I am here in Texas, and finding that the US is a place of great social complexity.
The Texans I am working with are fine people and our business dealings are honest and straightforward, of all the places I have been Houston is easily the most diverse and enjoyable from purely a fitting in perspective. They all vote for Trump and support his economic policy, and ignore the crazy stuff as politics.
However they are all very much aware of the racial history and the sensitivity around things like KKK and Blackface, and none condone anything that the Virginian Governor and AG did in the past. While my view is that maybe you need to move on and judge the guys from their current actions, these conservative, Christian, pickup driving, gun-toting, Trump-supporting family men say the past is important and it tells us more about character.
Perhaps it is something to do with the obvious shame they display at treatment of coloured folk and a need to set it right. Interesting to hear @DonMania view on this, as it may just be a Texan thing to have a strong sense of duty and justice. President Johnson, although a Democrat, has had a huge effect on the Texan psyche.
In any case, we did the deal yesterday to now make our products here in Houston, so I will be spending a lot of time here, buying a huge pickup, learning to shoot and drinking Shiner Bock. Church is not on my agenda.
Congratulations @Bacchusfox on the developments! That is great news.
I think the sensitivity to Blackface is significantly heightened in the US given the historical context. Slavery, lynchings, discrimination, and Blackface often being used to mock African-Americans. I know that is not the case in other countries including Spain where my mrs is from. The first time I spent 3 Kings Day (Jan 6) there I was shocked to see folks in Blackface acting as one of the 3 Kings. They meant no malice and my shock was quite amusing to them.
As for Houston, Hillary Clinton won Harris County (where Houston is) by carrying 54% of the vote to Trump’s 41%. She also won neighboring Fort Bend county. So the diversity is also leading to a change in electorate behavior.
We are still going to make product in Bacchus Marsh at present and become more a R&D company, planning to employ a few more scientists. I have also stitched up a partnership with MIT and Stanford, and hope to send a post-doc to Boston this year.
This manufacturing deal is limited to the Oil & Gas Industry at present, and is a good earner in terms of the license fee and royalties.
As I have said before though, it some big Texan or Cossack or Mandarin comes along with enough money then it is party time for all at Blitz !!!
I’ve told this story before… Worked closely with some Texans at the time of the GOP primary. Asked one about Trump and he said he was really sad as he didn’t have anyone he could vote for. Hillary was a definite no and Trump was so bad he couldn’t support him.
Don’t blame them in the slightest. If I was a Yank, in the 2016 GE, I would have either a) Not voted or b) Voted for the Green party
Voting the for the ‘lesser of two evils’ has gotten Americans farking nowhere. If you’re going to vote, at least vote in something that somewhat resembles your interests.
This one of the biggest flaws in the U.S electoral system. Dr Jill Stein has been advocating for ranked choice voting (i.e. preferential voting) for a while now.
You’ve got to look at the system. Fundamentally, in the US in a first past the post system with no preferential voting, if you don’t vote for someone, you’ve helped their opponent get in. Anyone who voted for a third party in the US was effectively helping either Trump or Hillary win their state.
Someone can have the view their morals is more important than having Hillary over Trump in the white house, but they then have to measure their morals against the real life consequences. Such as the potential for Rove vs. Wade to be overturned due to a conservative Supreme court.
That is true for mainstream media, but I believe it ignores some of the right wing (and to a lesser extent some explicit left wing) media. Some of the founders of Fox news for example have been quite open that it was done so as a way of influencing the conservative vote. And many of those stations are quite explicitly biased, and would probably say proudly so.
We’ve had this argument in the past and I disagree. You (and many other liberals) seem to think that someone like Jill Stein was a spoiler in the 2016 GE. It isn’t clear that Jill Stein voters would have voted for Clinton, in fact I think exit polls show that Green voters would not have voted at all. Further, there were millions who voted for Obama in 2012 who switched to Trump in 2016. This was by far a bigger reason Clinton lost.