SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Following a number of CEOs pulling out of President Trump's American Manufacturing Council and Strategic and Policy Forum, President Trump tweeted that the initiatives have been ended:
Rather than putting pressure on the businesspeople of the Manufacturing Council & Strategy & Policy Forum, I am ending both. Thank you all!
The CEOs of Merck, Intel, 3M, and other companies had already left:
3M Co. Chief Executive Officer Inge Thulin stepped down from the White House's manufacturing council, adding to the corporate exodus as the backlash grows to President Donald Trump's ambivalent response to racially-charged violence in Virginia over the weekend.
Thulin joined the White House panel in January "to advocate for policies that align with our values and encourage even stronger investment and job growth -- in order to make the United States stronger, healthier and more prosperous," the CEO said Wednesday in a statement tweeted by 3M. "After careful consideration, I believe the initiative is no longer an effective vehicle for 3M to advance these goals."
Update: The members of the Strategic and Policy Forum reportedly disbanded the group before President Trump's tweet:
The quick sequence began late Wednesday morning when Stephen A. Schwarzman, the chief executive of the Blackstone Group and one of Mr. Trump's closest confidants in the business community, organized a conference call for members of the president's Strategic and Policy Forum. On the call, the chief executives of some of the largest companies in the country debated how to proceed. After a discussion among a dozen prominent C.E.O.s, the decision was made to abandon the group altogether, said people with knowledge of the details of the call.
Also at Bloomberg:
Trump made the announcement on Twitter, less than an hour after one of the groups was said to be planning to inform the White House that it would break up. [...] Trump appeared to be making an effort to get ahead of the news as the councils began to disintegrate. The strategy forum, which is led by Blackstone Group LP's Stephen Schwarzman, planned to inform the White House Wednesday before making the announcement public, according to another person familiar with the matter, who wasn't authorized to discuss the news publicly.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday August 16 2017, @07:45PM (8 children)
Yes, Big Business is not on the side of conservatives. It is not on the side of progressives, either. It is generally against everyone and everything except the naked, rigged profits of a tiny handful of people. If humanity doesn't do something to bring them down soon, it will be the end of our civilization.
You are also correct that helping small and medium businesses grow forms the basis for a much better economic policy. I don't think Trump would do that, because he was never one of them. He started life with a massive head start. But we're so far down the rabbit hole and careening through the forests of upside down world that anything could happen, right?
Describing the MBAs from Harvard and Yale who run the Fortune 500 as Communists sounds weird, though. It's entirely the wrong term. I know that in some circles "communist," "socialist," and "fascist" are interchangeable pejoratives, but they are actually specific terms that describe different things, in the same way that calling somebody a "Buddhist" is not the same thing as calling them a "Catholic." You can see that those are different, right? Same deal here.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Grishnakh on Wednesday August 16 2017, @09:09PM (7 children)
Yes, Big Business is not on the side of conservatives. It is not on the side of progressives, either. It is generally against everyone and everything except the naked, rigged profits of a tiny handful of people.
You're missing a very important point here, however: conservatives are on the side of Big Business. It's been this way clearly for decades. Of course, it's a bit of a one-sided relationship, but conservatives are plainly very happy to push policies which benefit the profits of Big Business at the expense of everyone else: deregulation, privatization, low taxes for rich people, special tax breaks for business, etc.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Wednesday August 16 2017, @10:46PM (6 children)
No, no, no. *Some* conservatives are on the side of big business. Many, however hate big business with a passion. This is odd, because all the candidates that they vote for support big business, but it's still true. You'd think they'd split off into a minor party, but they are conservative, and here what they are conserving is the name of the party they vote for the candidates of.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Thursday August 17 2017, @01:41AM (5 children)
If they hate big business with a passion, they sure aren't showing it at the voting booth. "Voting is as voting does" as Forrest Gump might say... or "you get what you vote for".
(Score: 3, Interesting) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday August 17 2017, @11:39AM (4 children)
The problem there is they hate progressives more. If you want to know why... well that's another huge argument all in itself.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Grishnakh on Thursday August 17 2017, @01:45PM (3 children)
Yeah, basically it comes down to: they'll happily vote to fuck themselves over economically just so that they can hope to push their crappy social and religious values on everyone.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday August 17 2017, @03:37PM (2 children)
A) The religious right hasn't had significant political power or even a noteworthy lobbying lineup since Reagan, try again.
B) The definition of conservative precludes pushing *new* anything on anyone. They want the status quo socially.
C) No Democrat President in most voters' lifetimes has done anything to markedly help the economy. At least the conservatives can look back to Reagan.
See, I am not a conservative but I do at least understand them. You seem to lack that capability.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @04:23PM (1 child)
Holy sweet jesus!!!! You are 100% certifiable. Vast majority of Republicans are religious, and they've controlled significant amounts of power multiple times. You are a brain dead fucking idiot. How do you live with yourself?
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday August 19 2017, @09:19PM
There is a huge difference between being religious and wanting to push your religion down someone else's throat. Learn it and you won't look like a fool as badly in the future.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.