Canada did not have a financial bubble in 2008, so we did not become

Xenophobic. Harper's Conservatives tried to play the xenophobic card during last fall's election saying that the conservatives would start a barbaric cultural practices hotline to the RCMP if elected. Canadians were disgusted. Trudeau's Liberals and their 'sunny ways' won the election. True we have much greater control over immigration than most other countries but we also had a mild recession only after the Financial bubble burst elsewhere and, to their credit, the conservatives did Keynesian spending during it. Not one Canadian bank went under. Previous Liberal government refused to deregulated banking completely. So yes. Neoliberalism has destabilize the world's economies when the deregulation goes too far. And yes that results in political destabilization when the resulting recessions go on too long. Things fall apart including democracy. People need economic and political equality for democracy to work. First Trump and now the Brexit. The moral to the story is that the right and neoliberals should not have carte blanch to deregulate to the nth degree and the left needs to be a part of trade discussions.

Are neoliberals and pnac trying to infiltrate us democrats now that the GOP

has proven to be unmanageable (my question mark does not work). I swear I saw a post yesterday here that said the reason for the Brexit was definitely not neoliberalism. Did not the neoliberals run crazy banking around the world with no regulations Did not that cause a crash which was then followed by austerity for a decade in Britain Would that cause the people to turn inwards when they were not benefitting from a better economy Business may not see color but people certainly do when their backs are against the wall. Was not the Bank of England Governor going HUGE with new regulations on banking What happens to those planned regulations now

On the Brexit and what it means:

I think in the USA people who voted for the GOP and were not well off and are white have suffered because of loss of unions and increasing inequality. So they went for Trump when he said he'd give them their jobs back. I agree businesses and intellectual elites are important to grow an economy. But inequality as been rising within western countries as the 1% has done much better for themselves there and good times have not been shared. Political equality has also been destroyed. So what is happening now in the usa is political instability because of lack of opportunity. Didn't help that Obama was not able to do Keynesian spending on infrastructure after the great recession, caused by banking practices, because the GOP would not allow it even though interest rates were low. I think that is the lesson. That democracies get unstable when the majority don't feel part of the success. Extended economic malaise for England didn't help and austerity after the bank caused financial crisis. Now aĺl will see that economic instability will be the result of political instability which is the result of economic and political inequality. Didn't help that the intellectual elites bought into neoliberalism which was itself all about unfettered capitalism. The intellectual elites are going back to being more liberal as we speak, after being neoliberal curious for a few decades.

I guess the lesson is that the 1% and the intellectual elites 'can't have nice things' , literally, unless there is a way most people can participate in doing well in a country. Democracy seems to break down when most people are unhappy and struggling. As to tribalism, in the US the political arm of business, the republicans, have been fomenting tribal ties for the last 40 years. It is actually their main tactic. So in the US to say that business is colorblind is only partially true. They are responsible for what happens when they set their political dogs out. That is racism. I would be nice if business would demand the GOP not tribalize the Republican base using hate. It would be nice if business would censure the Koch brothers and others of their class (who have used the untold billions, that they make by not paying all that much in taxes after tax loopholes, to push for more tribalism and more inequality and to consolidate political power). As we speak many, many businesses are dropping their support for ALEC (American Legislative Exchange Council) that comes up with the worst republican legislation around the country. Passing legislation to make it illegal for people to lease solar panels for their roof in Florida is certainly not democracy in action.

I think the lot of so many in the world, outside the G8, has improved so much because of new ideas, trade and immigration that you find less men willing to go fight war in say Syria because they have a cousin in Berlin and know what middle class life can be. So they have an out. Or someone from Eritrea hears how lovely it is when their sister is working full time in Canada so she risks all to go across the mediterranean. So people from poorer countries are benefitting from increased world trade and better ideas from the intellectual elites from every country in the world. The middle class is growing in poorer countries. It is the western countries where inequality has been growing and life is tougher (relatively). A simple infrastructure program would have done wonders but the GOP wanted wages to fall in the USA. And fall wages did. The right wanted it all. They took it all. They took it all during the credit default swap age, they took it all when it came to recovery. Seems to me that if business 'doesn't see color' there is a danger they don't see people suffering either. And suffering people are the last to take risks like globalism. They batten down the hatches. They do see color.

So the moral of the story is that democracy is a living breathing thing and it requires that it work for everybody and you can't socially engineer it to benefit a few groups at the expense of the many or it will bite back. Maybe Europe is just not ethnically diverse enough in its member countries to sustain such rapid change. But the 1% playing fast and loose with credit swaps a decade ago was one of the nails in the coffin: not democracy at its finest. So there are lots of problems with democracy today. And now the unhappy people have crashed the economy in England. And now business and the elites may be hurting as much as the working poor have been for years. Is there not a way for the people to share in the prosperity business and intellectual elites are having around the world while the risks of a crash to all is mitigated? Don't you think we could all cooperate better? I think the right needs to stop going for it all.

Like a lot of creative people, Trump gets bored when he is not in a situation involving

novel things. The campaign is getting on in time. That and his inability to know detailed written knowledge of policy make him dumber. If he could just read he would be on a novel knowledge curve the whole time like Hillary has been for the last 50. But he's not. He would be pretty disengaged by the end of a presidency like Reagan was.

Trump had an easy time of destroying other Republicans because their policies are all fictions.

Democrats policies are based on what is actually good for the middle class. He will not be able to pull that down because it is the truth.

I first thought of it when our conservative prime minister cancelled the long

form census which was used to create scientific statistics used by social groups, educators and business people to predict markets and the future. What could a government hate about that? Why would a pro business conservative government hurt business like that? And I thought that big business would be able to afford to hire other businesses to do market research but small businesses would not. And I thought they are cleaving small business people from big. Deregulation normally does away with medium sized businesses but I always saw that of one of the many negative effects of Deregulation. But until the long form census was cancelled I never saw the strategy dividing business into huge vs. small business was a goal of the right. How could you get rid of free stats for small businesses if you cared about all business. Thankfully the Liberals are in power and brought back the long form census.

The GOP wants to cleave the country into two groups: rich assholes

and the poor that will include formerly well of professionals like teachers and doctors and factory workers who will see their jobs replaced by robots, and then join the rest of the working poor. They want all predatory or morally laxadaisical people to be rich because they will then vote and support Republicans. No middle class anymore. Thus the GOP would be able to win all elections by hoarding money, power and knowledge.

Psychopaths love to jump in on a narrative like they are girls doing double dutch in a schoolyard.