“The opposite of hate is not love, it is indifference.” ~Elie Wiesel A WWII survivor and Nobel prize winner, his words writings are apropos for these troubled times. Listen, protest, resist.
I didn't watch not one episode, nor wanted to. It was trump's so I knew it wasn't worth watching. I did get a spark of interest in it when I heard Bret Michaels (of Poison) was on it. But that was more a disappointment in Bret and his friendship with Eric Trump. Like, he KNEW how they are.
Ugh
Sorry but we had our own Brexit. This is yours now and I hope you turn it around quicker than we have or for some weird reason ever seem to want to do so 🤷♂️
I remember learning about this scene; he was a real lawyer and economist commentator, and they told him to just improv it as if he were giving a real lecture.
Stein was always a Republican.
His father, the economist Herbert Stein, was the chair of the Council of Economic Advisers for Richard Nixon.
Ben Stein, who is also a lawyer, started his career as a Nixon speechwriter.
A teacher on X once compared MAGAs to the kids at the back of the classroom who never paid attention & made fun of (but secretly resented) the kids up front who wanted to learn.
Yes, it was one of my favorite movies at the time. That tariff caused a retaliation of Europe, raising their own and decreased our exports, which took us further into the depression. Save farmers my foot.
I sent this clip to a MAGA (now ex) friend. She, rather confinedently, replied, "That was not true." I said- "Well, Ben is actually an economist and ad-libbed that scene." To which she replied, "Who's Ben?" 🤦♀️fml
The tariffs being proposed will in fact work just as the budding American oligarchy intends them to work. They're intended to destabilize the economy and leave what's left of the middle-class and the lower class competing for scraps.
Lack of understanding is NOT the issue.
The students here are the Trump voters; explains why they never understood tariffs. Note, the sentence following after "tariff" -- "the US sank deeper into the great depression", for those that are slow ...
Best part is this tool was a hard-core trickle-down economic & social conservative & even he knew this shit was bad (hence his role in the film wasn’t even ironic)
Wow scary !!!! Good I live elsewhere !!!!! Oh and by the way anyone not feeling comfortable in the USA your neighbours welcome you with open arms 🤗 CANADA 🍁
My god this scene is so perfect. The information is valuable, it’s freaking Ben Stein, and the students response is completely correct and rational. just perfection.
These tariffs were a return to the system that the US used for revenue in the 150 years before the income tax was put in place in 1913. To say that they "didn't work" is a silly critique because they didn't lower/remove the income tax at the same time and simply collected more revenues for the gov.
Xennial-for that exact reason- got nothing in common with majority 45+yr old people, particularly YTs who voted for Trump. My soul is older than most millennials. Men of all ages elected Trump. Latino/Yts aged 18-29 overwhelmingly voted Trump. 45% of them claim they face “discrimination.” 🙄
Ben Stein just knew that stuff, off the top of his head; John Hughes told him to teach something boring that he would know, and Ben (literally) understood the assignment.
His supporters don’t understand they were voting against their interests. Farmers voted for him and are now asking for him to not deport their workers. Trump never spoke without saying mass deportations and they voted for it anyway.
Yep, it needs to be paired with the revocation of the income tax, otherwise it acts the same as an increase in corporate taxes on net household incomes.
One thing a corporate tax does not do nearly as effectively as a tariff, however, is to create a bilateral negotiating chit in foreign policy.
They weren’t trying to teach anyone anything. Ben Stein himself said the film makers needed him talk about anything at all for his part in the movie. Something boring. So he chose that topic. It’s called improvising.
When I came to the USA 32 years ago, I was surprised that athletes had more respect than people who were good with science, had good grades in school and those “geeks” were disrespected by most of their peers.
Sorry, but I think what we have now is the result of this “culture” (cult?).
I’ve lived in the USA almost my whole long life and have noticed the same trend. In the 1950’s when I was a teen, the good students were admired as much as the star athletes.
There were some amazingly smart folks in my school and they were held up from the rest of us to aspire to. But I was also somewhere pretty blue and our sport teams weren't nearly as funded as the schools I was at previously.
Being a former collegiate athlete who hated the sport and wanted nothing more than to be out, I agree. Once you're not an athlete you have to completely redefine yourself and I can say my version of self now couldn't care less about athletics. Being informed and aware is the real flex.
Some definite food for thought, and thinking about it now I can't disagree. It's sad because athletics can teach kids a lot beyond the sport, something my daughter has shared, but it's also about balance and priorities and we lost that long ago. You're absolutely correct.
I am not against athletics, I was a handball goalie in high school and cross country team member in college. And I was a “geek” at the same time. You are right both should be considered to be a good example for all. At 150cm I was not someone to mess with.😂
The period between 1995 to 2000 was good when it comes to "respect for nerds" in popular media, because those "nerds" were becoming rich. However, we quickly devolved again. Now, people are treating political parties exactly like their favorite sports teams. They need to go back to football.
The entire system is upside down. A high school will have a many-thousand-seat stadium but the science lab doesn't have enough beakers to teach students.
The images make the problem of anti-intellectualism crystal clear.
Ben Stein, of all people. It’s crazy that we are driven to “relying on” people like him, the likes of Susan Collins and the dad burned Cheneys to help us out of this mess.
Well before either of us were born. He was a speechwriter for Nixon and has spent his entire life since Nixon's resignation defending him. Nixon was just as much a racist, misogynistic, antisemite as Trump
Ironically the story goes the director let Stein figure his own lines for this because he knew Stein could give a boring economics lecture off-the-cuff. The man was a speechwriter for Nixon and Ford, Republican economic policy was kind of his bag.
I've no idea how truthful the story is, but Stein obviously had enough of a sense of humor about himself to do it considering he monetized this demeanour into a whole gameshow.
The character is basically a self-roasting satire.
I was on that show once. He was an incredibly nice man who happens to hold a number of political and cultural beliefs that range from the simply unfortunate to the utterly horrific.
I wonder what he learned from Nixon's budget director.. the guy who Failed every quarter to balance it and tamp down inflation... You probably remember him, too
I knew he was a dum dum, so I wasn't surprised by his support of orange fuck face, but when he compared Trump to Washington.. that's some special big time brain dead shit.
Trump appeals to people whose brains stopped developing in grade school. Bodies grew; brains stopped. They think like kids.
Hrs always saying he's smart because he knows he's stupid. People say he doesn't read because he won't wear glasses, but I actually think he might be dyslexic. He obviously has adhd.
Trump himself has an arrested development according to his neice and clinical psychologist Mary Trump. Its due to childhood abuse. Of course his other siblings were also abused abd none of them were crazy. His dad was a sociopath. Part nature, part nurture.
Greed.
I have in laws that are perfectly normal successful people when you talk and hang out with them. Makes no sense they’d vote against us.
2016 they claimed to be voting with their wallet or whatever.
Not going to Turkey Day to find out their reason this time.
Russian propaganda.
My son used to be a reasonable decent person.
He once asked me to marry his immigrant worker/friend, for citizenship. Then he voted to have him deported. 🙄😢
He listened to too much effed up podcasts etc for some reason.
It DID start about $ but if he’d looked into facts… idk
I can definitely see this as one of many explanations. And I’m so sorry you’re enduring that. I hope something shifts and he changes his mindset. The campaign of misinformation truly hit us hard. ♥️💔
I know right?!?! I don’t get it either. I mean I get the ones who aren’t intelligent pining after Trump…but someone like Stein or Kelsey Grammer….how exactly does that work?
Fun fact, Ben Stein is a far-right nut who worked for Nixon, and made a movie where he dismissed science because nazis also did experiments, thus Climate Change isn't real.
Proof that you can know a lot of stuff and still be an idiot.
I remember screaming at the TV when T(rapist) said he would have China pay for our child care with tariffs. I wanted to strangle the journalist who let that comment slide by.
He did pull his support for Trump in October 2016, saying it's time for Trump to go back to Trump Towers and for Pence to move to the top of the ticket. But then the idiot voted for Trump anyway. This is what I don't understand ... why vote for someone you hate??? These people are morons.
Comments
Ugh
Same energy lol…
With that said, these are facts.
#TrumpTariffTaxesHellNo
#TrumpflationHellNo
#TrumpTariffsHellNo
All need to trend in the Millions! He posts Tariffs so we say Hell No!
anyone anyone
He's a....
anyone anyone?
Clue: he's not poor
He's. a. billionaire.
#Zuckerberg #trump
Anyone?..anyone?”
If anyone knows how conservative Ben is, then it's fucking hilarious.
D O-O
economics
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFfnlYbFEiE&pp=ygUZdm9vZG9vIGNoaWxkIGppbWkgaGVuZHJpeA%3D%3D
Me: Alan Ruck was almost 30 when he played Cameron.
His father, the economist Herbert Stein, was the chair of the Council of Economic Advisers for Richard Nixon.
Ben Stein, who is also a lawyer, started his career as a Nixon speechwriter.
Lack of understanding is NOT the issue.
Did they? Hell no the failed on both accounts.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Stein?wprov=sfla1
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xKKPHq0sb0s
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/jun/04/ben-stein-interview-donald-trump-economics
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ben-stein-trump-must-go/
But of course that was Conan Doyle's way of warning about tariffs as a subtle aside.
I read Boström's Doyle biography From Holmes to Sherlock. Excellent biography and deepened my appreciation for Doyle.
anyone?
anyone?
anyone?
... Bueller?
Ben Stein just knew that stuff, off the top of his head; John Hughes told him to teach something boring that he would know, and Ben (literally) understood the assignment.
And that's the thing MAGA doesn't understand. You can't vote for the guy and then say "But I don't support his terrible policies."
It doesn't work that way.
Of course, they think, it will never happen to me. (Until it does.)
“Anyone? Anyone?”
Kids are in a coma.
One thing a corporate tax does not do nearly as effectively as a tariff, however, is to create a bilateral negotiating chit in foreign policy.
Yes
Sorry, but I think what we have now is the result of this “culture” (cult?).
The images make the problem of anti-intellectualism crystal clear.
A case I reported for years.
https://bonnierussell.wordpress.com/?s=Brandon+vandenburg
So this is literally *his stuff* here.
The character is basically a self-roasting satire.
Greenspan was his name
Trump appeals to people whose brains stopped developing in grade school. Bodies grew; brains stopped. They think like kids.
I have in laws that are perfectly normal successful people when you talk and hang out with them. Makes no sense they’d vote against us.
2016 they claimed to be voting with their wallet or whatever.
Not going to Turkey Day to find out their reason this time.
My son used to be a reasonable decent person.
He once asked me to marry his immigrant worker/friend, for citizenship. Then he voted to have him deported. 🙄😢
He listened to too much effed up podcasts etc for some reason.
It DID start about $ but if he’d looked into facts… idk
Proof that you can know a lot of stuff and still be an idiot.
Ha🤣😂🤣
To me its just blunder to dupe companies into direct payments in trumpets own pocket.
He cant be this stupid🤯