Yeah. Even just keeping the USSR around as a creaky ex-superpower even if no cold war would help alot.
The end of the cold war was only a good thing if you're involved in the finance sector.
Just like “only Nixon could go to China,” I think it’s analogous that “only Bill Clinton could do welfare reform.” And it works fine in economic good times, but then people can really struggle and hurt during bad times.. . . Notice nothing like Bill Clinton's destroying the US industrial base with free trade or welfare reform of the sort recommended by Charles Murray was able ot even be seriously proposed in the 80s. You know, the same one who wrote 'The Bell Curve".
I have wondered as the right wing really went after environmentalists as “extremists” in the early ‘90s. And they criticized the environmentalists as not really caring about the environment, but as really just hating capitalism. It struck me as a classic blame-the-person misdirect, and as a way not to talk about what seemed to me to be valid points about the environment.. . Remove the Soviet threat and idiotic right wingers can be let loose to go to town with their various heart's desires . .
It’s all well and fine to take on the big oil companies and insist on a better deal, but I don’t know, things haven’t worked out very well for Venezuela.. . the Chavez regime . .
Please tell me what alternatives you might have in mind.. . a combination of the alternative to western capitalism collapsing on top of it.
It’s all well and fine to take on the big oil companies and insist on a better deal, but I don’t know, things haven’t worked out very well for Venezuela.
And they were hurt by the 2014 drop in oil prices, as was Russia.Venezuela's problem comes from the fact oil is basically 97% of their exports . . .
So, in this potential POD the market for political comedy is discovered a couple of decades earlier.https://books.google.com/books?id=H...ated doubts about Carter's sincerity"&f=false
' . . . A little more than a month after the 1976 election, before Carter even took office, SNL blatantly demonstrated doubts about Carter's sincerity in a brief speech by Dan Aykroyd as Carter sitting outside a warehouse in Plains, eating from a bad of shelled peanuts. Smiling broadly, he proceeded to tell the audience that it would simply not be possible for him to keep all the promised he made during the campaign. He made those promises without knowing the sort of stuff only a president gets to know. So now, after the election, as he was getting ready to become president, it was becoming clear to him that Ford had been a pretty good president after all. He now knew that it would simply be impossible to cut unemployment and reduce unemployment as he'd promised during the campaign. Saving the economy would take a long time. People shouldn't expect to see any improvement until his second term. But, ending with a smile and "Merry Christmas," he promised that by 1984, the United States would have full employment and a balanced budget. . . '
Venezuela's problem comes from the fact oil is basically 97% of their exports along with the fact they actually didn't invest more into the oil stuff along with the drought they went through. Though I suspect them being socialist also meant they were viewed unfavorably by the US, which could've gimped trade for them.
So, it looks like David Letterman is ahead of the curve and poking fun before the purchase goes through for sure (maybe it needed anti-trust approval?)https://case.hks.harvard.edu/genera...nal-broadcasting-company-a-clash-of-cultures/
'On June 9, 1986, General Electric Co. acquired the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) for $6.8 billion, setting a record for the largest non-oil merger in US history. GE wanted RCA for its defense-related businesses and for its solid domestic sales of consumer goods, an area where GE was faltering. But the "jewel in the crown" was the RCA-owned television network, the National Broadcasting Company (NBC). . . '
Notice that share of revenue is not dropping as fast as share of audience, but the owners of the big three may see and fear the coming future.https://books.google.com/books?id=M...etwork share of the audience dropped"&f=false
' . . . During the 1980s, the three-network [NBC, ABC, CBS] share of the audience dropped from about 90% to 60%; network share of television ad revenues declined from 60% to 47% (Owen & Wildman, 1992). . . . . Cable networks and multistation owners (companies that own several local broadcast stations) began to challenge the dominance of the big three. . . '
This pertains to GE power plants leaking PCBs into the Hudson River. And good for New York Gov. Mario Cuomo standing up to CEO Jack Welch.https://books.google.com/books?id=W...se his veto, a tactic that backfired"&f=false
‘ . . . Welch met with the governor to persuade him not to exercise his veto, a tactic that backfired. Cuomo not only vetoed the measure but he also later revealed Welch’s persistence on the issue: He “has called me, and lobbied me, about PCBs. I dispute what GE is saying and I said no to his ideas and proposals.” . . . ’