needs to be considered. People do not behave as predicted in either Marxist or Libertarian thought and true examples of either in real life can be shown to exist.

I find it more useful as a critique of current policies instead of a coherent theory of government and society.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 11:20 AM (ctrM5)

51 Slightly on topic:

Trump has opened up the government website on COVID again.

There have been some slight changes:

COVID.gov

Instead of displaying info on the virus and vaccines, etc., the site is now an indictment on the natural origin theory and puts the blame squarely on China and the Wuhan lab.

And then it goes on to question the U.S. health authorities' actions and mandates, as well as blaming Fauci.

Trump is turning this entire thing around on the Dems and China, and I love it.

Posted by: SpeakingOf at April 18, 2025 11:20 AM (6ydKt)

52 The Yankees are cloning him and using him as a test subject for their new pelican bat.
---------------
Ted played for Boston and Managed the Senators. I don't see him as a Yankee fan.

Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:21 AM (pZ64F)

53 Elric & James Madison: Are you ok with Americans losing their jobs because the work has been outsourced to foreign slaves?
Posted by: Buck Throckmorton at April 18, 2025 11:13 AM (p6zRz)
_______

See my comment above on that question.

Plus, the outsource issue isn't just about foreign workers being cheaper (whether slaves or otherwise). Jobs moved overseas not only because of cheap labor, but also because of suffocating USA regulations, expensive real estate and infrastructure, litigation risk, sky-high insurance and similar costs, the whim of politicians, etc.

It would cost way more to manufacture widgets here even if the labor rates were the same.

Posted by: Elric Blade at April 18, 2025 11:21 AM (iFTx/)

54 The Yankees are cloning him and using him as a test subject for their new pelican bat.
Posted by: Sponge - F*ck Cancer at April 18, 2025 11:19 AM (

They are using his frozen arm as a bat!

Posted by: Minnfidel at April 18, 2025 11:21 AM (ewjUl)

55
The left has reached rock bottom and is using dynamite to blast the hole deeper.
Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Soldier of the Persistence at April 18, 2025 11:18 AM (L/fGl)

Anthony's mother was crying on TV about how they are living in fear now and they can't even send their daughter to school.

Well, your sociopath son DID brutally and premeditatively MURDER someone in cold blood for no reason, so I would think your life SHOULD be in a little bit of turmoil right now.

Posted by: Sponge - F*ck Cancer at April 18, 2025 11:21 AM (Zz0t1)

56 Take a look at covid.gov this morning!

Posted by: Notsothoreau at April 18, 2025 11:21 AM (cvWHI)

57 Ted played for Boston and Managed the Senators. I don't see him as a Yankee fan.
Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:21 AM (pZ64F)

You say that as if the evil Yankees organization gives a flying f*ck.

Posted by: Sponge - F*ck Cancer at April 18, 2025 11:22 AM (Zz0t1)

58 Has Brian Kemp made a statement about this? Interesting that Wellmade supplied flooring to Walmart, among others. Any comment from Walmart? How about Stacey Abrams? Has she condemned this neo-Colonial/neo-slavery scheme by Chinese nationals?

Hmmmmm....

Posted by: ErikInTexas at April 18, 2025 11:22 AM (LQqtT)

59 Slavery is the Idaho Dairymen's Association being ok with hiring illegal mexicans for pennies on the dollar.

Posted by: Elrond Hubbard at April 18, 2025 11:22 AM (VJc7E)

60 In the absence of moral codes that value humanity, all systems and ideologies lead inevitably to the same result: Hell on Earth.
Posted by: Brother Tim sez
____

"There are only two conceptions of human ethics, and they are at opposite poles. One of them is Christian and humane, declares the individual to be sacrosanct, and asserts that the rules of arithmetic are not to be applied to human units. The other starts from the basic principle that a collective aim justifies all means, and not only allows, but demands, that the individual should in every way be subordinated and sacrificed to the community--which may dispose of it as an experimentation rabbit or a sacrificial lamb. The first conception could be called anti-vivisection morality, the second, vivisection morality. Humbugs and dilettantes have always tried to mix the two conceptions; in practice, it is impossible.”

― Arthur Koestler, Darkness at Noon

Posted by: Biff Pocoroba at April 18, 2025 11:22 AM (UBKzV)

61 Yes humans are weak and will somewhere always enslave others but we shouldn't condone it and stop it if we can.
Posted by: Skip at April 18, 2025 11:14 AM (ypFCm)

Agreed.

Posted by: Dash my lace wigs! at April 18, 2025 11:22 AM (h7ZuX)

62 However, the point that Libertarianism as a formal theory is utopian no less than Marxism in nature and seeks to impose top down theory on a very complex society needs to be considered.
Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 11:20 AM

It is Bearded Spock Universe Progressivism. It might work, if you compel everyone to participate.

Posted by: toby928 at April 18, 2025 11:23 AM (jc0TO)

63 Pay the true price of the goods and services, or pay them via taxes for welfare and additional policing needed.
Posted by: Thomas Paine
========
Yep. Tanstaafl. There Ain't No Such Thing as a Free Lunch courtesy of R. Heinlein.

And free trade just like any other policy has winners and losers in the domestic sphere. The winners inevitably think this is the nature of things and to depart from it will be woeful. The losers cannot wait to overturn the winners.

Policy is lumpy in who wins and who loses--who pays and who gets paid. We forget that sometimes in vague abstractions of GDP and other derivative indexes of the economy and society.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 11:23 AM (ctrM5)

64 I just started reading a series of fantasy novels where the main character is charged with ending slavery within the fantasy world. He's from OUR world, so he has a base level of knowledge for ending slavery.

He decides to take an economic approach to the problem, making it more difficult and costly to own slaves than to simply pay people what their labor is worth.

We'll see how it works out. Lots of blood and gore required, though, as slavers don't like to give up their slaves without a fight.
Posted by: "Perfessor" Squirrel at April 18, 2025 11:18 AM (7fElN)
______

That was actually happening in the American south during slavery. The slaves were expensive to maintain, and their productivity was low. Slavery probably would have died out on its own. But then came the cotton gin. That drastically spiked slave productivity on a very valuable crop at the time.

Posted by: Elric Blade at April 18, 2025 11:24 AM (iFTx/)

65 Pay the true price of the goods and services, or pay them via taxes for welfare and additional policing needed.
Posted by: Thomas Paine at April 18, 2025 11:19 AM

THIS! I would argue it's cheaper in the long run to pay the true price of wages and goods. Because there is a social cost on top of the fiscal. Schools are overrun by non English speaking kids. There's a failure nor any incentive to assimilate. Crime that comes with it and the decreasing of wages to others. It's a death spiral in many ways.

Posted by: Minnfidel at April 18, 2025 11:24 AM (ewjUl)

66 You say that as if the evil Yankees organization gives a flying f*ck.
------------
They fired George Constanza.

Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:24 AM (pZ64F)

67 They already embrace and endorse slavery, at this point we’re just talking about its geographic location.

-------------

... and "negotiating the price."

Another good rant, Buck!

Posted by: ShainS -- Waking Up Early is White Supremacy at April 18, 2025 11:24 AM (arzIt)

68 Anthony's mother was crying on TV about how they are living in fear now and they can't even send their daughter to school.
-------

You know who else can't send their offspring to school?

Posted by: ... at April 18, 2025 11:24 AM (u9Npv)

69 Instead of arresting only he CHinese involved in this forced labor factory, let's also go after the people who approved this place of business, signed off on the inspections and permitted it to continue. Who agreed to allow the temporary visas for factory workers? Put their fucking feet to the fire.

Posted by: Night lifted.... at April 18, 2025 11:24 AM (FZn/N)

70 Well, yea. But that's an economic problem for us, not a moral one. The same is true of third-world countries that don't use slaves, but where the prevailing wages are so low they can manufacture shit on the cheap.

No, it's both a moral and an economic problem. My response to your first comment was based on morality. I didn't mention the damage done to our own economy by overseas slave labor. Nonetheless, that damage is very real.

The difference between a slave and a low wage worker is that the latter at least has SOME agency, and can move to another job or not show up for work. They may not have good alternatives, but they have something.

I am not so naive as to think all we have to do is demand that other countries must match what our workers have. Demanding that foreign workers be given the same salary and bennies that American workers get would simply mean they would have NO jobs at home, and would likely start looking to move here or to some other wealthy country, illegally or not.

Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 11:24 AM (s8j++)

71 If re-shoring slavery would result in lower consumer prices, how could libertarians object? They already embrace and endorse slavery, at this point we’re just talking about its geographic location.-CBD-

Libertarians: How dare you!
US: We know what you are. Now we're just negotiating on price.

As a guy who briefly considered myself libertarian, no capital L, there were a few deal killers.

Posted by: OneEyedJack at April 18, 2025 11:25 AM (FCbAQ)

72 They fired George Constanza.
Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:24 AM

After the shrinking uniform affair, he deserved it.

Posted by: toby928 at April 18, 2025 11:25 AM (jc0TO)

73 I have known of several instances here in East Texas with businesses run by either families from India, or Chinese, where de-facto slavery is in play. (the Indians tend to gravitate towards the low end hotel business, especially in small towns that the larger chains ignore) The family buys an establishment; then, they recruit some younger family members from the home country to come over and work and get a green card, of course with great promises about their wonderful new life. When they get here, instead, they are told to work 12 hours a day and given a cot in a small room and a couple bowls of ramen a day. Of course, no pay. And then they're told that if they try to leave or complain to anyone, immigration will be called and they'll be immediately shipped back, and that the rest of the family back home will shun them so they'll be out on the street in Mumbai or wherever. It's a vicious racket.

Posted by: Tom Servo at April 18, 2025 11:25 AM (uWKK8)

74 It's now "enslaved person."

I prefer the more enlightened "Freedom challenged individual."

Posted by: NR Pax at April 18, 2025 11:25 AM (jjoN6)

75 Plus, the outsource issue isn't just about foreign workers being cheaper (whether slaves or otherwise). Jobs moved overseas not only because of cheap labor, but also because of suffocating USA regulations, expensive real estate and infrastructure, litigation risk, sky-high insurance and similar costs, the whim of politicians, etc.

It would cost way more to manufacture widgets here even if the labor rates were the same.

Posted by: Elric Blade

All of those costs are still present, it is just that the cost is divided between the price tag and the income tax bill.

Posted by: Thomas Paine at April 18, 2025 11:26 AM (lTGtQ)

76
After the shrinking uniform affair, he deserved it.
Posted by: toby928 at April 18, 2025 11:25 AM (jc0TO)

You mean it shrinks?

Posted by: Elaine at April 18, 2025 11:26 AM (uWKK8)

77 It is Bearded Spock Universe Progressivism. It might work, if you compel everyone to participate.
Posted by: toby928
=====
Which is antithetical to the one principle that Libertarianism is built upon. "Do what thy wilt except if it hurts someone else."

At the end of Das Kapital where Marx is just speculating--his 'true communism' where the government withers away resembles that of Libertarian theory about the basic goodness of people in the absence of government and how society will organically heal itself from the outrages of government.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 11:26 AM (ctrM5)

78 That was actually happening in the American south during slavery. The slaves were expensive to maintain, and their productivity was low. Slavery probably would have died out on its own. But then came the cotton gin. That drastically spiked slave productivity on a very valuable crop at the time.
-------------
Slavery was already collapsing. Those hungry textile mills in New England needed cotton. So did the British and French.

Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:26 AM (pZ64F)

79 The left has reached rock bottom and is using dynamite to blast the hole deeper.
Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Soldier of the Persistence at April 18, 2025 11:18 AM (L/fGl)

Anthony's mother was crying on TV about how they are living in fear now and they can't even send their daughter to school.

Well, your sociopath son DID brutally and premeditatively MURDER someone in cold blood for no reason, so I would think your life SHOULD be in a little bit of turmoil right now.
Posted by: Sponge - F*ck Cancer at April 18, 2025 11:21 AM (Zz0t1)
____

Where are the videos of the murder? Supposedly several kids filmed the whole thing. Now, that could be bullshit, but I think it's rare that teenagers don't film every single thing that's of any interest. So I expect the videos exist. Where are they? I assume they are very very bad for Anthony.

Posted by: Elric Blade at April 18, 2025 11:27 AM (iFTx/)

80 It's undercompensated individual! Kind of like underhoused. LOLeft.

Posted by: Minnfidel at April 18, 2025 11:27 AM (ewjUl)

81 Slave politics is downstream from slave culture.

Posted by: ShainS -- Waking Up Early is White Supremacy at April 18, 2025 11:27 AM (arzIt)

82 Now, wages will have to rise in the absence of actual slavery or the overrunning of the country by illegals.

Pay the true price of the goods and services, or pay them via taxes for welfare and additional policing needed.

I'm torn about this. To be blunt, I'm UMC, and have enough money to buy what I want, expensive or not. However, most people have less than I do, so while it's easy to say "let's pay more", it's easier for some than others. See Whig's #63.

Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 11:28 AM (s8j++)

83 You people have it all wrong. The only slaves in history were black people.

Nobody else has ever been a slave.

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:28 AM (77rzZ)

84 Saying Libertarians support slavery makes you sound like an idiot. It never fails the second the GOP gets power again they go full retard. Hey lets start the War on Drugs again, that was such a fucking success, at electing Democrats too...

Posted by: Fisht at April 18, 2025 11:28 AM (BHEHK)

85 So I expect the videos exist. Where are they?

Just guessing here. It exists, it's under lock and key and very tight security and it won't be broadcast until the trial to avoid compromising the case.

Posted by: NR Pax at April 18, 2025 11:28 AM (jjoN6)

86 Anthony's mother was crying on TV about how they are living in fear now and they can't even send their daughter to school.

Well, your sociopath son DID brutally and premeditatively MURDER someone in cold blood for no reason, so I would think your life SHOULD be in a little bit of turmoil right now.

Do you not understand that the black person is ALWAYS the victim?

Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 11:28 AM (s8j++)

87 Where's your minkey, Buck Throckmorton?

Posted by: m at April 18, 2025 11:29 AM (CQE5S)

88 Relax, everybody.

New York Post@nypost
AG Letitia James calls claims of mortgage fraud ‘baseless,’ but refuses to give details in new interview

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Soldier of the Persistence at April 18, 2025 11:29 AM (L/fGl)

89 Did we not learn a thing from Spartacus' 24 hour filibuster?

Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:29 AM (pZ64F)

90 Anthony's mother was crying on TV about how they are living in fear now and they can't even send their daughter to school.

Well, your sociopath son DID brutally and premeditatively MURDER someone in cold blood for no reason, so I would think your life SHOULD be in a little bit of turmoil right now.
Posted by: Sponge - F*ck Cancer at April 18, 2025 11:21 AM

This is exactly WHY their kid is as psycho murdering thug. Shit parents. Imagine the horror if your own child did something so heinous. Now imagine going all over media claiming victimhood. Their actions tell you all you need to know about Rollo. Or Carmelo.

Posted by: Minnfidel at April 18, 2025 11:30 AM (ewjUl)

91 Where's your minkey

On vacation to see his family for Easter weekend.

Posted by: NR Pax at April 18, 2025 11:30 AM (jjoN6)

92 And then they're told that if they try to leave or complain to anyone, immigration will be called and they'll be immediately shipped back, and that the rest of the family back home will shun them so they'll be out on the street in Mumbai or wherever. It's a vicious racket.
Posted by: Tom Servo at April 18, 2025 11:25 AM (uWKK

Like all of those OYO motels and On The Road gas stations. Nail salons and donut shops to boot.

Posted by: ErikInTexas at April 18, 2025 11:30 AM (LQqtT)

93 Did we not learn a thing from Spartacus' 24 hour filibuster?
Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:29 AM

Or as I refer to him. Temu Obama.

Posted by: Minnfidel at April 18, 2025 11:30 AM (ewjUl)

94 To be blunt, I'm UMC, and have enough money to buy what I want, expensive or not.
Posted by: Archimedes

United Methodist Church?

Also, can I borrow $50?

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:30 AM (77rzZ)

95 I have wondered how things might have worked out if Southern slave owners had freed their slaves and adopted a Scottish Crofter/Laird system in 1840 or so. Basically sharecropping.

Posted by: toby928 at April 18, 2025 11:31 AM (jc0TO)

96 So I expect the videos exist. Where are they?

Just guessing here. It exists, it's under lock and key and very tight security and it won't be broadcast until the trial to avoid compromising the case.
Posted by: NR Pax at April 18, 2025 11:28 AM (jjoN6)
_____

Maybe, but since when do juicy videos ever stay hidden? If the kids did film it, they probably sent it to 100 friends before the cops ever arrived. Juicy, salacious, or violent videos always leak out.

Posted by: Elric Blade at April 18, 2025 11:31 AM (iFTx/)

97 It's now "enslaved person."

I prefer the more enlightened "Freedom challenged individual."

Posted by: NR Pax at April 18, 2025 11:25 AM (jjoN6)

-----------------

I thought it was POC (Person of Chains)?

[h/t F. Joe Biden]

Posted by: ShainS -- Waking Up Early is White Supremacy at April 18, 2025 11:31 AM (arzIt)

98 Imagine the horror if your own child did something so heinous.

Never had kids but if I did and this happened?

"I am truly sorry for the actions of my child. I am ashamed because my wife and I raised him better than that and are in shock at his actions. We are now going to beat the hell out of him until the cops arrive to carry him off."

Posted by: NR Pax at April 18, 2025 11:31 AM (jjoN6)

99 heh, from the previous thread:

201 MONKEY TIME
Without a monkey
Posted by: Skip at April 18, 2025 11:01 AM (ypFCm)

Posted by: m at April 18, 2025 11:31 AM (CQE5S)

100 100

Posted by: m at April 18, 2025 11:32 AM (CQE5S)

101 90
'This is exactly WHY their kid is as psycho murdering thug. Shit parents. '

Hear. Hear. I want to see them publicly ground into the dust.

Posted by: Dr. Claw at April 18, 2025 11:32 AM (3wi/L)

102 Nowhere in her statement: "innocent"

Posted by: ... at April 18, 2025 11:32 AM (u9Npv)

103 Mine eyes hath seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword;
His truth is marching on...

Posted by: "What A Load Of Crap"...Chinese Slave Labor USA at April 18, 2025 11:32 AM (R/m4+)

104 Pay the true price of the goods and services, or pay them via taxes for welfare and additional policing needed.

I'm torn about this. To be blunt, I'm UMC, and have enough money to buy what I want, expensive or not. However, most people have less than I do, so while it's easy to say "let's pay more", it's easier for some than others. See Whig's #63.

Posted by: Archimedes

I know where you are coming from, but someone is paying the true cost. Progressive income taxes mean that the wealthier are paying proportionately more, but we as a whole are almost certainly paying (or borrowing) more under present conditions in order to get the goods and pay for all of the social spending that outsourcing brings.

Posted by: Thomas Paine at April 18, 2025 11:33 AM (lTGtQ)

105 Who other than the chinks is engaged in the slavery?

We witnessed chink slavery in the Adirondacks and nearby Burlington VT in the 00s. It was in the chink restaurant business, the slaves snuck in from NYC or Montreal, made to live in housing owned by their chink overlords, and work in the restaurants.

I call them chinks because they are despicable slavers.

Posted by: Mr Gaga at April 18, 2025 11:33 AM (KiBMU)

106 Romantic advice from Ted Cruz.

Ted Cruz@tedcruz
Find someone who looks at you the way Democrat senators look at illegal alien MS-13 gang members

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Soldier of the Persistence at April 18, 2025 11:33 AM (L/fGl)

107 the absence of moral codes that value humanity, all systems and ideologies lead inevitably to the same result: Hell on Earth.
Posted by: Brother Tim
====
Yeh, this. ^^^^^

Posted by: From about That Time at April 18, 2025 11:33 AM (n4GiU)

108 95 I have wondered how things might have worked out if Southern slave owners had freed their slaves and adopted a Scottish Crofter/Laird system in 1840 or so. Basically sharecropping.
-------------
For most 'free slaves' they became sharecroppers (serfs). The biggest problem with that is a sharecropper needs to know math to survive and personal restraint with money.

Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:33 AM (pZ64F)

109 Bruh,

If we don’t have these slaves working, the cost of running shoes might increase by 1.2%. And that will mean the end of western civilization.

Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at April 18, 2025 11:34 AM (DKKgv)

110 Where's your minkey, Buck Throckmorton?

Posted by: m at April 18, 2025 11:29 AM (CQE5S)

-------------

WHO LET THE DOG OUT?!?!?!

Posted by: ShainS -- Waking Up Early is White Supremacy at April 18, 2025 11:34 AM (arzIt)

111 This is exactly WHY their kid is as psycho murdering thug. Shit parents. Imagine the horror if your own child did something so heinous. Now imagine going all over media claiming victimhood.

I read in an article that the parents of the kid who shot Trump in Butler, PA have cut off all outside communication and stay almost entirely inside their home now, only leaving at 3 AM to buy groceries.

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:34 AM (77rzZ)

112 Human trafficking is slavery. The penalty for participating in slavery, including knowingly employing slave labor must be complete seizure of all personal funds for reparation to the individuals enslaved.

Posted by: Kindltot at April 18, 2025 11:35 AM (D7oie)

113 I have wondered how things might have worked out if Southern slave owners had freed their slaves and adopted a Scottish Crofter/Laird system in 1840 or so. Basically sharecropping.
Posted by: toby928 at April 18, 2025 11:31 AM (jc0TO)
______

That was the previous system. It was replaced by slavery when Anthony Johnson -- a black man and former indentured servant/sharecropper -- won a legal case over whether he had contract rights over his indentured servants, or whether he owned them outright. He won the case. Slavery became the norm.

At first, it was people of all races who were slaves in the USA. But the endless civil wars in Africa created a cheap and easy supply of labor, so eventually the slave trade became almost exclusively African.

Posted by: Elric Blade at April 18, 2025 11:35 AM (iFTx/)

114 111
'I read in an article that the parents of the kid who shot Trump in Butler, PA'

And also murdered a local. That probably reinforces the shame.

Posted by: Dr. Claw at April 18, 2025 11:36 AM (3wi/L)

115 For most 'free slaves' they became sharecroppers (serfs).
Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:33 AM (pZ64F)

Some became tradesmen but regardless, since we ended up with sharecroppers anyway, it would have been nice to have gotten there without slaughtering our own citizens and burning our cities and industry.

Posted by: toby928 at April 18, 2025 11:36 AM (jc0TO)

116 Bruh,

If we don’t have these slaves working, the cost of running shoes might increase by 1.2%. And that will mean the end of western civilization.

Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at April 18, 2025 11:34 AM (DKKgv)

----------------

AND more murders for Air Jordans in the inner cities.

AND avocado prices over $2/pound! Oh, wait ...

Posted by: ShainS -- Waking Up Early is White Supremacy at April 18, 2025 11:37 AM (arzIt)

117 Mine eyes hath seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword;
His truth is marching on...
Posted by: "What A Load Of Crap"...Chinese Slave Labor USA

In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea
With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me
As He died to make men holy, let us die to make men free
While God is marching on.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Soldier of the Persistence at April 18, 2025 11:37 AM (L/fGl)

118
Glory glory, Hallelujah
Teacher hit me with a ruler....

Posted by: ... at April 18, 2025 11:37 AM (u9Npv)

119 Let's tariff the f*$# out of China, with its abuse of labor, with its corporate espionage and state-backed market manipulation.

But: don't try to stretch the "anti-slavery" justification beyond its worth. Don't try to stretch it to French wines or Japanese electronics, or whatever. Americans can compete. If you want tariffs because you think the foreigners just do it better, you don't deserve the protection.

Posted by: KLA at April 18, 2025 11:37 AM (R1Eqe)

120 This is exactly WHY their kid is as psycho murdering thug. Shit parents. Imagine the horror if your own child did something so heinous. Now imagine going all over media claiming victimhood.

I read in an article that the parents of the kid who shot Trump in Butler, PA have cut off all outside communication and stay almost entirely inside their home now, only leaving at 3 AM to buy groceries.

Phoenix Ikner, the guy who shot up FSU, used his sheriff's deputy mother's service pistol, because apparently locking the damn thing up was too much trouble.

Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 11:37 AM (s8j++)

121 Reported on X by Sarah Fields @SarahisCensored - father who forgave son's killer and was kicked out of son's killer's press conference was swatted last night.

Posted by: Chuck Martel at April 18, 2025 11:38 AM (Dv3i1)

122 We can't force the Chinese government to treat their workers humanely, but we CAN refuse to buy their products, or tariff them highly enough that they are uncompetitive.
Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 11:08 AM (s8j++)

Ironically, this is exactly the sort of thing that a principled free trader would insist upon and, yet, Principled Free Traders never do.

Posted by: I used to have a different nic at April 18, 2025 11:39 AM (ExV1e)

123 This is exactly WHY their kid is as psycho murdering thug. Shit parents. Imagine the horror if your own child did something so heinous. Now imagine going all over media claiming victimhood. Their actions tell you all you need to know about Rollo. Or Carmelo.
Posted by: Minnfidel

Victimhood sweepstakes are a deranged mockery of Christianity. Being a victim or this or that does not imply moral supremacy to do what you want to do. Even worse if you claim victimhood when you are privileged (in the legal and political meaning of the term). Woman is caterwauling to get more gimmedats from grief stricken AWFLs is my guess.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 11:39 AM (ctrM5)

124 Human trafficking is slavery. The penalty for participating in slavery, including knowingly employing slave labor must be complete seizure of all personal funds for reparation to the individuals enslaved.

Posted by: Kindltot at April 18, 2025 11:35 AM (D7oie)

------------

And The Junta from 2021-2024 encouraged, facilitated, rewarded, aided, abetted, and ran the largest human, child sex, drug, and terrorist trafficking operation in human history.

I want blood and executions ... but mostly executions.

Posted by: ShainS -- Waking Up Early is White Supremacy at April 18, 2025 11:40 AM (arzIt)

125 If Yellow Slavery keeps my Chop Suey affordable, I will choose to ignore it.

Posted by: No MSG! at April 18, 2025 11:40 AM (G5+As)

126 And The Junta from 2021-2024 encouraged, facilitated, rewarded, aided, abetted, and ran the largest human, child sex, drug, and terrorist trafficking operation in human history.

I want blood and executions ... but mostly executions.

Will you settle for Joe Biden wanting $300k for a speech and getting no takers?

Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 11:41 AM (s8j++)

127 Anthony's mother was crying on TV about how they are living in fear now and they can't even send their daughter to school.
Posted by: Sponge

I'm sure those sweet, sweet GoFundMe bucks could buy an armed bodyguard or to.

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:41 AM (77rzZ)

128 Reported on X by Sarah Fields @SarahisCensored - father who forgave son's killer and was kicked out of son's killer's press conference was swatted last night.

Posted by: Chuck Martel at April 18, 2025 11:38 AM (Dv3i1)
_________

The father never should have publicly forgiven his kid's murderer. That make the father look like an impotent chump not to be taken seriously. There's no coming back from that.

Posted by: Elric Blade at April 18, 2025 11:41 AM (iFTx/)

129 Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 11:39 AM (ctrM5)

Did you read the article earlier in the week by a pastor who voxplained that Jesus was primarily an anti-MAGA revolutionary?

Posted by: ... at April 18, 2025 11:41 AM (u9Npv)

130 or *two*

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:41 AM (77rzZ)

131 Now imagine going all over media claiming victimhood
____

Did they take any questions? Because I have a few.

Posted by: Chuck Martel at April 18, 2025 11:42 AM (Dv3i1)

132 But: don't try to stretch the "anti-slavery" justification beyond its worth. Don't try to stretch it to French wines or Japanese electronics, or whatever. Americans can compete. If you want tariffs because you think the foreigners just do it better, you don't deserve the protection.

Posted by: KLA

I believe the end goal of Trump is reciprocal tariffs for most countries, Canada and Mexico get their deal if they patrol the border, and China is the primary target.

China is a communist mercantilist system that threatens the entire world. Their goal is to bankrupt every western capitalist nation by exploiting the welfare state.

Posted by: Thomas Paine at April 18, 2025 11:42 AM (lTGtQ)

133 Ironically, this is exactly the sort of thing that a principled free trader would insist upon and, yet, Principled Free Traders never do.
Posted by: I used to have a different nic
=====
Principled Free traders do not want the mix the streams of economics and society but instead insist a sterility that forbids analyzing how one affects the other. Comes down to treating people as meat puppets and fungible as inputs.

That is why to steer clear of ideologues as they will happily send people to the grave, peonage, or slavery just to prove their theory is perfect.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 11:42 AM (ctrM5)

134 I stood behind the door, with a loaded .44.
And the teacher ain't a teacher anymore.
Sing it with me!

Posted by: Elrond Hubbard at April 18, 2025 11:42 AM (VJc7E)

135 If Trump is looking to repatriate the Chinese, their women with the flat butts should go first.

Posted by: Bubble Butt Fan at April 18, 2025 11:42 AM (G5+As)

136 Did you read the article earlier in the week by a pastor who voxplained that Jesus was primarily an anti-MAGA revolutionary?
Posted by: ...

At the Last Supper, they had Molotov cocktails.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Soldier of the Persistence at April 18, 2025 11:43 AM (L/fGl)

137 "Libertarians and Principled Free Traders swoon at the idea of being able to control Chinese nationals who work 12-hour days..."

---

Which libertarians, Buck?

You undermine your credibility, by just throwing out epithets, without any facts.

What should we call you, an Principled Boomercon?

Posted by: BurtTC at April 18, 2025 11:44 AM (dGCAG)

138 Did you read the article earlier in the week by a pastor who voxplained that Jesus was primarily an anti-MAGA revolutionary?
Posted by: ...
========
Not surprised. Appeal to authority is very big by con men disguised as religious leaders. So in Christianity, most charlatans end up citing him as approving of their positions on Earth. They purposefully ignore that he said his kingdom is not of this Earth.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 11:44 AM (ctrM5)

139 The father never should have publicly forgiven his kid's murderer.
Posted by: Elric Blade

Yeah, that makes a mockery of the whole process of seeking justice.

If he wants to visit the kid in prison in a few years and forgive him then to his face (like John Paul II did with Agca), that's one thing. But to forgive him right out of the gate is profoundly disrespectful of his dead son.

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:45 AM (77rzZ)

140 As someone (although, I think it was a liberal) said, the drive for lower labor costs is a race to the bottom that no one wins.

Of course, this is all complicated and simplifications downplay the tradeoffs.

If I had my way, I'd slap a 100% tariff on any country that did not have a full and effective Bill of Rights.

If a billion Chinamen want to work for $0.25 an hour, that's fine.
But let's see how long that lasts if they have a billion guns, free speech and jury trials.

Posted by: People's Hippo Voice at April 18, 2025 11:45 AM (11WUE)

141
Ironically, this is exactly the sort of thing that a principled free trader would insist upon and, yet, Principled Free Traders never do.
Posted by: I used to have a different nic at April 18, 2025 11:39 AM (ExV1e)

Some "principled free traders" have no principles at all.

Posted by: Night lifted.... at April 18, 2025 11:45 AM (FZn/N)

142 I happen to think that what is good for America is good for the World but that is secondary. What is important is what is good for America and its citizens. Man loves by proximity.

Posted by: toby928 at April 18, 2025 11:45 AM (jc0TO)

143 Victimhood sweepstakes are a deranged mockery of Christianity.

-
That's a Bingo!

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Soldier of the Persistence at April 18, 2025 11:46 AM (L/fGl)

144 At first, it was people of all races who were slaves in the USA. But the endless civil wars in Africa created a cheap and easy supply of labor, so eventually the slave trade became almost exclusively African.
Posted by: Elric Blade at April 18, 2025 11:35 AM (iFTx/)

Nonsense.

The only slaves ever were blacks in the US. And the only slave owners ever were whites in the US.

- Public Education System

Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at April 18, 2025 11:46 AM (DKKgv)

145 Some became tradesmen but regardless, since we ended up with sharecroppers anyway, it would have been nice to have gotten there without slaughtering our own citizens and burning our cities and industry.
--------------
Sibling Rivalry is a thing. Just ask Cain.

Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:47 AM (pZ64F)

146 If he wants to visit the kid in prison in a few years and forgive him then to his face (like John Paul II did with Agca), that's one thing. But to forgive him right out of the gate is profoundly disrespectful of his dead son.
------------
A cuck cucks.

Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:48 AM (pZ64F)

147 >>Man loves by proximity.

And the eagle
flies with the dove

Almost but it needs work.

Posted by: JackStraw at April 18, 2025 11:48 AM (viF8m)

148 Mrs D just rest where the Metals family was SWAT'd last night.
I'd beat the crap outta whoever did that.

Posted by: Diogenes at April 18, 2025 11:49 AM (W/lyH)

149 Burt: I can’t keep up with your pronouns. I apologize if you identify as a capital-L libertarian rather than a lower case libertarian, or vice versa, or whatever. Your special version of libertarianism is beautiful and special. You are affirmed.

Posted by: Buck Throckmorton at April 18, 2025 11:50 AM (p6zRz)

150 I know where you are coming from, but someone is paying the true cost. Progressive income taxes mean that the wealthier are paying proportionately more, but we as a whole are almost certainly paying (or borrowing) more under present conditions in order to get the goods and pay for all of the social spending that outsourcing brings.
Posted by: Thomas Paine at April 18, 2025 11:33 AM (lTGtQ)

Same thing with importing cheap labor here. They use our benefits programs, flood our emergency rooms, their kids are in our schools, we have to police their third-world antics. All that costs money.

Shit like this is why I regard libertarians as clowns. They can't even conduct a serious cost-benefit analysis.

Posted by: bear with asymmetrical balls at April 18, 2025 11:50 AM (TdYBy)

151 yeah but like we're all slaves to the system maaaaan so who r u 2 judge huh

Posted by: average lolbert at April 18, 2025 11:50 AM (dBS1q)

152 Almost but it needs work.
Posted by: JackStraw

I hear Muldoon accepts apprenticeships.

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:50 AM (77rzZ)

153 Man loves by proximity.
—
During Covid, he did that a lot.

Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at April 18, 2025 11:50 AM (DKKgv)

154 But: don't try to stretch the "anti-slavery" justification beyond its worth. Don't try to stretch it to French wines or Japanese electronics, or whatever. Americans can compete. If you want tariffs because you think the foreigners just do it better, you don't deserve the protection.
Posted by: KLA

You really do not have 'free trade' if nations use various ruses under regulation like the EU or Japan do to deny free sale of US goods there. Tariffs are just the tip of the iceberg in trade matters.

Then there is the issue that most central banks manipulate their currencies for mercantilist reasons--it lowers the prices of their exports and raises the prices of their imports as to ensure their companies (not their citizens) benefit the economy.

Essentially where globalism comes in as a theory is that you must have free flow of capital, free flow of ideas, free flow of trade, and free flow of people so that borders become superfluous and by mixing the populations and societies thoroughly that peace will spontaneously emerge as everyone understands everyone else.

Also means that government becomes stronger than society in order to arbitrate disputes between groups in society.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 11:51 AM (ctrM5)

155 I went from being a Libertarian to be a Super Federalist. They govern best who govern closest.

Posted by: toby928 at April 18, 2025 11:51 AM (jc0TO)

156 The only slaves ever were blacks in the US. And the only slave owners ever were whites in the US.

- Public Education System

-
Well, Spartacus is a black man.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Soldier of the Persistence at April 18, 2025 11:51 AM (L/fGl)

157 That is why to steer clear of ideologues as they will happily send people to the grave, peonage, or slavery just to prove their theory is perfect.
Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 11:42 AM (ctrM5)

For some, slaughtering millions is easier than admitting you're actually a big dummy.

Posted by: ... at April 18, 2025 11:52 AM (u9Npv)

158 Well, Spartacus is a black man.
Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks

And fiercely heterosexual.

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:52 AM (77rzZ)

159 People avoid it like crazy, but slavery is common all over the US

People call it "trafficking" in hopes of avoiding the topic.

Posted by: Boron Quidquid - you realize Darwin disproved evolution, right? at April 18, 2025 11:53 AM (weQLb)

160 For some, slaughtering millions is easier than admitting you're actually a big dummy.
Posted by: ...

Don't tell that to Lamont...

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:53 AM (77rzZ)

161 Human trafficking is slavery. The penalty for participating in slavery, including knowingly employing slave labor must be complete seizure of all personal funds for reparation to the individuals enslaved.

Well, hell...

Posted by: Half the US Government at April 18, 2025 11:53 AM (e/Igv)

162 157
'For some, slaughtering millions is easier than admitting you're actually a big dummy.'

I always hated being criticized.

Posted by: Dead Chairman Mao at April 18, 2025 11:54 AM (3wi/L)

163 Free trade has enriched about 1/3 of the US population at the expense of the other 2/3. The 1/3 controls everything though, so they can easily ignore the wishes of the 2/3.

Elections can kinda get in the way for them. Like Trump. But no matter who wins an election, eventually they go away. The 1/3 is permanent. Much like the deep state.

Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at April 18, 2025 11:55 AM (DKKgv)

164 I went from being a Libertarian to be a Super Federalist. They govern best who govern closest.

Clearly you have no HOA.

Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 11:55 AM (s8j++)

165 Which is to say that I worry less about the powers of a representative government than I do about it's reach. I care what Michigan does with it's citizens only very slightly more than I do about what France does to it's.

Posted by: toby928 at April 18, 2025 11:55 AM (jc0TO)

166 I am Spartacus

Posted by: Spartacus at April 18, 2025 11:55 AM (VJc7E)

167 Clearly you have no HOA.
Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 11:55 AM

Precisely.

Posted by: toby928 at April 18, 2025 11:55 AM (jc0TO)

168 went from being a Libertarian to be a Super Federalist. They govern best who govern closest.
Posted by: toby928
-

Fistbump

The funniest part is understanding that the libertarians would require the most oppressive government in order to attempt to thwart local customs, which are much more invasive and all encompassing than laws would ever be because they're enforced by the community in individual relationships and interactions.

Posted by: Boron Quidquid - you realize Darwin disproved evolution, right? at April 18, 2025 11:56 AM (weQLb)

169 I went from being a Libertarian to be a Super Federalist. They govern best who govern closest.

Clearly you have no HOA.
Posted by: Archimedes

Or he is on the HOA board.

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:56 AM (77rzZ)

170 I am Spartacus
Posted by: Spartacus at April 18, 2025 11:55 AM (VJc7E)

But your known as Cool Breeze on the streets though.

Posted by: Dr Pork Chops & Bacons at April 18, 2025 11:57 AM (g8Ew8)

171 Instead of arresting only he CHinese involved in this forced labor factory, let's also go after the people who approved this place of business, signed off on the inspections and permitted it to continue. Who agreed to allow the temporary visas for factory workers? Put their fucking feet to the fire.
Posted by: Night lifted....

Interesting that it is considered cost-effective to bring their 'workers' here, use their old world labor methods, and risk arrest rather than stay home nice and safe and ship it overseas*.

Maybe the cost of transportation is a bit more than everyone claims it is and something else is skewing the balance?

*Then again, southern plantation owners could have set up shop in Africa but did not.

Posted by: Itinerant Alley Butcher at April 18, 2025 11:57 AM (/lPRQ)

172 No overcrowding!

El Salvador Plans to Double Size of Deportees’ Prison

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Soldier of the Persistence at April 18, 2025 11:57 AM (L/fGl)

173 The fallout of tariffs on China will be spectacular. What will they do if the majority of their industrial output has no takers?

Posted by: Thomas Paine at April 18, 2025 11:58 AM (qv8nr)

174 169
'Clearly you have no HOA.
Posted by: Archimedes

Or he is on the HOA board.'

Tyrannical power always gets a bad name.

Posted by: Dead Chairman Mao at April 18, 2025 11:58 AM (3wi/L)

175 The HOA observation makes the point almost perfectly.

Don't like how a region is being governed? Move.

Posted by: Boron Quidquid - you realize Darwin disproved evolution, right? at April 18, 2025 11:59 AM (weQLb)

176 Shouldn't Vivek be givenm some equal time here?

But American's don't cotton to slavery so we have import them...

Posted by: Itinerant Alley Butcher at April 18, 2025 11:59 AM (/lPRQ)

177 158 Well, Spartacus is a black man.
Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks

And fiercely heterosexual.
Posted by: Bulg

And governed Newark with a velvet fist.

Posted by: Big Sissy at April 18, 2025 11:59 AM (G5+As)

178 I recommend the sidebar link to Trump with Meloni. She's clearly smitten with him, and she's smart and hawt.

Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 11:59 AM (s8j++)

179 For some, slaughtering millions is easier than admitting you're actually a big dummy.
Posted by: ...
=====
The usual response by such people is that failure in policy results in doubling down whether in rhetoric (if not in power) or if in power, coercion.

Globalist aka Globo Homo do this all the time demonstrating they put ideology over what are real results from their policies. But, you see this doubling down, refusal to self correct, and being obstinate that just if implementation was done better, if the people understood the true policy better,and so on.

Something like True Communism has never been tried which explains the miserable history of how socialism and Marxism impoverish people in those systems. So you need better people aka New Soviet Man, you need more power aka Stalin's purges, you need more propaganda because people continue to fail to understand, you need to get rid of counterrevolutionaries, wreckers, and horders to fix agriculture, ad infinitum.

Ideologues never seem to apply the Rule of Holes.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:00 PM (ctrM5)

180 171
'*Then again, southern plantation owners could have set up shop in Africa but did not.'

Ask me about low rubber prices!

Posted by: Leopold II at April 18, 2025 12:00 PM (3wi/L)

181 American Thinker. Straightforward and appropriate.
Couldn't shorten link, so look it up.
Jesus and Acadamia.

Posted by: From about That Time at April 18, 2025 12:01 PM (n4GiU)

182 178 I recommend the sidebar link to Trump with Meloni. She's clearly smitten with him, and she's smart and hawt.
Posted by: Archimedes
=======
Feminine women like masculine men. Tis a fact demonstrated throughout society and history.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:01 PM (ctrM5)

183 VOTE VANCE!

Posted by: Aliassmithsmith just wants to vote for Vance at April 18, 2025 12:01 PM (wpIQD)

184 I recommend the sidebar link to Trump with Meloni. She's clearly smitten with him, and she's smart and hawt.
Posted by: Archimedes

Best Munchkin ever!

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Soldier of the Persistence at April 18, 2025 12:01 PM (L/fGl)

185 Ideologues never seem to apply the Rule of Holes.
Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:00 PM (ctrM5)

Mostly because they have their campers do the digging for them.

Posted by: ... at April 18, 2025 12:01 PM (u9Npv)

186 *Then again, southern plantation owners could have set up shop in Africa but did not.
Posted by: Itinerant Alley Butcher

Nope. Too many diseases.

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 12:01 PM (77rzZ)

187 If he wants to visit the kid in prison in a few years and forgive him then to his face (like John Paul II did with Agca), that's one thing. But to forgive him right out of the gate is profoundly disrespectful of his dead son.
------------
A cuck cucks.
Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:48 AM

That's fucked up. The man lost his son. Who the fuck are we to tell him if/when he should be forgiving the killer?

Posted by: Minnfidel at April 18, 2025 12:02 PM (ewjUl)

188 I recommend the sidebar link to Trump with Meloni. She's clearly smitten with him, and she's smart and hawt.
Posted by: Archimedes
=======
Feminine women like masculine men. Tis a fact demonstrated throughout society and history.
Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:01 PM (ctrM5)
________

"Fuck you, hater!"

-- Harry Sisson and David Hogg

Posted by: Elric Blade at April 18, 2025 12:02 PM (iFTx/)

189 *Then again, southern plantation owners could have set up shop in Africa but did not.
Posted by: Itinerant Alley Butcher
========
Britain and France already had colonies there and would not appreciate Dixie planters moving in on their gig.

Quite a few though went to Brazil and stayed there.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:03 PM (ctrM5)

190 There is some weird crap in the water around here lately.

Posted by: ... at April 18, 2025 12:03 PM (u9Npv)

191
Well, Spartacus is a black man.
Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks

And fiercely heterosexual.
Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 11:52 AM (77rzZ)

159 People avoid it like crazy, but slavery is common

So the free traders love both oysters AND snails.

Posted by: IllTemperedCur at April 18, 2025 12:03 PM (y9nCu)

192 Slavery was already collapsing. Those hungry textile mills in New England needed cotton. So did the British and French.
Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:26 AM (pZ64F)

Britain at least was about to enjoy a windfall of cheap cotton from India so didn't need a low-tariff Deep South anymore. Otherwise they certainly would have intervened on the Confederacy's side.
Brits never looked too closely at the conditions of Indian workers.

Posted by: gKWVE at April 18, 2025 12:03 PM (gKWVE)

193 *Then again, southern plantation owners could have set up shop in Africa but did not.
Posted by: Itinerant Alley Butcher

Nope. Too many diseases.

Brits who went to Africa early on were effectively being given a death sentence.

Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 12:04 PM (s8j++)

194 "Fuck you, hater!"

-- Harry Sisson and David Hogg
Posted by: Elric Blade
------
See, effeminate men can always find each other for comfort. Effeminate men attract women looking for a fixer upper and other men looking for a bottom.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:04 PM (ctrM5)

195 Burt: I can’t keep up with your pronouns. I apologize if you identify as a capital-L libertarian rather than a lower case libertarian, or vice versa, or whatever. Your special version of libertarianism is beautiful and special. You are affirmed.
Posted by: Buck Throckmorton at April 18, 2025 11:50 AM (p6zRz)

I can't figure out which libertarians you are talking about either, apparently it is the one that believes in socialism and economic enslavement.
which makes me think you are dealing with the libertarians who thought Jo Jorgenson was "just not corporate enough" (and who left in a snit to join progressive think tanks when they lost).

Posted by: Kindltot at April 18, 2025 12:04 PM (D7oie)

196 There is some weird crap in the water around here lately.
Posted by: ...

You gotta move away from Camp LeJeune.

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 12:04 PM (77rzZ)

197 It was hilarious. People laughed. We ate Robin's minstrels. There was much rejoicing.
Posted by: TheJamesMadison, looking for laughs with Ivan Reitman at April 18, 2025 11:10 AM (GBKbO)
---

This is the Holy Grail of jokes.

Posted by: Darth_Randall at April 18, 2025 12:05 PM (WLnsx)

198 *Then again, southern plantation owners could have set up shop in Africa but did not.
Posted by: Itinerant Alley Butcher
========
Britain and France already had colonies there and would not appreciate Dixie planters moving in on their gig.

Quite a few though went to Brazil and stayed there.
Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:03 PM (ctrM5)
____

As bad as slaves had it in the USA, those sent to Brazil had it far worse in every way. Harsher conditions, sadistic owners, much lower life expectancy, etc.

Posted by: Elric Blade at April 18, 2025 12:05 PM (iFTx/)

199 There is some weird crap in the water around here lately.
Posted by: ...

You gotta move away from Camp LeJeune.
Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 12:04 PM

We have room.

Posted by: Flint Michigan at April 18, 2025 12:05 PM (jc0TO)

200 Speaking of slavery . . .

Starbucks Implements New Dress Code, Receives Push Back from Union

https://shorturl.at/4cC8a

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Soldier of the Persistence at April 18, 2025 12:06 PM (L/fGl)

201 VOTE VANCE!

Posted by: Aliassmithsmith just wants to vote for Vance at April 18, 2025 12:06 PM (wpIQD)

202 Britain at least was about to enjoy a windfall of cheap cotton from India so didn't need a low-tariff Deep South anymore. Otherwise they certainly would have intervened on the Confederacy's side.
Brits never looked too closely at the conditions of Indian workers.
Posted by: gKWVE at April 18, 2025 12:03 PM (gKWVE)

They did, they did support the CSA.
they moved to India for cotton after that, and they still imported US cotton for their mills.

Guess who supported the Union and did a fair amount of maneuvering to block the Brits? The Russians.

Posted by: Kindltot at April 18, 2025 12:07 PM (D7oie)

203 They purposefully ignore that he said his kingdom is not of this Earth.
Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 11:44 AM (ctrM5)

"Blessed is the sultan who visits the shaykh; cursed is the shaykh who visits the sultan."

Posted by: gKWVE at April 18, 2025 12:07 PM (gKWVE)

204 190 There is some weird crap in the water around here lately.
Posted by: ...
=======
Some are on edge, others may not be getting paid by AID or the various fedgov propaganda operations and other ops like the Patriot Front being identified and paused.

Implosion and possible demise of 4 Chan is also interesting. Particularly the reveal of a lot of dot gov and dot edu email addresses of admins. Also the location of posters on it by country.

Leads to my conclusion it was an op and honey trap for dissidents to watch.

DOGE truly is the DeathStar for a lot of things.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:07 PM (ctrM5)

205 >>As bad as slaves had it in the USA, those sent to Brazil had it far worse in every way. Harsher conditions, sadistic owners, much lower life expectancy, etc.

And it lasted longer in Brazil than it did here.

Posted by: JackStraw at April 18, 2025 12:08 PM (viF8m)

206 That's fucked up. The man lost his son. Who the fuck are we to tell him if/when he should be forgiving the killer?
Posted by: Minnfidel

No, sorry. That is not a normal human reaction so soon after the event.

Like I said above, if he were to wait a few years and then offer forgiveness to the perp, then that might be understandable as a way to gain closure. But to do it right after the act is just wrong. He's almost repudiating his dead son by doing so.

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 12:08 PM (77rzZ)

207 I thought the baristas already had a dress code, to dye their hear purple and get a nose ring

Posted by: gKWVE at April 18, 2025 12:08 PM (gKWVE)

208 Burt: I can’t keep up with your pronouns. I apologize if you identify as a capital-L libertarian rather than a lower case libertarian, or vice versa, or whatever. Your special version of libertarianism is beautiful and special. You are affirmed.
Posted by: Buck Throckmorton at April 18, 2025 11:50 AM (p6zRz)

So you have nothing to offer.

Ok, boomer.

Posted by: BurtTC at April 18, 2025 12:09 PM (dGCAG)

209 Guess who supported the Union and did a fair amount of maneuvering to block the Brits? The Russians.
Posted by: Kindltot

That was due to their geopolitical rivalry with Britain. The Great Game and all that.

It's also why they wanted to sell Alaska to us, and not the Brits.

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 12:10 PM (77rzZ)

210 Hogg is going end up being our secret weapon.

Posted by: JackStraw at April 18, 2025 12:10 PM (viF8m)

211 I don’t believe I’ve ever seen a non-gay male barista at SBUX.

Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at April 18, 2025 12:11 PM (DKKgv)

212 208
'So you have nothing to offer.

Ok, boomer.'

He offered his post. What are you offering?

Posted by: Leopold II at April 18, 2025 12:11 PM (3wi/L)

213 What are you offering?
Posted by: Leopold II

Hey, I'll go conquer the Congo for you!

Posted by: Henry Morton Stanley at April 18, 2025 12:13 PM (77rzZ)

214 I went on a business trip to Portland back in the last century and encountered Starbucks. I came home and tried really hard to convince my wife that we need to open a franchise here. She was not a believer. 'Who would want to pay that much for coffee?'

Posted by: Grump928(C) at April 18, 2025 12:13 PM (jc0TO)

215 Buck, As an enthusiastic supporter of tariffs you are a big government republican. You might as well be a democrat.

Posted by: Earl Schlobodowicz at April 18, 2025 12:13 PM (P7Iz+)

216 'Who would want to pay that much for coffee?'
Posted by: Grump928(C)

Sh**y coffee, at that.

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 12:14 PM (77rzZ)

217 I can't figure out which libertarians you are talking about either, apparently it is the one that believes in socialism and economic enslavement.
which makes me think you are dealing with the libertarians who thought Jo Jorgenson was "just not corporate enough" (and who left in a snit to join progressive think tanks when they lost).

Posted by: Kindltot at April 18, 2025 12:04 PM (D7oie)

I just figure people are angry, and they're lashing out at what they don't understand.

Posted by: BurtTC at April 18, 2025 12:14 PM (dGCAG)

218 Buck, As an enthusiastic supporter of tariffs you are a big government republican. You might as well be a democrat.
Posted by: Earl Schlobodowicz at April 18, 2025 12:13 PM

Aroo?

Posted by: Grump928(C) at April 18, 2025 12:14 PM (jc0TO)

219 >>As bad as slaves had it in the USA, those sent to Brazil had it far worse in every way. Harsher conditions, sadistic owners, much lower life expectancy, etc.

And it lasted longer in Brazil than it did here.

Posted by: JackStraw

Sugar was higher profit so you could burn through more workers per harvest. Expendable items they were.

Posted by: Itinerant Alley Butcher at April 18, 2025 12:14 PM (/lPRQ)

220 Off, Mass murdering sock.

Posted by: Dr. Claw at April 18, 2025 12:14 PM (3wi/L)

221 It's like butter and sour cream on a baked potato.

Brian Stelter Defends Taxpayer-Funded Propaganda as Trump Moves to Cut the Cord

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Soldier of the Persistence at April 18, 2025 12:15 PM (L/fGl)

222 As bad as slaves had it in the USA, those sent to Brazil had it far worse in every way. Harsher conditions, sadistic owners, much lower life expectancy, etc.
Posted by: Elric Blade
=====
Sugar plantations resulted in short life spans from various diseases endemic to swamps. Saw that in the US in Louisiana and the threat to sell and ship a slave 'down south' was considered a death sentence threat back in the day.

Sugar plantation deaths is probably why the US had roughly single digit share of transported slaves from Africa and the Caribbean and South American nations like Brazil got far more percentage wise to replace deaths from working conditions.

But, in some ways, the US system was worse because it relied then on breeding slaves for wealth as they could not longer be legally imported (although smuggling did occur). Interestingly enough, US Navy ships participated with the British navy after they outlawed slavery in their colonies in 1832. Both nations cooperated in trying to blockade slave ships from leaving Africa without seizure of slaver ships and immediate return to Africa of freed slaves. That was the US policy until the Civil War started.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:15 PM (ctrM5)

223 'So you have nothing to offer.

Ok, boomer.'
-------
He offered his post. What are you offering?
Posted by: Leopold II at April 18, 2025 12:11 PM (3wi/L)

I asked a specific question, dimwit.

He didn't answer, because he couldn't answer. If you're going to accuse people of supporting slavery, I think you have to have proof. Not just lashing out like a wounded bear.

Posted by: BurtTC at April 18, 2025 12:15 PM (dGCAG)

224 'Who would want to pay that much for coffee?'
Posted by: Grump928(C)

Sh**y coffee, at that.
Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 12:14 PM

And yet. We would have been the first neo-coffee shop in our little touristy town.

Posted by: Grump928(C) at April 18, 2025 12:15 PM (jc0TO)

225 CBD,

Not sure if you're around but thank you for the Art today. Superb choice my friend.

Posted by: AlaBAMA at April 18, 2025 12:15 PM (2sg1c)

226 214 I went on a business trip to Portland back in the last century and encountered Starbucks. I came home and tried really hard to convince my wife that we need to open a franchise here. She was not a believer. 'Who would want to pay that much for coffee?'
Posted by: Grump928(C) at April 18, 2025 12:13 PM (jc0TO)

Starbucks doesn’t have franchises though. They’re all corporate owned. The exceptions are the ones inside a hotel or grocery store which is sort of owned by the grocery store or hotel.

But it’s not like McDonald’s where an individual buys franchise and it’s your business.

Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at April 18, 2025 12:15 PM (DKKgv)

227 Sugar was higher profit so you could burn through more workers per harvest. Expendable items they were.

And yet. You'd still expect it would be more cost effective to feed your slaves a bit more, and not work them to death in a matter of months.

Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 12:16 PM (s8j++)

228 DOGE truly is the DeathStar for a lot of things.
Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:07 PM (ctrM5)

Oh yeah I hadn't connected doge and 4. Duh

Posted by: ... at April 18, 2025 12:16 PM (u9Npv)

229 223
'I asked a specific question, dimwit.

He didn't answer, because he couldn't answer.'

So. Nothing.

Posted by: Dr. Claw at April 18, 2025 12:16 PM (3wi/L)

230 The US is a victim of its own success in a way, coasting on the fumes as it were, from a legacy economic system that is no longer operative.

What I mean by that, the US dollar being the “reserve currency”. It has allowed the politicians a virtually unlimited “credit card”, exporting monetary inflation around the world. There’s a reason no other national government is $38 Trillion in the hole, and yet can still borrow more at favorable rates.

The US resembles an open air insane asylum in so many ways, economically, spiritually, and physically - and much of it as deliberate strategy over many decades. None of this would have been possible without an “elastic currency” and pseudo-intellectual expert economists.

They can save the dollar, or save the markets, but they can’t save both. Clearly they have decided on inflating the markets for quite some time, and shoring up “too big to fail” financial institutions who have been playing games all along. It will be interesting at best to see how this shakes out. Reality will never be denied, however.

Posted by: Common Tater at April 18, 2025 12:16 PM (QuDWu)

231 Starbucks doesn’t have franchises though. They’re all corporate owned. The exceptions are the ones inside a hotel or grocery store which is sort of owned by the grocery store or hotel.
Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at April 18, 2025 12:15 PM

My offer to the missus was to start small with a coffee cart on the sidewalk. They had those in Oregon at the time.

Posted by: Grump928(C) at April 18, 2025 12:18 PM (jc0TO)

232 Isn't meat popsicle a regularly used but un-defined sci-fi trope re: being who isn't 100% born human? A sub-human of some form just like the CCP treats peasants.

Posted by: DaveA at April 18, 2025 12:18 PM (FhXTo)

233 .
NOOD

Ace is up: CNN: Trump and Musk Murdered a Federal Worker By Worrying Her With DOGE Cuts Until She Had a Heart Attack

NOOD!

Posted by: Grumpy and Recalcitrant at April 18, 2025 12:18 PM (O7YUW)

234 Hawaii no longer produces sugar cane, because it's all grown in China now.

I'll bet most of the workers there are slaves, as well.

Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 12:18 PM (77rzZ)

235 New one: Trump is a murderer

Posted by: Archimedes at April 18, 2025 12:19 PM (s8j++)

236 >>Sugar was higher profit so you could burn through more workers per harvest. Expendable items they were.

Long before Europeans hit the region the natives in South America were busy enslaving each other for centuries. Whitey gets tagged with carrying the burden of evil slavers but the truth is we were late to the game.

Posted by: JackStraw at April 18, 2025 12:19 PM (viF8m)

237 China lends the US money with which to buy its goods. So we get fucked over twice by them. They get all the jobs and we pay them interest.

But if we stop that the price of an iPhone might go up $80 and that would be unthinkable.

Posted by: Its Go Time Donald at April 18, 2025 12:19 PM (DKKgv)

238 Methodist update: "We believe in a brown Palestinian Jew, a black messiah ... black women are a source of the divine" 🥴

-
Quite a method.

Posted by: Anonosaurus Wrecks, Soldier of the Persistence at April 18, 2025 12:21 PM (L/fGl)

239 >>> But, in some ways, the US system was worse because it relied then on breeding slaves for wealth as they could not longer be legally imported....

Always thought there was hidden agenedas in that peculiar institution that are not looked into / exposed enough.

Posted by: Itinerant Alley Butcher at April 18, 2025 12:22 PM (/lPRQ)

240 Ok tater, tell us which economic "system" would be operative going forward.

Posted by: Earl Schlobodowicz at April 18, 2025 12:23 PM (P7Iz+)

241 As bad as slaves had it in the USA, those sent to Brazil had it far worse in every way. Harsher conditions, sadistic owners, much lower life expectancy, etc.
---
The average slave in America consumed more daily calories than 1/3 of the "free" people living in Europe at the time.

Slavery in America was horrible for all.
And life for most in Europe wasn't much better.

And it must be said every time:
For every slave sent west from Africa, two were sent east.
There are almost no decedents of those slaves in the Middle East ....

Posted by: People's Hippo Voice at April 18, 2025 12:25 PM (11WUE)

242 Donald, China buys US bonds thereby loaning the Federal Government money. If you buy something from China, through WalMart or Costco or similar, you are using money you earned. Unless you borrowed from China, they are not "loaning us money" to buy anything. Countries don't trade, people do.

Posted by: Earl Schlobodowicz at April 18, 2025 12:25 PM (P7Iz+)

243 No, sorry. That is not a normal human reaction so soon after the event.

Like I said above, if he were to wait a few years and then offer forgiveness to the perp, then that might be understandable as a way to gain closure. But to do it right after the act is just wrong. He's almost repudiating his dead son by doing so.
Posted by: Bulg at April 18, 2025 12:08 PM (

Lose a kid and then decide what's acceptable. Criticizing someone, well. Nevermind. A guy on the Cross said. Forgive them for they know not what they do. He was still nailed to a piece of wood.

Posted by: Minnfidel at April 18, 2025 12:26 PM (ewjUl)

244 Jesus and Acadamia.

**********

Acadamia? That's just nuts!!!

Posted by: muldoon at April 18, 2025 12:26 PM (/iMjX)

245 'Free trade' inevitably results in trading with countries that have repellent societies with such things as slavery, religious or ethnic repression, and other such cruelties. The implicit assumption of globalism is that trade will soften those awful societies and eventually cause their overturn. That is demonstrably false at least in human lifespans.

'Free movement of people' creates other problems in society as cultural incompatibility and the inevitable stronger government emerges to resolve the inevitable disputes between existing cultures and the imported ones. Sort of like new magma under a volcano that has not erupted for some time.

'Free movement of capital' inevitably seeks the highest return while seeking to minimize costs. Thus the owners benefit but the overall societies may not. Outsourcing is an example and so is offshoring.

Overall, I find libertarianism as a useful critique of human society and economic thought in particular However, I find it lacking as underlying ideals of how to set up a country because its base assumptions of how people and countries act is not supported by history. Aka utopian.

Marxism has the same problem.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:27 PM (ctrM5)

246 Acadamia? That's just nuts!!!
Posted by: muldoon
=======
Acadamia cookies and ice cream are pretty good.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:28 PM (ctrM5)

247 A cuck cucks.
Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 11:48 AM

That's fucked up. The man lost his son. Who the fuck are we to tell him if/when he should be forgiving the killer?
-----------------
Forgiveness is first requested not given. I have not seen the murderer admit his crime. He has shown no remorse nor made any visual acts of contrition; ergo he does not seek forgiveness. The father is a cuck.

Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 12:30 PM (pZ64F)

248 Always thought there was hidden agenedas in that peculiar institution that are not looked into / exposed enough.
Posted by: Itinerant Alley Butcher
=======
Course there was just like the Roman and Greek systems of slavery and you can throw in the Phoenicians as well. Too many rich people want to be a king that rules everything including sex partners.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:30 PM (ctrM5)

249 Acadamia cookies and ice cream are pretty good.
--------------
They come from Hawaii.

Posted by: Pudinhead at April 18, 2025 12:32 PM (pZ64F)

250 Lose a kid and then decide what's acceptable. Criticizing someone, well. Nevermind. A guy on the Cross said. Forgive them for they know not what they do. He was still nailed to a piece of wood.
Posted by: Minnfidel
======
Emotional appeal of authority via victimhood plus an appeal to divine authority undermine your argument.

Want to correct people, cite the scriptures involved, and specifically how those were interpreted via your own sect and faith.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:33 PM (ctrM5)

251 They come from Hawaii.
Posted by: Pudinhead
======
Hopefully they are ethically and organically grown.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:34 PM (ctrM5)

252 Whig, I suggest you take another look at history. The world is more free now than it ever was. Human misery is less than ever before. There are fewer people starving today in the US than ever before. And this is in absolute numbers, not percentages, actual numbers. You're point of view is actual marxian. Saying history does not support freedom is textbook communism.
Do not intentionally misunderstand me. I am NOT open borders. I believe all the people coming here should make an effort to fix their own countries. Regarding libertarianism, of which I am a supporter, there is nothing conservative about tariffs. That is a big government "solution" intended to buy votes. Nothing less. Anyone who believes in them is a sucker.

Posted by: Earl Schlobodowicz at April 18, 2025 12:35 PM (P7Iz+)

253 215 Buck, As an enthusiastic supporter of tariffs you are a big government republican. You might as well be a democrat.
Posted by: Earl Schlobodowicz
------
Ah yes, the No True Scotsman (Republican or conservative) argument to disqualify Buck.

Pure rhetoric.

Posted by: whig at April 18, 2025 12:37 PM (ctrM5)

254 Whig, are trying to say that tariffs are not a big government solution? Populism requires the government to impose its solutions otherwise it is also just "rhetoric". I guess big government is fine when we do it, huh?

Posted by: Earl Schlobodowicz at April 18, 2025 12:43 PM (P7Iz+)

255 Whig, are trying to say that tariffs are not a big government solution? Populism requires the government to impose its solutions otherwise it is also just "rhetoric". I guess big government is fine when we do it, huh?
Posted by: Earl Schlobodowicz at April 18, 2025 12:43 PM

I would say that in the case of tariffs, yes. As would our Founders.

Posted by: toby928 at April 18, 2025 12:55 PM (jc0TO)

256 And I would dispute the idea that 'Countries don't trade, people do' in the case of totalitarian governments like China.

Posted by: toby928 at April 18, 2025 12:57 PM (jc0TO)

257 CHYNA!!!! Xi should start to feel a little lonely these days.

Posted by: FINGERS at April 18, 2025 03:25 PM (C8ve7)

258 Do people really believe that the US manufacturers outsourcing to forced labor countries will not be willing to enslave American workers including children so that they can have more billions? By importing it here in Atlanta, the elites have made it clear that their wealth trumps everyone else's trivial concerns, like life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Posted by: Night lifted.... at April 18, 2025 11:19 AM (FZn/N)

________________

You underestimate our supply of rope.

Posted by: DFCtomm at April 18, 2025 06:15 PM (H0Gk5)

259 America Was Not Founded on Slavery like the leftists written fake Text Books claim

Posted by: Tamaa the Drongo Bird at April 18, 2025 06:57 PM (wGqjj)

260 It is useful to remember that many slaves got paid. Slavery is not about work without paying, but lack of liberty and self determination.

Posted by: Christopher R Taylor at April 18, 2025 08:53 PM (lwW3A)

261 Nor was America "built by black people". It was built by Americans of all sorts

Posted by: Christopher R Taylor at April 18, 2025 08:55 PM (lwW3A)

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