
Trump Strategic and Policy Forum, Which Included IBM and GM CEOs, Disbands - janober
https://techcrunch.com/2017/08/16/trump-strategic-and-policy-forum-which-included-ibm-and-gm-ceos-disbands
======
matt4077
Matt Levine says it best:

"[..] but I have to confess that it seems odd to me to denounce Nazism out of
fealty to shareholder value. You can just denounce Nazism because you're not a
Nazi! This is a financial newsletter, but I have never assumed that the
operations of capital are autonomous and self-executing, or that executives
are robots who are programmed to maximize shareholder value to the exclusion
of all other considerations. Corporations exist in society, and are not above
society's concerns. Businesses operate through human beings, who remain human
even in their roles as CEOs. One would hope."

[https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-08-16/ceos-
cons...](https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-08-16/ceos-consultants-
and-communists)

~~~
WaxProlix
> I have never assumed that the operations of capital are autonomous and self-
> executing, or that executives are robots who are programmed to maximize
> shareholder value to the exclusion of all other considerations.

But that is how it works, right? If you don't maximize shareholder value you
can be ousted, if you don't where others do you will lose in the marketplace
and cease to exist. Isn't that competitive ruthlessness exactly what people
like about our current system?

> Corporations exist in society, and are not above society's concerns.
> Businesses operate through human beings, who remain human even in their
> roles as CEOs. One would hope.

Citation needed, I guess. For mid-small size companies this might be the case,
but evidence seems to point to the opposite of this for any organization large
enough to be its own thing outside of the humans and subsystems that comprise
its pieces.

~~~
ForRealsies
"Corporations are people." And it behooves them to be politically correct at
all times.

~~~
i386
Literal nazis are waking the streets in nation that leads the free world. Save
us this "political correctness gone mad" BS.

------
_1
Just yesterday:

> "For every CEO that drops out of the Manufacturing Council, I have many to
> take their place. Grandstanders should not have gone on. JOBS!"
> [https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/89747827044214374...](https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/897478270442143744)

How many had already quit and this was just to stop further embarrassing
himself?

~~~
zitterbewegung
Twelve quit before it was disbanded. See
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Manufacturing_Council](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Manufacturing_Council)
and sort by Membership status.

~~~
egwynn
Might be worth noting that three of those twelve left because they left their
jobs with their respective companies, and one in protest of a different matter
in Juny. It looks like eight left in the past two days in protest of
Charlottesville stuff.

------
jldugger
Not exactly a vote of confidence in the administration's priorities in
renegotiating NAFTA, which started like an hour ago.

~~~
Analemma_
It was already clear that nothing of substance is going to come out of the
NAFTA talks, both because nobody in business or agriculture wants it
([http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/15/trump-win-nafta-
tal...](http://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/15/trump-win-nafta-
talks-241617)) and because nobody is impressed by Trump anymore: just like the
rest of the world, Canada and Mexico have figured out that he's all bluster
and folds like a cheap tent as soon as you say "No".

~~~
gremlinsinc
It was already clear that nothing of substance...was going to come out of this
entire 4 year term... I think you meant to say..

~~~
ep103
Only if we're lucky. Repealing obamacare without a replacement came within a
single vote.

~~~
maxxxxx
With the uncertainty they have spread and the refusal to work on Obamacare
problems they are on track of making it fail even without repealing.

~~~
maxerickson
The public exchanges may not have any affordable policies or even any policies
at all available at some point.

The ACA is a lot more than just the public exchanges.

------
WaxProlix
> You can believe that broad common ownership of the means of production can
> still foster competition, while also thinking that that common ownership
> should be allocated by capitalist methods.

I don't understand how this would work - anyone more economically versed care
to chime in on how you could have common ownership of the means of production
that was also distributed capitalistically?

~~~
richmarr
Pension funds do this already to a degree. Everyone pays in, the funds invest
in all sorts of things, so everyone kinda owns bits of everything in a
capitalist way.

Of course it's obfuscated enough that it's hard to know what you own a piece
of, but it doesn't have to be that way.

------
corporateslave3
The weird part is they arent doing it for political reasons, this is to
protect the image of their corporation. But we havent been told that. There is
so much obfuscation of the truth in politics, I am constantly amazed and
dismayed at the same time.

~~~
Consultant32452
It's definitely political posturing/virtue signaling to customers. The big
gripe is that Trump didn't explicitly call out white supremacists when
denouncing hate and violence. The Sheriff explicitly stated that there was
violent escalation from both the white supremacists and the antifa crowd. A
single member of the white racist asshole group escalated the violence to the
next level and someone got killed. I'm on board with explicitly calling out
the white supremacists, but I think the reaction by the media is eye-rollingly
inconsistent. They didn't hold anyone's feet to the fire when BLM killed cops,
or antifa has previously escalated to violence. In short, this is fair
criticism of Trump, but the scale of the response is kinda ridiculous. But
also, I welcome the media to the club. Maybe we'll also get Islamic terrorists
called out by their group identity too.

~~~
vaishaksuresh
The flak that Trump is getting is not because he did not condemn white
supremacist groups, it is because he said both groups are same. One was there
preaching the idea of owning other people and violence, the second was there
to ask for equality.

BLM and KKK may both be violent, but they are being violent for different
reasons. You can condemn the violence without equating them. It is like saying
Nelson Mandela and Pablo Escobar are same because they fought government and
went to prison.

~~~
Consultant32452
Both groups deserve equal protection under the law and should have the right
to assemble. Any violence against either one is equally problematic. The
content of their shitty messages is irrelevant.

~~~
vaishaksuresh
>The content of their shitty messages is irrelevant

To you, but the president endorsing a group or legitimizing the cause of
another is not irrelevant.

~~~
Consultant32452
Again, it's completely fair criticism to call Trump out for not explicitly
naming white supremacists or alt-right or whatever in his initial remarks.
What I take issue with is that when it's left leaning groups committing
similar acts of violence no one on the left and hardly anyone in the national
media explicitly calls out Antifa or BLM as having murderers or violent acts
carried out amongst its ranks.

Are we going to associate everyone with their political identity or not? It's
unethical to do it only when it's a political identity you disagree with.

------
maxxxxx
The sad part is that business will go on but now the lobbyists will do the
advising again.

~~~
sxates
Seems like these panels were in place more for their legitimizing optics than
for genuine counsel.

------
austincheney
So..... who else do you think the Republicans are going to nominate for
president in 2020?

~~~
D-Coder
Based on recent history, Martin Shkreli has good odds. :-)

