But ultimately, isn't it the complacency of poor people, their disinterest in politics, in standing for each other, in learning and pushing for change is what allowed the existence and conduct of the rich?
There is no "fascism" in 21st century because there are no fascist movements or parties. The term "fascism" doesn't mean much, it is just a word used by certains movements back in the past to self describe. Therefore if a party or movement doesn't self describe as fascist then it isn't. Every attempt to define it becomes way too broad and could be easily applied to almost every country in the world.
The term is recently became heavily recycled by left wing activists to label everything they disagree with (and sometimes even used by more radical lefties aka tankies to label less radical ones).
We can analyze Fascism, summarize its general aspects, and apply the definition to other movements. Hence why we can call Nazism fascism, even though they were separate parties. Trumpism is fascist. This is the point the article is making, and it has been made thoroughly elsewhere as well. At this point, it's is just basic table stakes discussion context for anybody who loves individual liberty or believes in the Constitution and limited government. If you're still unable to even entertain the idea, then you're part of the problem. Based on your touchstone strawmen of "leftists", "radical", and "activists", it sounds like you've got a heavy case of TDS - the real TDS, not the accusation-in-a-mirror version.
What unnecessary wars did the US start so far? And what would you say is necessary to do when there is an extremely theocratic country with a goal of "wiping out" another country is getting close to create a nuclear weapon?
The second Iraq war was completely unnecessary. The fake WMD stories have been well documented. America then created the power vacuum that allowed ISIS to grow to an international problem.
Afghanistan too, the exuse was 9/11 but the Taliban was never proven to be involved, it was all Saudi Arabians. But SA is a "friendly" nation so they had to go after Afghanistan instead. Meanwhile Bin Laden was living comfortably in Pakistan.
Further back the Vietnam and Korea wars were unnecessary too, America had no business there. If they wanted to become communist that was their right. The only one I can consider justified in some way was the first gulf war, because Iraq did indeed invade Kuwait.
All Trump did was prove to Iran that they need a nuclear weapon to be safe. What would actually have worked (and did work) would have been guarantees. You know like the agreement Obama achieved and Trump trashed.
Hasn't the Model Y been the world's #1 best selling car the last 3 years in a row? Even if their sales are down some, I hardly think you can call them a failed experiment.
As for tariffs, SmarterEveryDay has proven that we need them with his smart grill scrubber that got destroyed by cheap Chinese copycats the moment it became popular.
I'm working on a smart air quality monitor, I don't want competition with the Chinese either.
> Is HN really a place to criticize administration?
Articles critical of economics policies aren't criticizing the administration, but the policies. Yes, economic policies are of interest to technology, and articles related to it are of interest to us.
Even ignoring the fact that an article critical of a policy isn't specifically critical of the administration, yes, HN is really a place to criticize any administration.
> I don't want competition with the Chinese either.
You also only want to be able to sell your goods in the US? Because the outcome of tariffs is retaliatory tariffs, which will considerably reduce your available market. No matter what you're going to have competition from China, and tariffs ensure markets outside of the US will be more dominated by them.
If your product can so easily be duplicated, and for cheaper, it's probably not a great product.
> in an environment with regulations and high living standards.
Is this a joke? The US has poor living standards for these types of workers. Minimum wage in low minimum wage states. Poor or no healthcare. Most are probably on government assistance programs. Tariffs hit these workers hardest as well, because they're the most likely to be laid off, and also the ones paying the largest percentage of their salaries for products affected by tariffs.
The factories in China cranking these things out also have poor conditions, but the reason they're making stuff so cheaply is because their factories are typically more advanced. You can get small batches made cheaply, which is nearly impossible in the US. This allows them to compete with even somewhat niche products.
Also, let's be a bit real here. Nearly every "American Made" product at some point offloads the production outside of the US, and there's plenty of companies in the US that make dupe products as well.
Start accepting CVs over snail mail. Much more difficult to automate, there is a cost already embedded in the process (72¢ for a stamp) and any attempts to automate this will be obvious.
