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   Angus McIntyre (angusm@mastodon.social)'s status on Tuesday, 26-Nov-2024 22:42:22 JST Angus McIntyre

   Trump's plan to use tariffs to force agricultural producers to move production to the United States, while simultaneously using the army to expel the workforce they need to do so is really some next-level strategic genius thinking.

   • Charlie Stross and Robert Link repeated this.
   • Embed this notice
     Codhisattva (codhisattva@mastodon.social)'s status on Tuesday, 26-Nov-2024 23:09:58 JST Codhisattva

     in reply to

     • Charlie Stross

     @angusm @cstross the prison labor force to the rescue?

   • Embed this notice
     Charlie Stross (cstross@wandering.shop)'s status on Tuesday, 26-Nov-2024 23:09:58 JST Charlie Stross

     in reply to

     • Codhisattva

     @Codhisattva @angusm That's what I'd bet on: round up the illegals in camps, fail to deport them (where's going to take them?), so try them for illegal immigration and turn them into convict labour, i.e. slaves. Which is going to do wonders for wages in the agricultural labour sector (but not in a good way).

     j@mastodon repeated this.
   • Embed this notice
     Charlie Stross (cstross@wandering.shop)'s status on Tuesday, 26-Nov-2024 23:17:23 JST Charlie Stross

     in reply to

     • Molly Cantrell-Kraig 🇺🇦
     • Lesley Shashaty

     @mckra1g @LShashaty @angusm It's not so much myopia as deliberate malice.

   • Embed this notice
     Lesley Shashaty (lshashaty@sfba.social)'s status on Tuesday, 26-Nov-2024 23:17:24 JST Lesley Shashaty

     in reply to

     @angusm I'm at the point where I feel the plan is simply to dramatically reduce the population. I still can't quite figure out how that will help him"

   • Embed this notice
     Molly Cantrell-Kraig 🇺🇦 (mckra1g@mastodon.social)'s status on Tuesday, 26-Nov-2024 23:17:24 JST Molly Cantrell-Kraig 🇺🇦

     in reply to

     • Lesley Shashaty

     @LShashaty @angusm

     His myopia is filtered through the lens of racism. Elimination of Black and brown bodies is his goal. Their humanity is immaterial to him; their contribution to society/the economy irrelevant. Trump believes BIPOC lives do not matter and have no value, and he’s willing to sacrifice the world to satisfy his prejudice. His owners seek to literally profit from Trump’s weakness and vanity.

   • Embed this notice
     Graydon (graydon@canada.masto.host)'s status on Tuesday, 26-Nov-2024 23:37:15 JST Graydon

     in reply to

     @angusm In the MAGA imagination, there's a large urban population who do nothing but drugs. As a result, MAGA thought holds that re-enslaving them to perform agricultural labour would be doing them a favour and only foolish leftist nonsense about human rights prevents this sensible solution.

     This is not quite the same thing as the "enslave every leftist" take or the "food crisis = infinite authority (because everyone will panic)" take, but all three sets of ideas slosh around together.

   • Embed this notice
     Codhisattva (codhisattva@mastodon.social)'s status on Wednesday, 27-Nov-2024 02:24:56 JST Codhisattva

     in reply to

     • Charlie Stross

     @cstross @angusm and wonders for the profits for the few megacorps. Sysco and Cargill already have prison based processing plants so this will just be scaling. AP investigated this for 2 years and released a sprawling condemnation.

     https://www.mprnews.org/story/2024/01/30/prisoners-in-the-us-are-part-of-a-hidden-workforce-linked-to-hundreds-of-popular-food-brands

   • Embed this notice
     Adam Moe (adammoe2022@c.im)'s status on Wednesday, 27-Nov-2024 06:17:10 JST Adam Moe

     in reply to

     @angusm I remember driving around farm country during the first trade war with China. I’d never seen it before, but there were MASSIVE piles of unsold beans rotting in the fields. The smell carried for miles. I remember. But so many apparently do not. I can’t even imagine the same scenario without workers. It’s going to get ugly. Everyone better learn how to live off the land!