from the do-you-really-want-Donald-Trump's-ear? dept.
The CEOs of Tesla, Uber, and Pepsi have joined President-elect Donald Trump's "Strategic and Policy Forum":
President-elect Donald Trump has tapped three additional high-profile chief executives including Tesla's Elon Musk to join a group that will meet regularly to give input on job creation and the economy.
Trump announced the first batch of CEOs for his "strategic and policy forum" on Dec. 2. The group is led by Stephen Schwarzman, the chief executive of Blackstone. Trump's transition team now said the group would expand to include Tesla's Musk, Uber CEO Travis Kalanick, and Pepsi chief Indra Nooyi.
From the article at The Wrap:
Trump announced the initial 16 members earlier this month, and the group will be chaired by Blackstone CEO Stephen A. Schwarzman. According to a press release distributed by Trump's transition team, "Members of the Forum will be charged with providing their individual views to the President — informed by their unique vantage points in the private sector — on how government policy impacts economic growth, job creation and productivity."
Also at WSJ (paywalled).
(Score: 2) by BsAtHome on Saturday December 17 2016, @12:27PM
So, the next wave of tech will be transportation hailed by an app running on electricity with a beverages-machine in the back.
Now I think we need a cinema guy, a popcorn guy and a privacy sign. Then we can have a car, loaded with film, beverages and popcorn to transport you from A to B silently with electric drive and entertainment provided. The privacy sign is, of course, for the couples that engage in private viewing on the backseat (while being transported for inspection).
Sometimes, my fantasy gets a hold of me, but then, reality is even more strange...
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @12:48PM
I'm not surprised that Uber is in there. The CEO is an ayn rand freak (he named the company after rand's fantasy of superior men aka ubermensch) whose business plan is pretty much the most dehumanizing, rent-seeking plan [nakedcapitalism.com] of any modern tech company. And Trump's administration is packed with randians. [alternet.org]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @01:44PM
Friedrich Nietzsche says hi and wants his concept back from that hack Rand.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday December 17 2016, @02:03PM
For Uber (or any other radical industry restructuring) to be welfare enhancing, it would have to clearly demonstrate:
The ability to earn sustainable profits in competitive markets large enough to provide attractive returns on its invested capital
The ability to provide service at significantly lower cost, or the ability to produce much higher quality service at similar costs
That it has created new sources of sustainable competitive advantages through major product redesigns and technology/process innovations that incumbent producers could not readily match, and
Evidence that the newly-dominant company will have strong incentive to pass on a significant share of those efficiency gains to consumers.
The obvious rebuttal is Uber's activities in New York City. You have to remember here that there are a variety of other business interests such as traditional taxi companies that have a financial interest in denigrating the whole concept of Uber rather than merely the business, which clearly is doing a lot of things wrong. Conflating the business competence of Uber with the viability of its business is one such way.
And Trump's administration is packed with randians.
That's not a particularly graceful flavor of libertarian even by libertarian standards, but they might provide a needful correction to the statist excesses of the past half century. It's more promising a beginning for a Trump administration than I expected. We'll see what comes of it.
(Score: 5, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @02:21PM
> The obvious rebuttal
Drink!
————————————————————————
The khallow Obvious Rebuttal Drinking Game:
Every time khallow says "the obvious rebuttal" everybody takes a shot.
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=16849&cid=437967 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=13985&cid=358591 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=15453&cid=400343 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=15259&cid=395330 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=15168&cid=393131 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=9968&cid=247750 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=16319&cid=422041 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=16518&cid=427099 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=10407&cid=257984 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=15451&cid=400237 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=6171&cid=146540 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=15790&cid=409076 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=13861&cid=354825 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=15899&cid=412132 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=10156&cid=252378 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=16621&cid=430615 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=16024&cid=414867 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=14796&cid=382957 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=14796&cid=382957 [soylentnews.org]
https://soylentnews.org/comments.pl?sid=12649&cid=319100 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday December 17 2016, @03:34PM
The obvious rebuttal: you're obsessed!
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @03:45PM
His drivel wears thin, so one day you go to google and do a site search and realize you aren't imagining it.
Now you have an excuse to drink. You are welcome!
Ethanol-fueled ought to get in on this.
(Score: 0, Redundant) by khallow on Sunday December 18 2016, @12:16AM
His drivel wears thin, so one day you go to google and do a site search and realize you aren't imagining it.
The great majority of these linked comments are people who just didn't think things through. That's what makes an obvious rebuttal, obvious.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @11:25PM
Wow, that is an awful lot of obvious butt for all! Do we really have to go over all this again? Keep an eye out for "Unter" real soon.
(Score: 0, Redundant) by khallow on Sunday December 18 2016, @12:11AM
For example, if some pundit bloviates [soylentnews.org]:
In fact, the central tenet of New Deal competition policy was not big or small government; it was distrust of concentrations of power and conflicts of interest in the economy. . The New Deal divided power, pitting faction against other faction, a classic Jefferson-Madison approach to controlling power (think Federalist Paper No. 10).
Then they should have been aware of well-known New Deal policies that didn't do that, such as my example, the National Industrial Recovery Act which was a huge power grab by FDR which ultimately was blocked by the Supreme Court, or the subsequent attempt to pack the Supreme Court with cronies when the Supreme Court turned out to be such an obstacle. Or if someone bloviates [soylentnews.org]:
These top-of-their-profession projects show that the driver to bring artificial intelligence into any field isn't the amount of labor, but rather the cost of that labor. A lawyer costs fifty times more per hour than a retail worker and so is that many times more likely to find themselves with an AI competitor.
while ignoring that they're speaking of vaporware (IBM Watson).
There's a pattern to stuff (you can thumb through this list for many such examples) that triggers the "obvious rebuttal" phrase: bloviation about stuff while ignoring something blindingly obvious. Hence the rebuttal which is... obvious.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday December 18 2016, @05:44AM
OMG! You have exactly zero self-awareness.
Do you dream of origami unicorns?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday December 18 2016, @09:59PM
> Or if someone bloviates
If bloviation is what it takes for you to go full autistic in a reply, then you should be drowned in the infinite recursion of criticizing yourself because, damn every single one of your "obvious rebuttals" is a freaking poster child for bloviation.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @04:21PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @04:24PM
Only a summary, sorry.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @02:09PM
Musk is not only an immigrant, but has been one of the most outspoken individuals in relation to the dangers of head-in-the-sand mentality when it comes to the human contribution to climate change. And he also, in a rare moment of direct political involvement, said Trump "was not the right man for the job." That Trump is now still seeking him out to help advise him I think shows Trump really is genuinely interested in trying to "make America great again." I think it's time we move beyond Clinton, but I think this really has to be contrasted there to emphasize how incredible this. Had Clinton become president every single appointment would read pretty much straight off a list of "donations" to her campaign or 'foundation.' Instead of seeking out people that would help improve the country as much as possible, she would be seeking out people that improve her own personal status in life as much as possible. Of course that's nothing unique to her, that's pretty much establishment politicking 101.
I suppose we do need to give it some time. Obama's first action on his first day of office, 8 years ago, was to officially close Guantanamo Bay - fulfilling one of his campaign promises. It's still open. Nonetheless, I'm quite excited by this direction for now. And I have hopes when he was the best and brightest informing him about climate change, digital privacy/rights, etc that his stances might be able to genuinely evolve.
(Score: 0, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @02:33PM
Musk is not only an immigrant, but has been one of the most outspoken individuals in relation to the dangers of head-in-the-sand mentality when it comes to the human contribution to climate change.
Lol. Its a symbolic non-job. Typical trump showmanship. Meanwhile the people he's actually appointed to real jobs in the government are hardcore head-in-the-sand types. Don't be a sucker for this reality-show misdirection.
Had Clinton become president every single appointment would read pretty much straight off a list of "donations" to her campaign or 'foundation.
That's just fantasy on your part. Clinton was a normal politician and normal politicians appoint donors to 2nd tier ambassadorships. Not to cabinet level positions. [politico.com] And definitely not goldman sachs people [rollingstone.com] because in the unlikely event that she would have been so tone-deaf, Sanders, Warren and Ellison would have screamed bloody murder and held her accountable to her campaign rhetoric. Nobody in the GOP is raising a finger to hold Trump accountable.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @03:21PM
Here are a few names for you: Rahm Emanuel, Robert Homats, Stephen Friedman, Diana Farrel, Mark Patterson, Adam Storch, Gary Gensler. That's just a sampling of the Goldman Sachs ONLY crew that Obama filled his cabinet and executive level positions with. Look at all his appointments and it's a typical establishment quid pro quo pool party. Add in ties to the "Clinton Foundation" (whose donations have mysteriously dried up now that her political time is over) and his entire cabinet was nothing but cronyism which clearly has some degree of transitivity. Again this is not unique to Obama and wouldn't have been unique to Hillary.
Some of Trump's picks for cabinet level positions have been absolutely disconcerting. But at the same time he's also appointing non-politicians, military generals, and even his previous rivals, who absolutely do stand outside this political nonsense that's been holding back America for so long. Nuance, something missing in modern discussion. I mean you link to Rolling Stone like that's a reasonable thing to do. Today a good chunk of the country thinks we just elected Hitler. And a good chunk also thinks we just elected a a modern day FDR (irony notwithstanding). Not supporting sources who have thrown away all notions of integrity over agenda would be a nice first step there for all of us.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @03:29PM
(1) Obama Not Clinton
(2) Not significant donors, unlike say Mnuchin who personally contributed over $400K
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @05:13PM
You are being misled by your news sources. FEC regulations prohibit a single individual from directly donating anywhere near $450k to an individual's campaign. There are lots of ways to get around this, but they leave less and less of a public paper trail. Some, such as donations to certain types of political action organizations, enable donors to keep their identity completely secret. The point here is you're comparing apples to oranges. I'm certain this Mnuchin individual did contribute $400k, however saying the typical cronyism is less shall we say "generous" is simply false. You're comparing what was likely his total "donation" to only "donations" for previous administrations tied to public records. Suffice to say, Obama was putting a much higher price on his cabinet seats than just that $2700 or whatever the relevant individual FEC limit was at the time.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @06:19PM
> however saying the typical cronyism is less shall we say "generous" is simply false.
Well you are encouraged to provide proof for these claims.
Oh, that's right you have none. Just hand-waving bullshit that is so insubstantial that it can't be disproven.
Convenient as hell, eh?
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @02:47PM
Musk is not only an immigrant,
So is Trump's wife.
She even appears to be an illegal immigrant. [foxnews.com]
But she and Musk have something very important in common. Guess what that is!
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @04:46PM
So is Trump's wife.
She even appears to be an illegal immigrant.
But she and Musk have something very important in common. Guess what that is!
They both suck Trump's cock!
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @03:21PM
Picking Musk is just one of a variety of recent Trump actions that seem to be "conciliatory".
This editorial properly (IMO) places them as the last step in a successful scam:
Trump blows off working class
A friend of mine, an expert car mechanic, once told me of losing $30,000 in a commodity deal. It was one of those investment swindles then making the rounds. I asked my friend whether he felt angry. “No,” he answered. “I could have tripled my money.” He had no idea that he had been hosed.
Every successful scam ends with a “blow-off.” That’s when the con artist, having relieved the mark of his money, gets rid of the victim. That can be done several ways. Often the chump is too embarrassed to complain. Or he can be intimidated into silence.
The ideal victim is the one who, like my friend, gets taken but doesn’t know it. Such trusting people often come back for more.
Donald Trump is now at the blow-off stage of his hustle to win the support of blue-collar whites.
He started with an in-your-face double cross, filling his administration with the very Wall Street financiers he promised to defang. Then he chose for labor secretary Andrew Puzder, a fastfood executive hostile to a decent minimum wage and several other worker protections.
Blue-collar America has indeed been hurt by mass immigration, especially the illegal kind. On this issue, Trump campaigned as a hard-liner. But Puzder has been a champion of cheap foreign labor. The department he would head is supposed to punish employers who hire undocumented workers.
Trump’s low regard for working stiffs hasn’t exactly been a closely held secret. He ran for president having already employed illegal labor, stiffed his contractors and defrauded the little guys attending Trump University. So how did he get their vote? “There’s nothing a con artist likes better than exploiting the sense of unease we feel when it appears that the world as we know it is about to change,” Maria Konnikova writes in her book “The Confidence Game.” Globalization and automation have put factory workers under enormous stress. Trump checked off all boxes in the art of the con. 1) Learn what the target wants. 2) Play on that desire. 3) Create an emotional foundation based on rapport and an illusion of empathy.
The revolution in information technology also helps. The Trump campaign spread fake news to trap low-information voters in an alternate reality it could control.
A common trait among fraud victims is a desire to believe that things will work their way.
How will labor respond to the Trumpian blow-off? Some may resist. The president of the local steelworkers union flatly announced that Trump “lied his a-- off” about the number of jobs he saved at the Carrier plant in Indianapolis. Trump hit back with an insulting tweet, and others threatened the labor leader’s family.
Some may quietly obey rather than expose themselves to such intimidation. And still others will continue to believe that Trump has their interests at heart – or that he’s not doing what he’s doing.
One wishes a better outcome for American workers of all colors. They’ve suffered enough.
Creators Syndicate
Froma Harrop
(Score: 4, Interesting) by n1 on Saturday December 17 2016, @03:10PM
In the grand scheme of things, these appointments are as irrelevant as they appear, but...
1) I'm sure Trump can see himself in Musk... They both have used large amounts of other people's money with little risk to their own capital and have created a brand around their name. If you enjoy the vision of TSLA, SolarCity and SpaceX that's fine, but don't be ignorant to what they are in practical terms and their actual potential as viable businesses. TBTF is the goal, viable business is secondary. Musk wants to be the next Steve Jobs, his own relevance and importance is what he really cares about.
2) Uber is an interesting business in that they rely on privately owned transport to enable their 'ride sharing/taxi' platform. But their longer goal is to put an end to private ownership of transport, and are now pushing forward with their driverless cars which will enable that. It's not something i've seen really, starting a business looking one direction with the actual direction in a very different one. Perhaps Trump's administration will use that as inspiration.
3) Linda McMahon is to run the 'small business administration' -- Vince McMahon bought the business from his father, disrupted the industry and broke up the territories to become THE big fish in a small pond who doesn't count their public facing talent as employees, despite having contracts which forbid them to take other work. WWE is entertainment, and this is a joke.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @03:40PM
> But their longer goal is to put an end to private ownership of transport,
You mean personal ownership. They fully intend to establish a transport monopoly and then extract maximum rent from it.
But even today they exploit information asymmetry with their drivers such that take home pay after expenses is usually less than minium wage. And the people they really suckered, the ones who bought more expensive cars than they would otherwise, expecting to offset the costs by driving for uber, those people are trapped - utterly beholden to uber's ability to cut them off for any reason.
(Score: 2) by n1 on Saturday December 17 2016, @03:49PM
Yeah, I meant personal ownership. Massive difference there, thank you for the correction and elaborating on the point I failed to make.
(Score: 2) by linkdude64 on Saturday December 17 2016, @03:38PM
That the next revolution in US Auto manufacture will be with electric cars and companies with forward-thinking designs.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @03:46PM
> This is exactly what I was hoping for.
More pepsi flavors?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @07:27PM
> companies with forward-thinking designs.
You mean like Chrysler's "cab forward" designs of the 1990's? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cab_forward#Automobiles [wikipedia.org]
An unmentioned effect (in some cars) was an engine and other service items shoved back under the leading edge of the windshield, making service extra difficult...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @04:36PM
Uber: We're planning to displace workers by the millions, but we're also in the innovation business competing with China and India so don't regulate us.
Musk: We need to roll out an EV charging infrastructure nationwide, and our space launches fail as often as not, but don't do anything that gets in our way.
Pepsi: We're in the business of helping make millions of Americans obese. We know you're not going to pull a Mike Bloomberg on us, but you could still do a lot of damage with nasty tweets and remarks at rallies and press conferences so we're here to play nice.
Bezos: I'm not going to apologize for what appeared in the Washington Post, but Amazon is displacing thousands and thousands of retail and IT jobs (and soon, transportation jobs) so I'm here to talk up innovation.
Trump: Look at all these captains of industry I have on my team. We're going to MAGA.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @09:07PM
What they're doing sounds more like a lemon party.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday December 17 2016, @07:19PM
Did I read this right? "Job Creation" and "Uber" in the same context? Someone, dial 666 and check how cold it's gotten over there...