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The Tools of the 1% Will Never Serve Us


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Maybe it is just me, but I'll never understand why we so strongly believe the tools of the 1% will ever be instrumental in improving our situation.

For example it is alarming how few in the online Black community are talking about TPP.  Social media was ablaze when on non-issues like Rachel, or Obama's use of the n-word. But virtually quiet on TPP.   In fact, I'm cynical enough to believe that Obama dropped the n-bomb and sang Amazing Grace just to divert attention from topics like TPP, which adversely affect all middle class and poor Americans--particularly Black people.

At anyrate, TPP does not generate income for social media owners, so it will never be highlighted on social media.

Rare is the issue that is really important to Black people and lucrative to the owners of social media, perhaps that is why we are losing so much ground on the web, employment, education, and on...

Maybe Bill Maher or John Oliver will put a humorous twist on TPP and get our attention, fro 5 minutes.

Edited by Troy
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Here are my comments from a discussion I had on Facebook which I initiated.

Post 1  "As someone that is directly involved in how this TPP will work, this whole process began when China funded our invasion of Iraq and officially became the Iron Bank for the U.S. I hate to use a Game of Thrones reference, but our wars allowed China to become the owner of so much American debt and property it's ridiculous... And no one discusses this or even brings it up as an issue. I manufacture shoes in China. I wanted and tried over and over again to do so here, but the hurdles the US has placed on the small biz community has handicapped us to the extent that it's more cost effective to manufacture offshore than it is to make anything here. What's even worse is we can't change because Americans are the most ignorant consumers in the world. The President isn't a dictator he is simply doing as a Lanister (any President) has to do; he's paying his debts.China is now the true world power since they own areas of the biggest resource in the world in Africa and they control the biggest consumer market in the world America. I'm off of my soapbox."

Post 2   "I hate that I'm a part of the problem...I hate more that I cant sell enough to stop."

Post 3   the closing of brick and mortars is a direct result of importing cheaper merchandise from China and other countries. However, it is also the responsibility of the American Consumer who has no remorse or interest in supporting anything that is not of convenience to them. The American consumer shops online or buys at the places they "PERCEIVE" as being cheaper. What the American Consumer fails to realize is that this indirectly supports TPP and actually made the deal happen as a result of not shopping locally. I'm not blaming this solely on the consumer since all of this is the end result of wars we should have never initiated. When we began taking on debt to fund these wars China was collecting. What is of bigger importance is that the American economy was built not on capitalist theory, but SKEWED capitalist theory. American is a debtors society where capitalism as it stands is a system of loans as opposed to a system of bartering or buying and trading. Even all of the wealth of our billionaires and millionaires is in inflated stocks and funds that don't represent real money, but represents "POTENTIAL" money. Everyone probably wonders why I don't get involved in all of the "racist/cop killing" convos... those are meaningless in the greater scheme of the nation and in my own attempts at building wealth. I hate to sound impersonal, but I can't do anything for my family by talking about that stuff. But by talking about consumerism we get to the root of every problem in the US EVERY PROBLEM. Want cops to stop killing Blacks? Let Blacks get fiscally more responsible. Want the government to vote in the interest of the people, get more fiscally aware and responsible. The TPP though is a direct reflection of the ownership of debt in this country. Is it bad? Honestly, no. It's just more of the same. See this chart and understand the severity of which the US Economy is shaped and this is from 2013: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/10/10/this-surprising-chart-shows-which-countries-own-the-most-u-s-debt/

Post 4    I forgot to mention how the subsidizing of banks who have built their entire portfolios on debt (which led to the housing bust that almost destroyed... actually did destroy this country) which has led to a debtor nation. People are not funded for creating a shoe company or a product, but they are funded by venture capitalists based on the ability of a company to reach an IPO!!!!! While everyone cries about racism, what is happening to the country isn't even taking place behind closed doors anymore. It's right out in the open and is celebrated. We celebrate Twitter or Square or Box or Living Social as great examples of entrepreneurship, or even Beats headphones which was sold for billions. When the honest truth is that Twitter and any of these tech companies honestly aren't solving any real issues and don't have any real means of creating a physical product which means that it's not a buy and trade of a product which is how capitalism should work, but the exchange of ideas which can't be valued, but are valued, packaged and sold to the public as stocks. The same with the packaging of bad home loans by banks, all of which is supported by the government and then throw in a Chinese manufactured product that costs pennies being sold for billions and the corruption of capitalism continues while we all stand around and complain about racism (which I'm not justifying) we fail to realize that what we can control we aren't.

Post 5   We spend so much time on the negative instead or recognizing how much is being done against the negative. We also fail to understand educate ourselves which leads to the mistreatment of the less informed community (which happens to be blacks, browns and every color including whites and this less informed community is being shaped by angry white men, prosper preaching black men, and self serving political parties.) You are exactly right in that real empowerment comes at the grassroots level no matter the race.

 

I obviously was really involved in bringing it up, but didn't start it here since I tend to not cross platform discussions, but I'm glad you brought it up. I hope those responses make sense above without the interaction.

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Thanks for sharing this Chris.  I actually like the Game of Thrones analysis.

It is interesting to note that in all of your insightful analysis you failed to mention Obama.

I just ran a Huria Search across all Black media to read who has covered TPP.  I did not read all of the articles but those against TPP do not mention Obama, those for if use his name quite liberally.  

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That's because this would have happened no matter what. Obama is just the latest on the Iron Throne. When you import the majority of your consumables and your debt is owned by the world like I said it's just a matter of repaying the debt. The person in office is just the person in office. Consider this, if my company begins to grow I will be considered in the same boat as the people who pushed this thing through, Nike, etc. Then again if I even sniff a consistent million each year for two years I'll be bought out. The lack of focus on eating, shopping, spending local is the only thing that could have slowed this down, but it was just bound to happen. We buy more than any other country so since we are no longer producing anything and our economy is built around consuming and debt, other countries need direct access to the US without the taxes, duties and tariffs. 

Now the smart person in the Black community would begin buying up warehouses or leasing them at pennies on the dollar and establishing storage and shipping options for the amount of product that will begin to arrive. Because if someone in the US doesn't do this, very soon there will be more warehousing companies opening with logistics outside of the US leaving the physical back breaking labor to whoever will take those jobs, until the robots come.

What we do have to add here is that the TPP is just able to be legislated now, it isn't law... yet.

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And here is proof of what economist and I was saying just the other day (like we needed more proof...). When the economy is built on a capitalistic system that has it's foundation in buying and selling debt as a commodity, when this happens your money is poof! Like magic.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/puerto-rico-says-it-cannot-pay-its-debt-setting-off-potential-crisis-in-the-us/2015/06/28/cbae1bc4-1e05-11e5-84d5-eb37ee8eaa61_story.html

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