I can't agree with that, given that Matt has repeatedly pointed out the difference between actual police states and the freedoms of an open society that we still have available in the US.
Matt's warning about a perilous trend. That's different than actually having arrived in the pit.
Yeah, but the fact remains that our rights, services and peace of mind are all being eroded at a shocking pace, by both parties, making elections increasingly pointless even as the language around them become incredibly histrionic.
Perhaps other nations are more "police state", but we definitely are moving in that direction, quickly, with no ability to influence our path.
I never thought that, and the old Indian and cowboys told you so. It was their land, but we came over and took it , but they were bad for fighting for what was theirs. As a kid it told me we are not who we say we are.
In the “meta” sense it shows the true dangers of “tribalism”(a synonym for diversity). If the Indians (early on) could have set their differences aside and recognized the existential threat Europeans posed to them they could have easily eliminated their small nascent communities. At least for awhile. King Phillip made a valiant effort but failed.
Tribalism is not a synonym for diversity. Not in any thesaurus or dictionary. Most people have a suspicious idea of "tribalism," that it might not be good. And you seem to want to somehow drag diversity into it?
If anything, diversity is an antonym of tribalism.
Diversity IS an antonym of tribalism, but we are practicing tribalism and calling it diversity. Kind of like how "freedom" meant mass surveillance in past moral panics.
I always remembered reading that a pope in the 15 century gave all those headed off to claim new land a thumbs up, and a sense of entitlement to the land of the infidels, and killing them off was indeed an option, and I'm sure what you're saying is true.
Kill yes, all of them, and then rape and enslave their women. I've actually read the bible, all of it. Some really seriously nasty and weird stuff in there.
From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out of the town and jeered at him. “Get out of here, baldy!” they said. “Get out of here, baldy!” He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys. And he went on to Mount Carmel and from there returned to Samaria.
Wow. Little gem of a story like that should be tip off that most cults are started by complete psychopaths with violent delusions of revenge and power.
When I was a kid and I would hear things on a par with this I use to think maybe these people were deaf and couldn't hear right, and God got it all wrong.
Sounds like you were a very interesting kid! I also remember looking around with skepticism about the human approach to life, social, political and religious assertions that were obviously contradicted by what I saw. But because everyone else seemed okay with the status quo, by my 20's I'd pivoted to doubting myself.
"Good mental health was not a prerequisite for European settlers emigrating to the New World. We are fond of reminding ourselves that Australia was (and mostly still is) populated primarily with murderers, thieves and sexual perverts, but the immigrants to America were not noticeably better. Indeed, the inscription on the Statue of Liberty got the words more or less correct in referring to “the wretched refuse of your teeming shore”. While the Australians had their serial killers and muggers, the Europeans went one better with their Christian extremists who spent their weekdays burning witches and killing Indians, and their Sundays in church thanking God for the opportunity. The Australians have marginally improved their habits over the centuries while the Americans have not.
America is widely accepted, and indeed even prides itself, on being a deeply Christian country, with 65% or more of the population declaring religion important in their lives. This would be supported by history, since the major migrations to the New World consisted of a long list of flaky religious sects whose primary goal in emigration was the opportunity to build a society entirely based on those isolationist and extremist heresies. It is probably safe to say that Salem witchcraft was the seedbed in which the peculiarly American version of Christian theology sprouted and flourished, and which also served as a practical introduction to mass hysteria which would later be so usefully applied to the concepts of patriotism and democracy. The enduring echoes of this religious ancestry have been highly influential in all of subsequent American history.
The Preamble to the American Declaration of Independence (“The most famous words in the English language”, if you’re American; just another Hello Kitty greeting card, if you’re not), states: “We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all White Men were created superior and are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights, the most important of which is slavery”. In the recent history of the modern world, only two nations of people have so thoroughly embraced slavery as to have practiced it on an immense scale for hundreds of years: the Christians in America and the Dalai Lamas in Tibet. And only these two groups so cherished slavery in their hearts they fought a civil war over the right to maintain it. It is hardly a moral selling point that both sets of racist bigots lost the war and, while Mao cleaned up Tibet, the racism and bigotry persisted in America, often violently, for another 200 years and is still widely in evidence today. Christian virtue does not die easily."
The cited article *is* good--at least as propaganda.
"In the recent history of the modern world, only two nations of people have so thoroughly embraced slavery as to have practiced it on an immense scale for hundreds of years: the Christians in America and the Dalai Lamas in Tibet [stopped by Mao]."
But definitely no slavery under Mao (no genocide, no forced labor, or any other stuff like that), definitely not!
And America (as the USA nation, anyway, since "nations" is the category used) definitely had slavery, at least in some states, from 1776 to 1860--1.04 centuries, to be precise, so definitely "centuries." (Although it is hard to say whether the nation as a whole "embraced" slavery.)
And if pre-independence time is being counted here, there are certainly more than "only two nations" with a "long history of slavery" into "modern times." Just in the Americas, for instance, there is Brazil, with slavery of Africans there starting as early as 1540 and extending into the 1860's.
My great great grandfather, whose name and memory I carry as my middle names, was kicked off his croft in Rogart Scotland in the highlands during the clearances. So he made his way to Pictou Nova Scotia where he did rather well.
When my Palestinian friends complain about losing their land I reply, "Tell me about it!"
If you ever get a chance to visit NS I highly recommend it. Cape Breton is one of the great places in the world.
True enough. My husband and I just returned from Netherlands and Belgium because we were tracing the roots of his paternal grandfather whose family came to America because their horse trading business owed money.
I guess the TL/DR version is that personal bankruptcy laws favor the creditors whereas corporate bankruptcy laws and courts favor the well heeled debtors with the money and connections to sway the system.
Thanks for the article, I'll read it. Looks good. As a kid I always had difficulty with my religious upbringing. Lots to question and interestingly the same applied to what they told me about history, like men with property could vote, but others couldn't didn't seem democratic to me, etc. I liked reading this. Thank you.
15th century? "...headed off to claim a *new land*, and a sense of entitlement to the land of infidels and killing them"? You got a little more reading to do. Better go read up on a "crusade" that happened from the middle of the 7th century to the 14th. Look up the geographical location of Al-Andalus and the Umayyad Caliphate and how it came to be. Read past the historical re-writes of how living in dhimmitude was cool beans(someone forgot to give some Frenchman named Chuck Martel the news that it was great). "New lands" only when they decided to embark on kicking the invaders asses all the way back to where they came from and plundered on the way back home(went Viking) because that shit cost$$$ and they were broke. You see when pushing back on and evening things up with your centuries long oppressors and you do this in silly outfits, swing cords to chop and crush up close and personal........well you tend to be brutal hard SOB's. Not putting a smiley face on it but look at it from the proper perspective not through the prism of today. This wasn't just some random "hey lets go kill these a-holes and take their shit cuz we're greedy and have nothing else better to do because Christianity".
The latter crusades we're questionable but the early ones had a purpose. Unfortunately chasing these oppressors back to where they came from the, Christian Crusaders discovered new resources of worth and good ol' human nature(conquest) took over.
The Papal Bull "Inter Caetera," issued by Pope Alexander VI on May 4, 1493, played a central role in the Spanish conquest of the New World. The document supported Spain’s strategy to ensure its exclusive right to the lands discovered by Columbus the previous year. It established a demarcation line one hundred leagues west of the Azores and Cape Verde Islands and assigned Spain the exclusive right to acquire territorial possessions and to trade in all lands west of that line. All others were forbidden to approach the lands west of the line without special license from the rulers of Spain. This effectively gave Spain a monopoly on the lands in the New World.
The Bull stated that any land not inhabited by Christians was available to be "discovered," claimed, and exploited by Christian rulers and declared that "the Catholic faith and the Christian religion be exalted and be everywhere increased and spread, that the health of souls be cared for and that barbarous nations be overthrown and brought to the faith itself." This "Doctrine of Discovery" became the basis of all European claims in the Americas as well as the foundation for the United States’ western expansion. In the US Supreme Court in the 1823 case Johnson v. McIntosh, Chief Justice John Marshall’s opinion in the unanimous decision held "that the principle of discovery gave European nations an absolute right to New World lands." In essence, American Indians had only a right of occupancy, which could be abolished.
The Bull Inter Caetera made headlines again throughout the 1990s and in 2000, when many Catholics petitioned Pope John Paul II to formally revoke it and recognize the human rights of indigenous "non-Christian peoples."
An English translation is available.
EXCERPT
Wherefore, as becomes Catholic kings and princes, after earnest consideration of all matters, especially of the rise and spread of the Catholic faith, as was the fashion of your ancestors, kings of renowned memory, you have purposed with the favor of divine clemency to bring under your sway the said mainlands and islands with their residents and inhabitants and to bring them to the Catholic faith. Hence, heartily commending in the Lord this your holy and praiseworthy purpose, and desirous that it be duly accomplished, and that the name of our Savior be carried into those regions, we exhort you very earnestly in the Lord and by your reception of holy baptism, whereby you are bound to our apostolic commands, and by the bowels of the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ, enjoy strictly, that inasmuch as with eager zeal for the true faith you design to equip and despatch this expedition, you purpose also, as is your duty, to lead the peoples dwelling in those islands and countries to embrace the Christian religion; nor at any time let dangers or hardships deter you therefrom, with the stout hope and trust in your hearts that Almighty God will further your undertakings. And, in order that you may enter upon so great an undertaking with greater readiness and heartiness endowed with benefit of our apostolic favor, we, of our own accord, not at your instance nor the request of anyone else in your regard, but out of our own sole largess and certain knowledge and out of the fullness of our apostolic power, by the authority of Almighty God conferred upon us in blessed Peter and of the vicarship of Jesus Christ, which we hold on earth, do by tenor of these presents, should any of said islands have been found by your envoys and captains, give, grant, and assign to you and your heirs and successors, kings of Castile and Leon, forever, together with all their dominions, cities, camps, places, and villages, and all rights, jurisdictions, and appurtenances, all islands and mainlands found and to be found, discovered and to be discovered towards the west and south, by drawing and establishing a line from the Arctic pole, namely the north, to the Antarctic pole, namely the south, no matter whether the said mainlands and islands are found and to be found in the direction of India or towards any other quarter, the said line to be distant one hundred leagues towards the west and south from any of the islands commonly known as the Azores and Cape Verde. With this proviso however that none of the islands and mainlands, found and to be found, discovered and to be discovered, beyond that said line towards the west and south, be in the actual possession of any Christian king or prince up to the birthday of our Lord Jesus Christ just past from which the present year one thousand four hundred ninety-three begins. And we make, appoint, and depute you and your said heirs and successors lords of them with full and free power, authority, and jurisdiction of every kind; with this proviso however, that by this our gift, grant, and assignment no right acquired by any Christian prince, who may be in actual possesssion of said islands and mainlands prior to the said birthday of our Lord Jesus Christ, is hereby to be understood to be withdrawn or taking away. Moreover we command you in virtue of holy obedience that, employing all due diligence in the premises, as you also promise—nor do we doubt your compliance therein in accordance with your loyalty and royal greatness of spirit—you should appoint to the aforesaid mainlands and islands worthy, God-fearing, learned, skilled, and expeienced men, in order to instruct the aforesaid inhabitants and residents in the Catholic faith and train them in good morals. Furthermore, under penalty of excommunication "late sententie" to be incurred "ipso facto," should anyone thus contravene, we strictly forbid all persons of whatsoever rank, even imperial and royal, or of whatsoever estate, degree, order, or condition, to dare without your special permit or that of your aforesaid heirs and successors, to go for the purpose of trade or any other reason to the islands or mainlands, found and to be found, discovered and to be discovered, towards the west and south, by drawing and establishing a line from the Arctic pole to the Antarctic pole, no matter whether the mainlands and islands, found and to be found, lie in the direction of India or toward any other quarter whatsoever, the said line to be distant one hundred leagues towards the west and south, as is aforesaid, from any of the islands commonly known as the Azores and Cape Verde; apostolic constitutions and ordinances and other decrees whatsoever to the contrary notwithstanding. We trust in Him from whom empires and governments and all good things proceed, that, should you, with the Lord’s guidance, pursue this holy and praiseworthy undertaking, in a short while your hardships and endeavors will attain the most felicitious result, to the happiness and glory of all Christendom.
QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION
Read the introduction and the document transcript in order to answer these questions.
By what authority did Pope Alexander VI claim the power to give Spain nearly exclusive possession of the New World?
Why do you think Spain wanted exclusive rights to the New World?
Along with the right to possess the land, the Papal Bull also indicated that Spain had specific responsibilities. List and explain these duties.
Why was it impossible for Spain, or indeed any other European nation, to realize the extent of the territory Spain controlled after May 1493?
Holy shit!(facepalm) I literally gave you a very condensed version of exactly this as it applied to the Christian Crusades. Spain was called Al-Andalus for a reason before the date at the top of this decree. Nothing like brainwashed agenda driven narrative to omit pertinent parts of history. Your ilk always shit the bed with the crybaby BS of the Christian Crusades blessed by the pope to drive out the poor poor muslims and kick their asses back to where they came from. WTF do you think the muslims were doing there IN SPAIN? Painting pictures and gardening? Why do you think the Pope whipped out the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch and blessed this decree? I explained it above.
I think I see Madjack's point. So-called diversity ISN'T diversity of ideas/thinking reasonably. It's the opposite, fractionating people into superficial tribal categories, i.e. white=oppressors, blacks=victims, questioning trans ideology's enforced demands=transphobia, etc. And so it goes.
I think you could argue there's two completely different word senses of 'tribalism' now. One is political tribalism (diversity being ONLY ONE of the many totem poles of a particular tribe, say, "protect the borders" would a the right-wing totem pole) and the other is actual tribal behaviors in real human contexts (like, tribes in Africa, etc.).
You make a good point about indigenous American tribes though.
Would that have worked out better for them? Both Persia and China were centralized empires and they didn’t fare any better against the guns and cannons of industrialized Europe. The Chinese empire had some outdated respect for the land due to their old Shamanistic beliefs and didn’t want to mine coal for industrialization. Same thing happened to the native Americans. Only when China had arms production on par with the Western countries did they start winning wars.
And who did 'The Natives' take the land from? Other natives...
American Pioneers in the 19th century who actually lived life without servants respected American Indians and their ways, our 'beloved' government decided to remove them much like their efforts on the middle class these days.
"And who did 'The Natives' take the land from? Other natives"
That's not what happened.
The continent was literally unoccupied when the ancestors of Native Americans came to the continent from Asia over the Bering Land Bridge during the last Ice Age, around 12,000 to 30,000 years ago. Did they then compete for territory, here and there, sure. But nothing like happened when the colonisers came.
You're agreeing that they arrived across an 18,000 year time span. So either they were the slowest walkers in history, or there were multiple waves of people coming across.
Well, not familiar with who was here first. I guess you didn't watch those cowboy and Indian movies I watched on TV where the message was this is our land not your's even though you were here first. You cannot excuse what we did to the indigenous people of the America's. Sorry, nor the permission given by the church, which was not restricted to the Americas. Trail of tears, lets see you justify that.
Conquest has been a human condition since the first caveman stepped outside his cave, looked across a valley seen another clan and said I want their stuff. Asian descendants that built grass rafts set out from their mainland and went island hopping would occasionally bump into others that did the same and wanted each others stuff. Humans did it as a matter of survival and advancement for living conditions. Not excusing what we did to each other as humans but as another commenter pointed out(Danimal28) the Indians weren't exactly living together in peace and harmony either. Some tribes had their own versions of conquest, genocide, slavery, robbing each others food stores, warring over hunting grounds, kidnapping females to breed. I'm not impugning Native Americans just pointing out an uncomfortable truth of human nature that even Indians were prone too.
You seem to be very focused on the church/ christianity. If that what floats your boat, fine, but don't let it skew the truth of history.
Trail of Tears? Justify what? Allowing the Indians that were paid to relocate force their 800 black slaves (some of the Cherokee/Creek elites among them owned) to have to go with them or the misfortune that befell the actual members of the tribe on the way?
I don't want to continue this conversation about how bad the Indians were, and let me just say that your understanding of the Trial of Tears is really off. I am not focused on the church, and it's a thing of the past. Why don't you focus on our Muslim wars, and the millions we displaced and killed then you can focus on using Ukrainian lives so we can keep the number one slot in the world. More timely.
I hate acolytes of violence who claim 'violence, conquest, genocide' are part of 'the human condition'. Yes, humanity has a violent history, but if you actually look closely you can also see that different tribes and ethnicities have co-existed peacefully adjacent to each other in many cases for very, very long periods of time, and there were many more peaceful cultures that would never have had it in their conception to launch genocidal wars of settler colonial conquest. By saying conquest is part of the 'human condition', you are both lying and making yourself an apologist for the grossest acts of inhumanity that have been committed by our species, usually acts spurred on and driven by a small minority of sociopathic leaders. Inhabitants of the United States, which has committed some of the grossest violence imaginable during its history, might be especially vulnerable or even dependent on this idea that conquest is 'natural' or inevitable, because it ameliorates and lifts any potential stain or responsibility or duty to correct or change our path. Just keep turning the crank on the violence.
Acolyte of violence? F U. Can you guys actually f'ing read? I know I suck at English Comp but FFS. Good job Captain Obvious at pointing out SOME tribes of people were capable of living next to each other in peace......of course this usually always came after violent conflict. All part of being a lefty idiot right? Can't tell the fucking difference between accepting the fact that every civilization/society on the planet at one time or another has done atrocious shit. I'm not apologizing for any violence you dumb fck, I believe it should be avoided at all costs until you are forced into it as a matter of self-preservation. Of course you lefty idiots always come back around to America bad as if it's the only place inhabited by the only people that have of course owned slaves or done f'd up shit to people.
The only acts of violence right now being committed in this country, spurned on and driven by a small minority of sociopathic leaders is within the left and the Transhumanist movement. The only crank being turned on violence is within the blue city cesspools that turn felons loose on the law abiding innocent public and politicians on the left that cheer on antifa, Janes Revenge and BLM. I guarantee the violence lays firmly in your camp, not mine.
I watched them; I will never excuse what we did to indigenous people, but that is the way of the world - and governments(not the People) are responsible for all of it. Just like when they locked you down through the use of force a mere three years ago.
Didn't mean to say they were, it's not just us, look at how Europe used Africa as it's backyard. We used South America as ours. However people, do look the other way or too easily go along with their government's policies. Look at how Americans went along with our Middle Eastern wars, and I bet if those were Christian or Jewish countries I don't think they could have pushed those wars.
I think I have a far better handle on this. Government is force, nothing more. It is supposed to protect our rights and negotiate in good faith and that hasn't happened since prior to 1860 for the most part. Government signed treaties with the Native's, reneged, and then used force to conquer them. Not that the Native's were always honest and forthright.... There have been many periods of peace, of course. Today is not a period of peace as the government is using force again to silence and censor Americans.
It depended on the tribe. The Comanche were horrifying. They ran a robbery, kidnapping, murder protection racket on horseback, and they maintained their power with a fearsome level of intimidation, including torture. https://scgwynne.com/product/empire-of-the-summer-moon
When Hernando de Soto arrived in the Southeast US, he found captive slavery and torture were as widespread among the tribes of southeastern North America, including the dominant civilization- the Coosa- as it was among the Spaniard conquistadors. The author does not whitewash the atrocities of the conquistadors, either. They were unimaginably cruel in those days. https://www.amazon.com/Hernando-Soto-Savage-Quest-Americas/dp/0806129778
Not to excuse the taking of most Native American lands by Euro settlers, but yes indeed the same thing was happening broadly between Native American communities. The West, at the time of European agression, was largely inhabited by Native nations that brutally pried lands from Native predecessors. And slavery was commonplace and widespread. The Southwest was largely inhabited by Athabascan and southcentral (Comance) peoples that slaughtered their way to their final homelands at the time of Euro conquest. Plains tribes had been eradicated by midwestt newcomers like the Lakota, who suppressed and eliminated their predecessors in Canada, the Dakotas, the middle west. It simply is history, and the final victors were simply the last in line of imperialist aggressors.
The United States is neither a democracy nor is it a democratic republic, but an oligarchy featuring unlimited political bribery for those who can afford pricey lawyers.
P.S. I think he might have misspelled the name. It's possible he was talking about a right-wing talk radio personality named John WilKow. Seems to be a common mistake after doing some light research on the matter.
For fun sometime do a "controversial" search in Google and then run the same on Duck Duck or Brave just to name a couple.
Things that I used to find easily on Google are now hard to impossible.
Sergey Brin has a long public history of collaborating with intelligence agencies going back to at least 2001 when he volunteered to help find the perps.
I had a lot of respect for Reich from his doc on income inequality until someone pointed out that he was the Sec Labor under Clinton during the NAFTA negotiations. That man is a quisling in that he bears a signifcant responsibility for the hollowing out of the USA's industrial base.
The situation described in Hillbilly Elegy rests (in a large part) on his shoulders. Both Reich and Arnand Ammawhazizname are such posers. Empty suits crying out empty platitudes, thinking their 'La Resistance'. Ugh
And the plethora of removed comments? WTF?
NOW I understand why SS contribs are moving to Locals.
I thought J. D. Vance's point in Hillbilly Elegy is that the crucial responsibility for the situation he described was on the people who lived there and just refused to change the self-destructive component of their life ways. Including his homefolks.
And Robert Reich did not negotiate NAFTA as Secretary of Labor under Clinton. The agreement was negotiated in the Bush I administration, and signed by President George H. W. Bush as an international agreement. The only thing that Bush ally (on the down-low, of course, although it's become much more obvious over the years) Bill Clinton did was to forcefully endorse its ratification by the Congress, the final authority on certifying treaties, and sign it into law after Congress had passed it.
Clinton was able to successfully articulate to his fellow democratic faithful, in coded speech and phony backwoods bluster refined by Yale Law, what the republicans had discovered a few decades previous. Money got you elected, and even more money kept you in office.
Anyone with a real interest in what's really going on in politics in the year 2023 needs to read the 1996 book Partners In Power, by Roger Morris. Especially the chapters entitled "Washington I/II/III"- and the one entitled "Mena" too, of course. And after that, the chapters in between. And to really go for the extreme sport trophy, read the entire book. https://www.abebooks.com/9780805028041/Partners-Power-Clintons-America-Morris-0805028048/plp
But the three chapters entitled "Washington" alone will tell any perceptive reader more about the way National Politics is currently practiced inside the Beltway than ten years of reading Twitter.
Reich is a partisan propagandist who supports everything they do. He is even trying to sell 'biden' as a functioning entity who is doing things. Unbelievable. I will be banned here for truth speaking. It's inevitable.
Reich is loyal to Team Blue, despite having most of his personal suggestions ignored and disrespected in the Clinton years. He was only appointed Labor Secretary as window dressing. No one who counted paid attention to his recommendations.
That's what the fake narrative framing of Team Blue and Team Red encourages. Ironclad team loyalty and partisanship. There's no third position, in the absence of ranked choice voting. Team Blue is terrified that they would be doomed if ranked choice voting got out of hand. And orthodox CNN/MSNBC American liberals are okay with that, because they buy into the neoliberal narrative that continues to insinuate that a 3rd Position could only be Fascist. The GOP establishment doesn't want ranked choice voting, either, because their leaders suspect that Team Red would be doomed.
If the voting system weren't rigged to limit "viable candidates" to the two established parties, at this point they're both about ready to fold up like cardboard suitcases in a typhoon.
Ranked choice voting would be a bit of a battle royal, at first. And I'd anticipate that one of the major party candidates would still win- at first. But the victorious candidate, his handlers, and his campaign would have to have actually listened to the points of the outlier candidates and parties. Politics, being the art of the possible, is about triangulation. Ranked choice voting provides another, crucial dimension to it.
Right now, the only triangulation either established party candidate requires is to beheld as slightly less bad, by slightly more voters. And after that, they can do whatever- grandstanding, punting, kicking cans down the road, private agendas getting into petty power plays with the private agenda of the other side....
"Getting the money out of politics" alone is not going to make any difference to improving politics under the current voting system. Because it isn't ever going to happen, unless we get a ranked choice voting system where outlier candidates can make their case for it, as political rivals. And ultimately, a ranked-choice result is always a majoritarian system. There would never be a party administration that didn't have at least some conditional assent by the majority of voters. Compare that to what we have now- cornered into the sham appearance of unconditional assent for one of two choices...and look at how that's worked out for us.
I think that even a two option ranking system would be an infinite improvement over what we have now.
If Substack wanted to shoot its value proposition in the ass, introducing mass censorship so as not to offend the delicate sensitivities of The People Who Matter is the way to do it, right there.
“Goebbels was in favor of free speech for views he liked. So was Stalin. If you’re really in favor of free speech, then you’re in favor of freedom of speech for precisely the views you despise. Otherwise, you’re not in favor of free speech.”
Consider Robert Reich's presence a test. Principally a test for him, not for those of us who have adopted it as a base for preserving freedom of speech and reasoned dissent.
If I want to read another of Bobby reich’s articles on how it’s horrible that we don’t do exactly what he says, I have about five dozen outlets that will deliver the exact same low rent lefty punditry. Maybe if he ever had an original thought he wouldn’t be so offensive. It it’s the same formula all the time “how dare we let billionaires live when people are dying every day!?”
He might have, I cannot even read him anymore. Like you said, his message never changes anyway. He's like one of those billboards in They Live. "Obey" "Consume"
LOL wow. Every other comment removed and/or user banned. Wonder what they said. Guess we'll never know because we're not allowed to read, much less engage with "wrongthink." 1984 all the way.
When Reich went all in on the trans-rights stuff I realized that he was full of shit from the very beginning, total establishment tool, much like what Bernie turned out to be.
The whole trans thing is yet another entirely manufactured controversy to get people arguing about something that is not genuinely important.
The last time I said this someone called me an "out of touch old man". Just as she had been programmed to.
It is important to those afflicted, to the the future of humanity and the world? Not at all. That would be war, over-population, the wealth transfer, the collapsing environment...
The comments (including mine) were mostly innocuous. Example: he claimed there was book banning, my comment was "can you named the banned books"? It was deleted. In fact "Heather" turned off commenting on the whole post, the only time I've ever seen it on Substack.
I see people here loving on the proxy war on Russia. I find that outrageous, dangerous and vile. Why can I not say so?
To protect Lord Reich's "beautiful mind"? Because "civility"? Maybe they promised him a safe space? Poor thing.
"Why should we hear about body bags, and deaths... I mean, it's not relevant. So why should I waste my beautiful mind on something like that?" - Barbara Bush
Yep. The two phoniest careers around are lawyer and economist. Most people still don't know that the Nobel Prize in Economics needs scare quotes around "Nobel" to be accurate.
All of the defenses of censorship I've seen are eloquent. Censors-in-waiting regard themselves as noble, and their messaging is rife with fawning self-elevation to heroism.
Censorship only “works”when there is only one game in town. In the US media ecosystem this is long gone, no matter how hard the Ds, neo-cons, Deep Staters, and corporate wokesters may try.
Except places like here, where (1) people think, and reward it in others; or (2) as in your case, they use structural and rhetorical tactics to game the system, while thinking they are convincing anyone.
Where's the "thinking" in regurgitating a widely-circulated, century-old platitude? And given how much time Democrats spent calling Trump a fascist during his term, I would love to know which Americans OP thinks aren't aware that "it can happen here".
I'm pretty sure it's a large amount of Americans on both the left and the right who think authoritarianism could never happen here. To a large degree, it's believing their side won't be the one that does it.
Clearly you don't spend as much time here as I do. 90%+ of the comments are so bonkers they could support an insanity plea in court. Most of the top comments are 1. inane platitudes, 2. manic rants, or 3. brown-nosing the author.
Right-wing partisan sentiments and anti-establishment paranoia (and I mean paranoia, not just anti-establishment points of view) are consistently upvoted and defended. Anyone who criticizes right-wing partisan sentiments, or expresses other views, is mocked and derided, under the implicit premise that dissenting views don't belong here.
LOL, you are such a piece of shit. Why are you, and not back on White People Twitter on Reddit or some Maoist city sub like r/Austin.
Hey, I also heard there is an Eastern European Border War that some elites are trying to sell. Good place to go get blown up for a terrifyingly stupid military alliance that only benefits wealthy Europeans and the military industrial complex, all the while America rots. I know you "progressives" are all in on war now.
I respectfully disagree - but feel free to hold forth. I will defend and respect your right to do so. The pithy banter is fun, and a more subtle way to make a point, and god forbid self-reflect.
So ignore those 3 categories, M. Dwhy, and stop calling for self-censorship.
One of the great things about substack is posters are free of your type of censorship, and so come here to fulfill the need to 1) emote, 2) practice writing, 3) support the writers they like (and you don't get to choose for others, I'm sure you agree), 4) express anti-State sentiment that would get them censored elsewhere.
Fully agree with your take. I get VERY tired of shopworn tropes like that above which seem to be designed to simply get likes. And why "kids"?! It is so gauche! No real contribution to the discourse, just social media-esque attempts for "likes" (love?). And unfortunately it works. I have noticed that a lot of Matt Taibbi's Substack commenters post things like "You go, Matt!" "We got your back!" "Give 'em hell, Matt!", etc. I for one would prefer more substantive comments. After all, aren't those rah-rah sentiments most efficiently captured by clicking the thumbs up icon? No need to type out a cliche!! Now watch how my post will be vilified by the same people who purport to hate similar vilification of dissenting voices in the mainstream media!!
What is the problem with complimenting a writer on their work - or in the case of Matt Taibbi - for their bravery in reporting on the shit-show that is our current government ? Let me be the first to apologize to you on behalf of everyone on this Substack who has wasted your precious time saying what they wanted to say - and not giving a shit if their comments offend the sensibilities of those who thought they were here to weigh in on a Ph.D. dissertation defense.
Satire sometimes necessarily takes the form of the thing it mocks. My goal is to shame the airheads who mindlessly smash the heart button whenever they see a shallow platitude that plucks at their willy.
You didn't satirize, you simply attempted mockery. To satirize you would have need to do a lot more work bringing in the people who click the like button and playing off of why it is so silly to support such an idea. But, in your quickness to riff of of an idea, that of simple platitudes that bring likes or "plucks at their willy", you do the exact same thing.
Someone on notes was just telling me that there is no "real" censorship on Subtack, because he grew up in communist Poland. Not sure what fallacy that is exactly but it it is fallacious.
“if an individual in a position of political power is a psychopath, he or she can create an epidemic of psychopathology in people who are not, essentially, psychopathic.”
I'm writing about this as well, with the added bonus of how the paid-off press like the LA Times will literally submit their questions beforehand -- and the president has a little notecard telling him who to call on.
It really tells you everything you need to know about the state of the media these days. Play along and you get rewarded. Dare speak out, and you're unemployed. (Tucker will be fine, but how many reporters will duck their heads back down because they wouldn't be fine?)
I didn't vote for trump in 2016, always a registered democrat, although not loyal. Bad enough I saw the democrat's growing authoritarian stance during the Trump years, but the media and so called left fell into line, like little soldiers. Asses.
And David Dayen was Tucker-lite. He wrote about the Great Financial Crime Spree and he now caved to the establishment. During the GFCS years, he uncovered many crimes the government/financial coup were doing. Now, he replaces an article favored to Tucker with one opposing Tucker? That shit is horrible! What a coward!
Yeah it's just such an inefficient format. His articles were concise, but in his videos he repeats the same thing two or three times and the transcripts approach unreadability.
I happily pay for GG's stuff, even though the "free transfer" won't let me comment on articles or read them from the webpage. At least I still get the emails.
...."unimportant" part of a "parenthetical." Oh you sound so smart, now who is M. sim's and what is his excellent point? Four degrees with bad comprehension and 2 in science. What an accomplishment for someone with no comprehension. Now if you could take a minute out of your day and rephrase your nasty ass comment maybe I'll condescend to answer.
I sincerely apologize for offending you, M. Fran, and I confess to a certain amount of over-protection for one of my favorite 'stackers, not that he needs it.
The Times denied giving Biden the questions. Does that mean the White House gave the questions to the Times? He clearly had the questions so it has to be one or the other...oh wait, one of the three letter agencies tapping in perhaps?
I saw that! The questions are obviously present, and if the Times didn't give them to the White House in advance, the only other possibility is that the White House gave THE TIMES the question in advance..........which is even worse.
For plausible deniability, it may have gone like this: White House tells certain reporters what specific aspects of certain specific topics the president would be addressing in questions today. Those reporters then submit the questions.
Just like the tabletop exercise on the "Russian Disinfo" that was rehearsed the month before the Post released the story on Hunter's laptop, these agencies (WH, intelligence) will always attempt to keep some veneer of deniability, which then their lapdogs in the MSM will highlight to say that assertions of their collusion/collaboration are not proven (and thus are lies).
Biden got tripped up by a couple of children today because that's the first time he's faced questions that weren't pre-planted in ages. Literal toddlers tripped him up more than the WH press corp has. If that doesn't tell you all you need to know about our current media, I don't know what will.
The question was pretty hard (what was the last place you visited or something like that). He was in Ireland a week ago, but he was stumped. Another child stepped in to help him out. This is where we are today.
yep. its one giant global cartel. there isnt anything that hasn't been monopolized. we live in a world of illusion that appears to have choice, but not too many of any real consequence.
Tucker is rare in that he has his own genuine talent and following meaning he doesn’t need a Fox or CNN brand to survive. Like a Megyn Kelly, he will be able to find a very prosperous new path. But that’s him, not most media people. And so his firing had a real sweeping effect to send a message to the rest.
Actually, this manipulation of the press in briefings started with Regan. If a reporter asked him an uncomfortable question, he didn't get a seat at the next press conference. And now no one asks the President or whatshername anything they don't want to answer or they're brushed off or attacked for even approaching a subject.
I don't remember where I saw it (it might have been right here, honestly) but somebody mentioned how the press complains that without being inside the velvet rope, they can't do their jobs -- but they don't realize they were never supposed to be inside the rope in the first place.
I'm just disgusted that the media/journalists don't do their jobs any more. Perhaps they never did, but there were just enough rogue journalists to actually dig in and find the truth so we were lulled into thinking we had a watchdog press of sorts. Now the ones in the mainstream are just lackeys for their controllers, and nothing original comes out of any of them. Do they know they have controllers? Do they bristle at being told what they can and cannot write about? It doesn't seem like it.
You mean the time I pointed out that you published a wildly inaccurate statistic in huge banner font in one of your articles, and in response you closed your comments to non-paid readers?
That's called the price of admission for trolls. Give me $5, you little spaz. Do you really want me to dig up the exchange and post it here so I can embarrass you again?
It's amazing to me how "trolling" and "saying things I don't like" seem to be interchangeable concepts to dimwits like you.
Tucker didn't get fired for speaking out, he got fired for 1. telling lies that cost his company $$$, and 2. allowing his staffing to be run in a discriminatory, abusive way. Rupert Murdoch is not exactly a bastion of woke leftism... when that dude wants his top earner gone, you know the guy REALLY fucked up.
LOL the good thing about trolls is that you know exactly what they're going to say. I love how the woman suing Tucker for a hostile work environment never even met him.
Tucker was actually the guy who went on TV and said Powell was full of BS. The media made fun of FOX for losing viewers to NewsMax. You can still read the articles today.
But now since it's politically convenient to rewrite history, that's what you do.
Fox is going to lose far more $$$ in the wake of firing Tucker than it did in the Dominion settlement. His positions on Ukraine and vaccines are what sealed his fate. The powers that be insisted he be muzzled before the next election cycle fully kicked in. There will be no major mainstream media platform for RFK, Jr’s presidential bid now.
You don’t have a clue what you’re talking about. In fact, Tucker was not a top earner because all of the left wing boycotts of his show scared off major advertisers over the last few years. Try again.
Fox doesn't rely on advertisement money. Fox is one of the lefts boogeymen they have been trying to take down for years. The battle cry has always been boycott their advertisers and hit them where it hurts. Now its not advertising? Seriously WTF? Do you just pull these lies out of your ass at random?
He's actually complimenting you. By accusing you of trolling, he's implying that you're smart enough to know better, but are deliberately posting bullshit. The alternative is that you are being genuine and actually believe what you write.
Have to disagree on point 1. Carlson was not a large part of the 20 examples Dominion cited in the actual coverage. I think it was one for him. In fact, Carlson made it very clear, on the air, that he asked Sidney Powell to come on his show and show the evidence that the election was stolen. She declined, and he pointed this out. It was almost heresy to do this on Fox News at the time.
Tucker certainly did bend over backward to feed the narrative about voter fraud and election-rigging. He did trash Sidney Powell, and good on him for that, but the fact remains that he was cited in the Dominion lawsuit, and contributed to Fox having to pay out almost a billion dollars.
Nobody *really* knows why he was fired, except the people who made that decision. But I find it highly unlikely that his "principled" (lol) stand against wokeism and the Ukraine war were his mortal sins.
What lies are you talking about? Name the most recent ones that got him fired...
Abby Grossmans lawyers confirmed that she has never met Tucker Carlson as he does his shows from a separate location in a different state. Maybe Tucker went to the Matt Lauer, Chris Cuomo, Don Lemon school of charm and how to promote a hostile work environment.
Rupert Murdoch and his sons are avowed leftists. Murdoch only tolerated Ailes because he made them money in a niche market. Shock; leftists like money too. Who knew!
Rupert Murdoch a leftist? I worked for him briefly. He's as much a leftist as I am the King of Neptune. Murdoch is a right-winger who loves money and does whatever he deems necessary to make it.
I suppose the irony of suggesting a "silence function" in the comment section of an article about the perils of preemptive restriction of speech is lost on you.
If by "silence function" you're recommending an "ignore" capability, you should realize that all you're doing is giving an edge to the people whose comments you refuse to read, who are still able to reply to anything you post for the wider audience to read. It's sort of like putting a paper bag over your head and imagining that you're invisible.
If I find another comment writer's post(s) to be worthless, I know how to use a scroll mouse. I don't feel any requirement to block everything they say forevermore.
Even more, it needs better system for submerging worthless ones like ...
An ignore flag would be perfect. And no, It's not censorship if each individual reader has to make the decision for themselves that a certain common terrorism not worth listening to.
Regarding AOC: if the establishment is good at nothing else, it is very good at determining who can be co-opted, who can be bought off, who is to be neutralized, whom to safely ignore.
How quickly she was co-opted, and now is just another culture warrior, and establishment sycophant. Man, that was quick. SMH. Wealthy elites love easy "turns" like this one.
I doubt she was ever who she claimed to be. That Netflix "documentary" was all scripted. Most likely she is a plant. At least that is what I believe now. A newcomer doesn't win against an establishment unless they want you to.
As a former constituent who followed her from before her first election, I have wondered what her "community organizer" tenure actually consisted of, for nearly a decade out of college. Did she go to the same school as Obama? Was it in Langley VA?
I'm convinced that's exactly what they do. Look, if they were infiltrating left-wing news organizations fifty plus years ago -- that is, back when they were considered by leftists to be all but Satanic ...
Not that I am too interested in defending AOC at this point, but I don't see this as a strike against her, at least not without being supplied much finer-grained detail: Have you had working-class origins, but then been plopped into an upper-middle-class environment, especially as a child?
My point is that she allowed the impression that she was inner city bred when, in fact, she spent most of her upbringinging in Yorktown, NY. It's like Biden's disingenuousness in floating a hardworking family background. LOL
Remember how people pointed out that she responded to a casting call, but all the 'fact checkers' said that was fake because the organization that put on the event does these types of things all the time looking for new talent.........
Mr. Reagan repeatedly used words such as “role,” “audition,” “casting call” and labeled Ocasio-Cortez “essentially an actress” in this video in an apparent attempt to paint the congresswoman with the same conspiratorial brush used to promote “crisis actor” and “paid protester” conspiracy theories. Ironically, the only actor in this scenario is Chris Kohls, who plays the character of Mr. Reagan.
The “Brains Behind AOC” video correctly states that Ocasio-Cortez was recruited by the Justice Democrats to run for office. However, this fact is presented in the video as if it were an unprecedented act of political malfeasance. In reality, it is quite common for Political Action Committees (PACs) to recruit candidates for office. The Justice Democrats made no attempt to hide this effort and openly discuss their recruitment process on their website and in videos published to their public YouTube page:
I think it goes deeper than the Justice Democrats. They most likely wanted Crowley out and replace him with someone who could garner them the youth vote. I wonder now what Crowley did. We should look into that.
Y'know, I never considered that. But...I remember seeing her do a livestream before the primaries, and...its hard to put my finger on it...but...there seemed to be a sort-of un-natural buzz in the room, from the commenters, etc...the whole thing seemed just a little too good to be true....And the fact that I was even alerted to that stream in the first place speaks volumes, since I typically don't even follow local political primaries in states/districts far away from me. That it was put in front of me at all to begin with is a little bit suss.
she never was. she’s an actor who responded to an ad, looking for someone to play the part she played well, at first. throwing her own words back at her...”and so, when you elect a politician, and then they let you down, it feels like rejection. it feels like heartbreak. it feels like betrayal.”
I wish I could link to an article I read in 2008 about Obama's nice digs on Lake Shore Drive overlooking Lake Michigan when he was sent to Chicago as a community organizer. After a hard day of speaking about asbestos in black neighborhoods, he would retire to a nice apartment. Maybe it was Paul Street's book or on Black Agenda Report or Adolph Reed, JR. Of course, the church ladies were doing most of the organizing and baking.
She was a socialist. Of course she was going to take the money and screw the little guy. Name a socialist country that doesn't, and if you say Denmark I will scream.
Part of me wonders if AOC fell into the trap of being more concerned about selling a brand/image than pushing for actual change. Because once you are more concerned about brand or image, it's a lot easier to co-opt you and get you to toe the line.
Shant Mesrobian has pointed out that when AOC first came on the scene, she branded herself as an anti-establishment radical but quickly realized that doing so left her with no future in the Democratic party. So she pivoted to staking out the most radical edge of party advocacy, routinely advocating for the censorship and deplatforming of Party critics and enemies and hoping that the difference in these two radical postures would go unnoticed. It's been a remarkably successful strategy considering how it's provided her so much approval and popularity within the liberal-left base, allowing her to have a future in the Party while continuing to maintain a differentiated political brand premised upon a more youthful, activist, radical mode of politics.
Ironically, her 2018 campaign touted the need for elected officials to exercise "courage". And now she's a subservient little mouse, unable even to buck the remainder of "The Squad" rescinding their Ukraine plea for negotiations.
I saw a really good meme about what happens to people like her (idealistic, naive) after they get to Washington. They are beaten down and brainwashed, especially when it comes to the bloated "National Security Apparatus." She no longer even seems to have a soul anymore. It's all so staggeringly corrupt and anti-human in some ways. Totally out of hand.
Yet advocating for censorship is antithetical to a true liberal or progressive who fights for freedom; so AOC will criticize book banning but not deplatforming of conservatives. Politicians do this hypocritical game which is so obvious but that’s part of the job I suppose. She tries to be the moral one but politics and moral integrity just don’t mix
All it takes is a little power and even those who pretended to thumb their nose at the boss are fast to jump in the passenger seat when it’s offered. It’s easy to turn into the Establishment.
Reminds me is the man who offered a woman a million dollars to sleep with him. When she assented he offered 100$. Offended she asked if he thought she was a whore. In reply he said” we’ve already determined that, now we are just negotiating price”
AOC who is nothing more than a pretty face and an empty bag of faux integrity. Cortez reminds me of Conrad's the brickmaker, whom Marlowe described as some, "papier-mâché Mephistopheles, and it seemed to me that if I tried I could poke my forefinger through him, and would find nothing inside but a little loose dirt, maybe."
And the classic picture of her in that stupid dress and in background, the wait-staff masked while none of the celebrities are. The message was crystal clear -- "we are somebody and you are nobody and don't forget it."
My point is what the hell is a supposed "for the People" Representative doing attending a MET GALA, where tickets cost FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS???? And up against the ticket cost you have her stupid "tax the rich" outfit. She is beyond ludicrous.
I can't even blame the establishment for her. She is really just a shallow individual who won a primary campaign (what was the vote turnout for her to win). So now the generous government world of Democratic rule is her oyster. She really is just an internet influencer, whatever that is. "Evita," the Broadway musical, meets Tanya (Patty Hearst) meets Social Media. Pretty sure Her AOCeminence is unschooled in those first two references.
Seems to me most politicians, that is the vast majority, can be bought off in time. I also think there should be more accountability for those so called lefties, even those speaking out now in light of Tucker's firing. They too, should be held accountable since they showed no objectivity during Trump's time in office. They were in almost total complicity with the democrats, the mainstream media in that regard and they are equally culpable in making this country more authoritarian. They were literally feeding into what many of them are complaining about now.
As bad as what AOC had to say is, I'm not giving her any credit for what happened to Tucker.
On the other hand, it wouldn't surprise me if it was the GOP establishment types who wanted him gone, because how dare Tucker question what the hell we are doing in Ukraine when he could talk about, for example, abortion.
I'm still amazed he got away with it this long. He was on mainstream television spouting anti-war rhetoric that would have given McGovern a hard-on. He slammed the military industrial complex again and again and again. It was beautiful. Especially when we started sending our TANKS to Ukraine. And he meant it, too.
I'm a bit mixed about my assessment of Tucker, but Jesus did he ever get the war stuff right.
Yeah the real power in the republicant party is by doing the lefts dirty work, and maintaining status quo and their fucking miserable little jobs. I have been a conservative since the debacle that was Vietnam, and renounced my membership in the gop in about 1977.
Saw a clip of R. Weingarten testifying before Congress yesterday. Is that an American flag crossed with a Ukrainian flag pin she was wearing? Hilarious.
yeah, Paul Ryan and his ilk happy to give him to boot. They will follow I up with 4 hour segments on Bud Lite and Disney and hope that makes up for it with the audience.
"Ex-government employee interviewing current government employee about how the current government should crack down on 'wrongthink' while the ex-government employee nods along'" -- totally not fascism at all.
Trump saying "you are fake news" -- THAT is fascism!
Trump sending his mob of thugs to overrun the capitol is a lot closer to fascistic than anything Dems have done. But you'll note that I never called Trump a fascist.
What you're describing simply isn't fascism. That said, I would love it if you and all your right-wing turd buddies would keep saying that, since it makes clear to the rest of the population what mush-brained lemmings you people are.
Dude you're still in your 2021 talking points. We know the Metro PD was in the crowd. We know the feds were in the crowd. Nobody was surprised by anything, it was a set-up from the start, and that's why the video remains locked away.
It was a very well run set up to stop the objections to certification. The left is great at stealing elections and working in concert with our dangerously broken Security state.
Well it was Mussolini who invented the system and the word --and who basically said it is what he says it is!
It’s symbol was a group of sticks bundled together and wrapped tightly as one. One stick is easily breakable. The bundle is impossible to break. The theory is everyone working together --going in the same direction, by force if necessary, makes the state strong. Dissent and difference of opinion make it weak.
So actually, the government working with business to wipe out unpopular speech is indeed textbook fascism.
"Everything in the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State."
That is Mussolini's take on fascism. Corporations and the government working together just ain't that.
"It’s symbol was a group of sticks bundled together and wrapped tightly as one. One stick is easily breakable. The bundle is impossible to break. The theory is everyone working together --going in the same direction, by force if necessary, makes the state strong. Dissent and difference of opinion make it weak."
I'm glad to see that you've actually done some research into fascism. But you neglect the totalizing aspect of it... "cracking down" isn't by definition fascism, or else every nation with a police force and laws is fascist.
Dude, I KNOW you learned this in your 20th century history course at Antioch, but c'mon. The fakewokeleft of the current moment is as close as this country has come to fascism probably, ever. Fascism emerged from dialectical materialism as it is and was very embedded in the "progressive" movement of the 1920s and 30s.
Also, CISA called again. Sigh. Your Mom needs you to tend the basement cat, didn't I tell you that!
Corporations and government working together --to censor / de-platform citizens and journalists with unapproved thoughts (as Matt so gloriously exposed in Twitter Files). So again --it may not be 1930s Italy but it’s not consistent with our 1st Amendment.
Nothing is ever "fascism" and nothing is ever "socialism" when you can constantly move the goal posts/change definitions to suit a narrative. Fascism? Well that's me(by the lefts definition and labeling), Mussolini and Hitler and Socialism is something in Amsterdam.
"Everything in the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State."
That is the quintessential definition of fascism, as stated by ol' Benito himself. It's a totalitarian worldview... it's not just about *some* control, it's about absolute, *unescapable* control.
If you can escape fascism by just turning off the TV, that's not fascism.
Right! Now maybe you can explain employing intellectual gymnastics and pretzel logic just how the hell you guys label people like me a fascist when I share no philosophical beliefs with your kissing cousin Benito and his buddy to the north you guys tie yourselves up in knots trying to hang around the rights neck. LMAO! You know when I'm not out in my white hood burning crosses, lynching, oppressing women with my girthy patriarchy and chasing atheists around with my Bible quoting scripture! LMAO! Such d-heads with your BS, f'ing old and beat.
Fascism is when you turn on the TV and the political philosophical opposition of a news network that has been this political oppositions object of removing from a market place entirely has someone removed for no logical, reasonable, rational explanation.
None of you freedom loving leftists have been calling for that right? That's the difference between me and you. I am all for the left having a platform and spewing their BS. I don't want them removed I want them all to be seen for what they are as an example of what not to be. Problem is you run from debate or lie your asses off as a tactic because by any means necessary and the ends justify the means. Yell liar or fascist or racist or copy n paste articles you do not read or comprehend yourselves as some sort of argument or refutation.
The best part about making baseless accusations on the anonymous internet is that you never have to feel like a shithead when it turns out you're wrong.
I'm not sure they ever really were about freedom. Matt says liberals "didn't want to ban things" but cites The American President, the climax of which has the president, glorying in his own power, promising to go door to door confiscating people's guns. Hard to be pro-freedom and anti-ban when you want to ban and seize lots of things and effectively delete 10% of the Bill of Rights. They're up to at least 20% now but they were never at 0.
Another great piece. My whole life (in my 50s) I've never liked the puritanical pearl clutching of the religious GOP but I also caught the scent very early for the totalitarian leanings of Democrats.
Political correctness was a start of it, the race baiting of Sharpton's Tawana Brawley era in NYC, Jessie Jackson and on and on. Manipulating people for ever increasing power and intrusion into day to day lives by the ever growing government. The obsession with disarming the public...it all spelled tyranny for years. Here we are now, my worst nightmares realized.
Look at the fanatical obsession with the smoking ban, another left mob driven cult expression. The issue was distorted in the extreme so the mob could join in othering a target that they knew was not going to be defended. The pattern repeated and escalated. Everything is always sold as the "greater good" when it means mob rule under a violent and oppressive government that will stop at nothing if you resist.
It's always been clear that conformity and compliance were something fundamental in the "liberal" orthodoxy. I've never known a Democrat in my life that had any respect for individual freedom and liberty.
The disgraceful false racism agenda is probably their most shameful exploit, causing utterly needless division using baseless fear driven nonsense. The censorship is a close second and equally disturbing, however without total information control they cannot ensure the falsehoods will propagate. With an open dialogue, their entire platform, their entire premise, baseless, will disintegrate instantly.
The fact that all of their motions are clearly mapped in Mao's Red Book, and all the Frankfurt School and other historical writings and that people can't even see it is probably the most distressing. They have so decimated education that people are woefully ignorant participants in something they don't even understand.
Excellent comment! An old friend of mine said years ago that the government outlawing smoking with ever encroaching laws was the first step in control of more aspects in private life. At the time I thought she was overreacting but now see the wisdom and foresight in her observation.
From what I can see, the government picks the issues to amplify (Trump indicted for paying off a prostitute), or gives minimal lip service to others (invasion at the border, fentanyl crisis) and in the case of Carlson, punishes those who bring up topics left ignored by them.
On many fronts, I'm a Classic Liberal, but I've never once felt those ideals represented by Democrats. The idea that the government of my lifetime would ever effectively create and deliver on major programs like universal healthcare is just ludicrous. I'm not opposed in concept to a nation as wealthy as ours providing social services like healthcare or subsidized education, it's our _actual_ government that leaves me where I would never support it.
You last sentence hits the nail on the head. Our healthcare system, in and of itself, is fine. The payment bureaucracy and associated politics is the nightmare.
I'm close to health services via my family and many relatives and friends. The current system is badly eroding due to incompetent regulation and the market consolidation in care providers. Add in DEI viral infection in accreditation bodies and physicians are running, retiring early and leaving the industry.
It is in a bad state and it will take time to be more visible to average people but right now it's crumbling and crumbling fast. In rural America it is almost impossible to find basic General Practitioners or OBGYNs, in more concentrated urban areas it is becoming impossible to get a simple appointment. I live rurally now and to get in to see a GP, you only find 30yr olds that have just ended residency accepting new patients and appointments are months out in booking and frequently canceled.
The heavy handed regulation, price fixing and other measures that were put in since the Obama administration have created an anti-competitive environment that was constructed to favor massive consolidation under just a few behemoth health provider networks. It's a bad scene.
This x 100. Here in a rural community in Illinois, we are losing our health care options. Whether GPs, eye doctors, dentists, . . . hell, veterinarians, the health care system for us used to be great. We knew our doctors, no problem getting an appointment, and so on. Now we have to go through Central Command to see if we need a prescription. Thanks, Obama.
About which Biden said "they have their guns, and we have the F-15s". We're all waiting to see what form Schumer's "sensible F-15 regulation" will take.
The Iraq war was the political event that most shaped my childhood. I learned to take anything the government says with a healthy grain of salt, and never trust those who would seek to censor or silence opposition viewpoints. Last year I took a First Amendment class in law school. Probably fifty or so students in the class. I figured there would be at least one other principled civil-libertarian in the class. I mean, after all, we read all the major free speech cases: Pentagon Papers, Times v Sullivan, the Flag-burning and draft-card-burning cases, obscenity doctrine, Skokie march, Wesborough Baptist Church, etc. Somebody had to come around to the obvious position that censorship does not work and it is foolish to trust the government with the power to decide which opinions are on and off limits. I’m 30 now, so I’m was a few years older than most of the other students. Nevertheless, it was pretty depressing to be literally the only student who fit into the old-school ACLU mold. I got the sense that myself and my professor were probably the only two people in the room who had even heard of Ira Glasser. I believe there are very few millennials, let alone gen Z, who value freedom of thought. They believe corporations and the government have a responsibility to protect us from wrong-think and, the most laughable phrase in vogue today, “harmful speech”. It’s bleak, man. I don’t see how this leads to anything besides ever-increasing polarization. I don’t see how this ends well.
Unfortunately many value freedom of speech as long as it’s theirs or one they agree with. Wait till the speech police come after them. Their values change from general to specific and are at odds.
When the speech police censor viewpoints they don't like, it's "holding people accountable". When they censor viewpoints they agree with, it's fascism. I have argued vehemently in effort to convince young people that the transgressive ideas they support (ie boycott divestment and sanctions, radical ideas about police and prisons, etc) may one day become to target of cancelation. The response is usually along the lines of, "Well then we will deal with the fascists when that happens".
I'm old enough to remember when police would go out into the streets and bash gay people. My parents are old enough to remember when police unleashed dogs on peaceful black protestors during the civil rights movement.
Now they think they'll be on the right side of "democracy" forever?
I don’t think you were attracted to liberalism per se then, you were attracted to the libertarian aspects of pre-2000s liberalism. Modern liberals are authoritarians, because there is nothing about either liberalism or conservatism that mandates whether they be authoritarian or libertarian, it varies by era. But don’t make the mistake of associating liberalism with tolerance or free speech -- those may be liberal values in some eras, but they are always libertarian values. Because “liberal” and “conservative” change their meaning over time, no one should establish a permanent identification as one or the other. In particular, you have to see if “your side” is using authoritarian means to achieve their goals -- if they are, they are probably the bad guys.
Basically, but modern liberals have substituted something different for “liberalism” than classical liberals or even liberals of the ‘60s and ‘70s understood as liberalism. It is another example of the nominative fallacy, mistaking the label for the thing, without realizing that the underlying thing identified by the label has changed.
The whole right, middle, left paradigm is a crock. You're either for ordered liberty or for some form of tyranny.
I love all of the malleable labels, definitions, stereotypes and caricatures people can come up with on the left. I seriously don't know how the hell you can keep up with it all.
Plato had it right. You can have Oligarchy, Tyranny, or Democracy. I assure you though that there also is indeed a Left and a Right. The basic tenets of Leftism: the common good is more important than individual property rights. Natural resources should be used for public benefit, not private gain. All people should be provided with medical care and housing. Monopolies should be nationalized, turned over to the workers, or broken up. Banking should be a public utility, not a privately managed interest-taking sector. All peoples of the world share a common humanity, war is just the elites sending the working class to die so the elites get richer and get more sphere of influence control. Workers of the world unite. THAT is Leftism, which is very very distinct from centrism or being on the Right.
I agree with your definition here but at best left/right are place holder/identifier words for the sake of discussion. Many beliefs claimed to be of the "right" by leftists that I do not harbor or have never encountered here on the "right" side of the isle.
It's dumb luck that someone hasn't been within arms reach of me to call me a fascist, nazi or racist with all that's been going on in society especially the last few years.
Indeed, "Freedom" is quite the tricky thing. Freedom to own property and accumulate wealth? Social, cultural and intellectual freedom? Freedom to consume? I think the most powerful conception of freedom is: "Feedom is participation in Power." But I shall spare additional digressions! :)
The left/right paradign describes centers of power. You can be philosophically opposed to one side or the other, but still support them for some reason or another.
Libertarians and Conservatives just happen to overlap in a majority of views and policy positions, and tend to vote almost exclusively Republican. Go figure.
"Because 'liberal' and 'conservative' change their meaning over time, no one should establish a permanent identification as one or the other."
Yes, agreed. Just as with "Democrat" and Republican" (in the US).
But "Left" and "Right" have essentially fixed meanings, and for that reason, I think it would be beneficial to beef up our understanding and use of them.
I don’t think so -- “left” and “right” are relative to the then-current status quo, so modern leftists for example are focused on race over class, in contrast to the leftists of the ‘30s and 40s. What is “progressive” in one era becomes conservative in the next, like how rock ‘n roll was once seen as edgy and progressive but is now considered staid and reactionary. Or, to put it another way, Woodrow Wilson and AOC are both progressives relative to the society of their time, but would hate each other and don’t have much in common viewpoint- or policy-wise. “Libertarianism” and “authoritarianism” however are not relative to the the current status quo, as libertarians in every era prioritize small government, free speech, due process and other civil rights etc. and authoritarians do the opposite.
Modern progressives love nominative fallacies, where people get attached to the label of a thing without realizing that the thing it identifies has changed. This is why many “old lefties” continue to support “progressivism” even though modern progressivism is antithetical to many of the things they believed in -- anti war, pro free speech, deeply suspicious of government, etc. In my view, no one should identify as permanently “progressive” or “conservative” under the assumption that those things are immutable, because they aren’t. The liberals of the ‘60s were largely libertarian progressives, modern liberals are authoritarian progressives, and it is important to keep that distinctions in mind rathe than simply reflexively identify as “progressive” or “conservative”, as those descriptors by themselves don’t capture all the relevant dimensions. As Orwell said, the real division is not between conservatives and revolutionaries, but between libertarians and authoritarians.
As a historical record, I agree with that. Thank you. I also see that "Authoritarian" and "Libertarian" are persistent impulses, what ever they are called, in contrast to shifting labels and label-to-label-associations.
But what is a great need today regarding political language? Allowing important words to constantly change meaning at the whim of thought leaders is just one type of potential poison to society. It is well-recognized that the pace of change is certainly driving us crazy today, turning us into a tower of Babel. But there's no reason to assume it is even necessary...
"'left' and 'right' are relative to the then-current status quo"
That's a fair conclusion from their origins in the French Revolution. But curiously, that era also produced what persists today in the French national motto -- Liberté, égalité, fraternité -- where the first two terms neatly reflect persistent fundamental Rightist and Leftist values over the centuries since: Freedom and Equality. So it's important that they persisted here *combined* in a national statement, even as they are assumed to be opposed in Western political ideologies.
I'd tweak the second to what I think is a more widely palatable concept, Fairness, and then you've got two essential, complementary components of societal needs: (individual) freedom and (social) fairness. The third component is one that has been disparaged in recent years, and now with woke politics supposed to be completely dispensed with: Brotherhood, or sense of community, where societies are permitted to define and support themselves in contrast to other societies. It presupposes no necessary hostility, despite what globalists promote.
I think the libertarian/authoritarian distinction frequently gets subsumed into or conflated with “progressivism” or “conservatism” because the progressive or conservative movement in any snapshot of time may seek to achieve their ends through libertarian or authoritarian means, and people living in that time assume that “progressivism” or “conservatism” always support those means. But in a broader historical perspective this is not true. Governments on both the left and the right can be either authoritarian or libertarian, and extreme political movements on both sides tend to converge on the authoritarian end (e.g., Stalin and Hitler both united at the authoritarian end though one is on the left and one on the right). I think it is important to disentangle the two axes to make sure you are not reflexively identifying with a tribe because it is nominally “progressive” or “conservative” if they are using authoritarian means (assuming you disapprove of authoritarian means) to achieve their progressive or conservative goals.
There is also the conundrum that some people, maybe a majority, sincerely like to be told what to do (authoritarianism, though they don't call it that), and likely will not, and cannot, ever be cajoled into becoming full-fledged citizens (i.e. those who, from our POV, do sufficient homework and thinking to justify their votes) -- especially in an unprecedentedly complex world with unprecedented aggregate power (via technologies). I'm confident in fact that's exactly how our quasi-democracy descended to its current state.
Don't misunderstand me -- I'm certainly NOT advocating rights removal, I am attempting to face uncomfortably realities. "Don't shoot the messenger." By raising consciousness about reality, only then can we find ways, including democratic ways, deal with it.
Yeah, when deluged with too much data, people fall back on heuristics like in-group identification and pattern matching to come to conclusions. That’s why a lot of modern propaganda just keeps repeating the same message over and over, once you put a pattern in people’s brains, they tend to revert to it when indecisive. Basically it’s the political version of what what web companies do with “dark patterns” to motivate desired user behavior,
... who work for perpetual shapeshifters barreling toward their their own secret goals. "Change is [always] good!" "Change is inevitable! [even when humans make the change]"
I just texted a couple friends yesterday when I saw that AOC interview and said "I am ashamed I once thought AOC was our political future." Seriously, the Democrats are going to force me to vote Trump in the next election. We've really sunk so far.
What has happened to the anti-war left, and the left in general, is mind blowing to me every single day. The two things that basically attracted me to the political "left" as it were; basically in a nutshell three things in the 1980s: it was still the place where the anti-war movement had traction, especially as it pertained to our actions in Central America and other places. It was definitely, 100% for free speech and free expression (I was a punk rock fan and especially found the Minutemen and other totally anti-war and anti-establishment bands transcendent). Finally, it opposed apartheid in South Africa and we longed for racial harmony in America, AKA the Martin Luther King Jr. variety.
These are all gone from the left now. The last professional conference I attended there was a "BIPOC Affinity Room" that white people were not allowed to enter, and the elites and liberal professional class scream at the residents of the most poverty stricken counties in America in Kentucky, which are mostly white, that they have "white privilege." The left is, in some ways, even more warmongering than the hated neocons of the 1990s and 2000s. But what really blows my mind is how much they want to literally censor everything.
I've never been more politically homeless in my life.
Smith - in the words of Noam Chomsky, the Democratic party is the only hope this country has to remain a democracy. The GOP are fascist.
So I can understand your concern that like 90% of Democratic leaders are corporate tools. They are. But 100% of GOP leaders are corporate tools as are most of their voters. Big difference.
If you want a home, fight for power in the Dem party. If not you are just naval gazing
Lifelong conservative here that unfortunately has had to vote R a few times in my life. 100% of Dems have been and always were corporate tools while railing against corporations as 99% of Republicans have always been corporate tools too. LMAO, fight for power in the Democrat Party? You guys already have the power. With the exception of a few red state legislatures you guys have the culture, institutions of higher learning, Hollywood, the media, FBI, DOJ and cancel culture is a whole owned subsidiary of you. As I commented elsewhere here and will pass along to S Smith. The whole right, middle, left paradigm is BS. You are either for ordered liberty or for some form of tyranny. There is no being kinda sorta for both. Taibbi has literally been documenting and reporting on this very thing. Maybe you should actually read his articles.
All the two political parties are is the Harlem Globetrotters vs the Washington Generals. Good cop, bad cop. Corporations need more regulatory power to stifle innovation and upstarts....vote(fund) Dem one cycle. Need corporate tax breaks vote(fund) Rep the next cycle. The GOP and Dems are fascist economically and use communist tactics in the streets(antifa/BLM).
Chomsky is a political idiot and should have stuck to his field of expertise, linguistics.
Jeff - No, the Democrats don't have all of the power. Hollywood has been screaming for things like Universal Health Care, Less Corporate Power, Higher Taxes for the rich for decades and law makers in the GOP and DEM party ignore them as well as the majority of voters that want these policies.
You say 99% of GOP have been corporate tools. The majority of GOP voters want to ban assault rifles. Can you name the 1% of GOP leaders that would vote the way GOP voters want on this issue. The majority of GOP voters want the government to fund health care. Can you name the 1% of GOP law makers that are willing to vote for government funded health care? 100% of GOP law makers vowed that they don't believe in climate change. Do 100% of GOP voters think it is fake?
Who are you kidding?
GOP law makers are 100% controlled by big business. They have ZERO % that are not controlled by big business.
As the former president of College Republicans in college it is very telling to hear that you have been a life long conservative. You need to wake up and smell the coffee... Yes most Dem law makers are terrible. But there is a huge difference between MOST and ALL.
I appreciate the correction, but "assault weapon" is still just a made-up category invented by politicians. There's no such category of weapons in reality. The people who answered "yes" on that poll are just showing their ignorance.
In practice, "assault weapon" tends to mean any semi-automatic weapon that can fire more than 10 bullets without reloading, but with a hundred thousand loopholes and asterisks, because banning semi-auto weapons that hold more than 10 rounds would most definitely *not* be popular on a poll.
The definition is so vague, the 1994 Federal Assault Weapons Ban bill resorted to arbitrarily banning specific models.
These types of weapon bans tend to focus on guns that are popular, like AR-15s and AK-47s, for example. But these guns are popular because they're reliable, accurate, and safe to operate. Banning them doesn't really make sense... it just forces responsible gun owners to use less safe, less reliable weapons, in the hope that that somehow reduces mass shootings.
Who am I kidding? I don't know what parallel universe you are living in or echo chamber you reside specifically but nothing, zero, nada of the shit you claim GOP voters want is true. I suppose you'd sight some obscure polls as proof. You're intellectually dishonest and do not debate in good faith. The GOP which is made up of the establishment has kept and preserved Obama Care after campaigning endlessly on repealing it. The GOP voters want to ban assault rifles(facepalm), I can't even entertain that obvious bogus claim. Yep, GOP lawmakers are controlled by big business as is the entirety of the Democrat Party. I mean how intellectually dishonest can you possibly get? Your side has been pimping the BS narrative as the party of the little guy, unions, the working man. Taibbi has done yeoman work in pointing this out to his own ideological brethren. He's now saying shit we've been pointing out for years. Big business/corporations and government work hand in hand while both parties point the fingers at each other.
I'm sure you were the president of College Republicans(eyeroll). Sounds about right as there isn't much difference between the Checked Pant Country Club Republicans and Limousine Liberals/Progressives.
My family was Goldwater conservatives even before he put out Conscience Of A Conservative(or Buckley's God and Man At Yale) of which I still have my Grandfathers hardcover first edition. My mother helped organize a fund raiser in Reno , Nv for Reagans 80' presidential run where I listened to the adults talk to Paul Laxalt and heard him explain how the Bushes were a huge problem/obstacle. Too bad Reagan feared he needed Bush to win. I'm sure you already knew that Laxalt was who Reagan wanted as VP and not that limp dick GOPestablishment Bush being a president of the College Republicans and all.
<< I'm sure you already knew that Laxalt was who Reagan wanted as VP and not that limp dick GOPestablishment Bush being a president of the College Republicans and all.>>
Reagan was the definition of limp a limp dick. Bush2 had the balls to stand up to corporations far more than Reagan. Reagan was their puppet. They told him to hop and he said "how high" Who are you kidding..
After Reagans tax cuts and wild spending exploded the deficit Bush had the balls to increase taxes and reign in Reagans wild spending.
Who are you kidding. Reagan was the ultimate limp dick.
<<Your side has been pimping the BS narrative as the party of the little guy, unions, the working man. >>
I 100% agree with you here. But i can point to many in the party that are fighting for the little guy. Bernie on health care, Sherrod Brown on unions, Warren on banks. And there are more. Yes, the Dems have totally screwed the little guy and unions. But some of them are still fighting for them.
Please name the GOP law makers that are fighting for the Unions or for the little guy to stop getting screwed by banks or by the health care industry. Pleas feel free to name those GOP because i don't know them
The Tea Party is an example of organizing. The Justice Democrats are an example of organizing.
If you can't get your ideas adopted by either the Dem or GOP party you are just navel gazing. Parties change quite a bit over time. Southern Democrats in 2023 are very different than they were in 1973. Trump Republicans are very different than Bush Republicans.
If you want your ideas adopted you have to organize and get them pushed through an effective political organizing group.
The Tea party is now the Trump party. All they ever really stood for was bringing down the old school Bush GOP. And at that they have succeeded. And they did it pretty quick.
Ideas are just naval gazing if they are not aligned with political power.... LBJ did not sign the Civil Rights bill because he was a true believer in MLK. He did it because MLK organized and brought VOTES to the table. and that is what LBJ wanted more than civil rights for people of color.
Why do you imagine that me, an apostate in the party now, as I viciously opposed lockdowns and vaccine mandates, in addition to opposing the madness of sending billions to Ukraine, and a huge free speech advocate, would even be accepted in the D party now? For these views, over the last 3 years I have been called a fascist and worse. I have been threatened with violence toward myself and my family for opposing the ludicrous mask mandate here as well. I hate the Rethuglicans, but sorry, man, the Dems hate my views as well.
It's very bad that there is uniform silencing of all those who vary from the Establishment narrative.
It's even worse that those granted the megaphone by our betters are so dull and stupid. When's the last time you watched a CNN or MSNBC and said "Wow, I never thought about that, I need to evaluate my underlying assumptions and thought process."
"When's the last time you watched a CNN or MSNBC..."
If you cut off your question right there, I could honestly say "on 9/11." Ditto with Fox News. And I highly doubt I will ever watch any of them (or any other TV news show) again.
Yes, they did. But I specifically remember a reporter commenting on Bldg 7 looking like "controlled demolition." I've looked at the way back machine on the video coverage of 9/11 and can't find it.
Uniform silencing? What do you think is happening right here, on this Substack? Silence? Joe Rogan gets 100,000,000 views a month, while CNN and MSNBC both hover at or below 1,000,000. Your "dull and stupid" comment is spot on, but that's probably why *nobody watches those networks*.
I have never watched any TV news, ever. Except in airports. That makes 60 years worth.
In Nov 2017 I decided to boycott the New York Times, and shortly afterward extended that to all non-independent media. I trust only those who are reader-supported, like the newspapers used to be.
We were dumbfounded that uoung people rolled over and just accepted being locked down and not being able to go to graduation, play sports, see live music, go to bars, etc. Our generation NEVER would have accepted that!! We were, in our late 50's, few of the rebellious folks that went to the grocery store, were out the first night of restaurants re-opening, and out anywhere that it was "allowed" during the lockdowns. But the narrative "you'll kill granny" worked on the youth! Why should we be surprised? Today's youth believe they only have 12 years left, thanks to AOC and others!
One of our few voices was Tucker. It appears even our only one conservative network rolled over. Thank God there are still courageous voices like yours, Matt.
Yes, but can you imagine how pissed off they're going to be when they finally wake up? I think that whole generation will become the greatest defenders of freedom in American since 1776. We just have to find a way to explain to them what's being taken from them. That should be something we can do. The dogs that end up as biters are the ones who grow up from the bottom of the pack.
"Yes, but can you imagine how pissed off they're going to be when they finally wake up?"
Chris Hedges was in Yugoslavia. Many people could not believe anything was going to change. That is, until they got put in vans and taken away to camps.
The real test of whether someone is truly anti-authoritarian and pro free-speech is whether they still believe either of those things when they are in charge.
"What we have instead is an increasingly pissed-off population that needs to look about eighty results down in every Google search to find its point of view represented. Who thinks that situation is going to hold? "
Who thinks that is going to hold? That's easy. Google, Facebook and their enablers in the administration think it is going to hold as long as they control access to opinions.
That's more due to search engine optimization than anything.
I'm increasingly becoming convinced that the internet is an overwhelming force for bad in the world... you almost couldn't conceive of a more effective tool for shifting power to the establishment and away from individuals.
USG "watch-out" lists aren't helping, though. As for the internet being a force for bad--I tend to agree, but I don't think those people who we all think control those platforms and data can really control them. They've evolved to function beyond their creators' purview. Those systems are all semi-autonomous and feedback-driven, so who knows what kind of shit will hit the fan in the future.
Remember, kids, authoritarianism is something that ever always only happens in other countries!
We're going full shithole!
we are full shithole.
I can't agree with that, given that Matt has repeatedly pointed out the difference between actual police states and the freedoms of an open society that we still have available in the US.
Matt's warning about a perilous trend. That's different than actually having arrived in the pit.
I just got done reading the Wired article about the deployment of Hikvision facial surveillance technology in the PRC. https://www.wired.com/story/surveillance-china-security-camera-giant-ipvm/
Now THAT is what actual totalitarian control is.
The American company that exposed Hikvision: https://ipvm.com/
Yeah, but the fact remains that our rights, services and peace of mind are all being eroded at a shocking pace, by both parties, making elections increasingly pointless even as the language around them become incredibly histrionic.
Perhaps other nations are more "police state", but we definitely are moving in that direction, quickly, with no ability to influence our path.
“Matt's warning about a perilous trend. That's different than actually having arrived in the pit. “
Time is what keeps everything from happening at once
See: how to boil a live frog
Going, going, gone...?
Osiris was right. You never go Full Retard.
I never thought that, and the old Indian and cowboys told you so. It was their land, but we came over and took it , but they were bad for fighting for what was theirs. As a kid it told me we are not who we say we are.
In the “meta” sense it shows the true dangers of “tribalism”(a synonym for diversity). If the Indians (early on) could have set their differences aside and recognized the existential threat Europeans posed to them they could have easily eliminated their small nascent communities. At least for awhile. King Phillip made a valiant effort but failed.
Tribalism is not a synonym for diversity. Not in any thesaurus or dictionary. Most people have a suspicious idea of "tribalism," that it might not be good. And you seem to want to somehow drag diversity into it?
If anything, diversity is an antonym of tribalism.
Diversity IS an antonym of tribalism, but we are practicing tribalism and calling it diversity. Kind of like how "freedom" meant mass surveillance in past moral panics.
Tribalism is a synonym for diversity.
I'm sure you'll provide us with the link to that source. The famous synonym guy, Roget, says you are incorrect.
I am the source, the only one of importance here on this thread. Resorting to a thesaurus is past folly, it veers into stupidity.
Wrongo.
it's quite correct actually.
I always remembered reading that a pope in the 15 century gave all those headed off to claim new land a thumbs up, and a sense of entitlement to the land of the infidels, and killing them off was indeed an option, and I'm sure what you're saying is true.
Might have something to do with the old Testament where God literally tells the Isaelites to kill tribe after tribe after tribe.
Kill yes, all of them, and then rape and enslave their women. I've actually read the bible, all of it. Some really seriously nasty and weird stuff in there.
From there Elisha went up to Bethel. As he was walking along the road, some boys came out of the town and jeered at him. “Get out of here, baldy!” they said. “Get out of here, baldy!” He turned around, looked at them and called down a curse on them in the name of the Lord. Then two bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys. And he went on to Mount Carmel and from there returned to Samaria.
2 Kings 2:23
Wow. Little gem of a story like that should be tip off that most cults are started by complete psychopaths with violent delusions of revenge and power.
As a baldy, this has always been one of my favorite bible stories.
When I was a kid and I would hear things on a par with this I use to think maybe these people were deaf and couldn't hear right, and God got it all wrong.
Sounds like you were a very interesting kid! I also remember looking around with skepticism about the human approach to life, social, political and religious assertions that were obviously contradicted by what I saw. But because everyone else seemed okay with the status quo, by my 20's I'd pivoted to doubting myself.
Reminded me of this article full of cold, hard and uncomfortable truths.
https://thesaker.is/nations-built-on-lies-how-the-us-became-rich/
"Good mental health was not a prerequisite for European settlers emigrating to the New World. We are fond of reminding ourselves that Australia was (and mostly still is) populated primarily with murderers, thieves and sexual perverts, but the immigrants to America were not noticeably better. Indeed, the inscription on the Statue of Liberty got the words more or less correct in referring to “the wretched refuse of your teeming shore”. While the Australians had their serial killers and muggers, the Europeans went one better with their Christian extremists who spent their weekdays burning witches and killing Indians, and their Sundays in church thanking God for the opportunity. The Australians have marginally improved their habits over the centuries while the Americans have not.
America is widely accepted, and indeed even prides itself, on being a deeply Christian country, with 65% or more of the population declaring religion important in their lives. This would be supported by history, since the major migrations to the New World consisted of a long list of flaky religious sects whose primary goal in emigration was the opportunity to build a society entirely based on those isolationist and extremist heresies. It is probably safe to say that Salem witchcraft was the seedbed in which the peculiarly American version of Christian theology sprouted and flourished, and which also served as a practical introduction to mass hysteria which would later be so usefully applied to the concepts of patriotism and democracy. The enduring echoes of this religious ancestry have been highly influential in all of subsequent American history.
The Preamble to the American Declaration of Independence (“The most famous words in the English language”, if you’re American; just another Hello Kitty greeting card, if you’re not), states: “We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all White Men were created superior and are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights, the most important of which is slavery”. In the recent history of the modern world, only two nations of people have so thoroughly embraced slavery as to have practiced it on an immense scale for hundreds of years: the Christians in America and the Dalai Lamas in Tibet. And only these two groups so cherished slavery in their hearts they fought a civil war over the right to maintain it. It is hardly a moral selling point that both sets of racist bigots lost the war and, while Mao cleaned up Tibet, the racism and bigotry persisted in America, often violently, for another 200 years and is still widely in evidence today. Christian virtue does not die easily."
It goes on...at great length.
The cited article *is* good--at least as propaganda.
"In the recent history of the modern world, only two nations of people have so thoroughly embraced slavery as to have practiced it on an immense scale for hundreds of years: the Christians in America and the Dalai Lamas in Tibet [stopped by Mao]."
But definitely no slavery under Mao (no genocide, no forced labor, or any other stuff like that), definitely not!
And America (as the USA nation, anyway, since "nations" is the category used) definitely had slavery, at least in some states, from 1776 to 1860--1.04 centuries, to be precise, so definitely "centuries." (Although it is hard to say whether the nation as a whole "embraced" slavery.)
And if pre-independence time is being counted here, there are certainly more than "only two nations" with a "long history of slavery" into "modern times." Just in the Americas, for instance, there is Brazil, with slavery of Africans there starting as early as 1540 and extending into the 1860's.
HAHAHA slavery of Africans in Brazil since the 1540s. LMAO at whose hands? Name names.
Another HOWLER - *only* since 1776 in "America"? Really? ! LOL show your sources bot.
LOL you're what's known as a comprador. If Joachim is really your name. You're fucking more than worthless - you're a useful idiot for the CIA.
A lot of the original immigrants to what is now the United States were on the run from their creditors.
This is one reason why US bankruptcy law is particularly debtor-friendly, and certain state-law considerations in Texas and Florida especially so.
My great great grandfather, whose name and memory I carry as my middle names, was kicked off his croft in Rogart Scotland in the highlands during the clearances. So he made his way to Pictou Nova Scotia where he did rather well.
When my Palestinian friends complain about losing their land I reply, "Tell me about it!"
If you ever get a chance to visit NS I highly recommend it. Cape Breton is one of the great places in the world.
True enough. My husband and I just returned from Netherlands and Belgium because we were tracing the roots of his paternal grandfather whose family came to America because their horse trading business owed money.
Bankruptcy law is friendly to well heeled debtors inclusive of those who can afford a good bankruptcy lawyer. But while it may have started as a means to protect many debtors, it has morphed into something quite different. https://www.amazon.com/Courting-Failure-Competition-Corrupting-Bankruptcy/dp/0472031708
And new(ish) legislation: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2020/10/27/biden-bankruptcy-reform/
Hint to those not in the know: The "reforms" they're implementing are making bankruptcy law more friendly to creditors, not debtors.
I guess the TL/DR version is that personal bankruptcy laws favor the creditors whereas corporate bankruptcy laws and courts favor the well heeled debtors with the money and connections to sway the system.
Thanks for the article, I'll read it. Looks good. As a kid I always had difficulty with my religious upbringing. Lots to question and interestingly the same applied to what they told me about history, like men with property could vote, but others couldn't didn't seem democratic to me, etc. I liked reading this. Thank you.
15th century? "...headed off to claim a *new land*, and a sense of entitlement to the land of infidels and killing them"? You got a little more reading to do. Better go read up on a "crusade" that happened from the middle of the 7th century to the 14th. Look up the geographical location of Al-Andalus and the Umayyad Caliphate and how it came to be. Read past the historical re-writes of how living in dhimmitude was cool beans(someone forgot to give some Frenchman named Chuck Martel the news that it was great). "New lands" only when they decided to embark on kicking the invaders asses all the way back to where they came from and plundered on the way back home(went Viking) because that shit cost$$$ and they were broke. You see when pushing back on and evening things up with your centuries long oppressors and you do this in silly outfits, swing cords to chop and crush up close and personal........well you tend to be brutal hard SOB's. Not putting a smiley face on it but look at it from the proper perspective not through the prism of today. This wasn't just some random "hey lets go kill these a-holes and take their shit cuz we're greedy and have nothing else better to do because Christianity".
The latter crusades we're questionable but the early ones had a purpose. Unfortunately chasing these oppressors back to where they came from the, Christian Crusaders discovered new resources of worth and good ol' human nature(conquest) took over.
The Papal Bull "Inter Caetera," issued by Pope Alexander VI on May 4, 1493, played a central role in the Spanish conquest of the New World. The document supported Spain’s strategy to ensure its exclusive right to the lands discovered by Columbus the previous year. It established a demarcation line one hundred leagues west of the Azores and Cape Verde Islands and assigned Spain the exclusive right to acquire territorial possessions and to trade in all lands west of that line. All others were forbidden to approach the lands west of the line without special license from the rulers of Spain. This effectively gave Spain a monopoly on the lands in the New World.
The Bull stated that any land not inhabited by Christians was available to be "discovered," claimed, and exploited by Christian rulers and declared that "the Catholic faith and the Christian religion be exalted and be everywhere increased and spread, that the health of souls be cared for and that barbarous nations be overthrown and brought to the faith itself." This "Doctrine of Discovery" became the basis of all European claims in the Americas as well as the foundation for the United States’ western expansion. In the US Supreme Court in the 1823 case Johnson v. McIntosh, Chief Justice John Marshall’s opinion in the unanimous decision held "that the principle of discovery gave European nations an absolute right to New World lands." In essence, American Indians had only a right of occupancy, which could be abolished.
The Bull Inter Caetera made headlines again throughout the 1990s and in 2000, when many Catholics petitioned Pope John Paul II to formally revoke it and recognize the human rights of indigenous "non-Christian peoples."
An English translation is available.
EXCERPT
Wherefore, as becomes Catholic kings and princes, after earnest consideration of all matters, especially of the rise and spread of the Catholic faith, as was the fashion of your ancestors, kings of renowned memory, you have purposed with the favor of divine clemency to bring under your sway the said mainlands and islands with their residents and inhabitants and to bring them to the Catholic faith. Hence, heartily commending in the Lord this your holy and praiseworthy purpose, and desirous that it be duly accomplished, and that the name of our Savior be carried into those regions, we exhort you very earnestly in the Lord and by your reception of holy baptism, whereby you are bound to our apostolic commands, and by the bowels of the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ, enjoy strictly, that inasmuch as with eager zeal for the true faith you design to equip and despatch this expedition, you purpose also, as is your duty, to lead the peoples dwelling in those islands and countries to embrace the Christian religion; nor at any time let dangers or hardships deter you therefrom, with the stout hope and trust in your hearts that Almighty God will further your undertakings. And, in order that you may enter upon so great an undertaking with greater readiness and heartiness endowed with benefit of our apostolic favor, we, of our own accord, not at your instance nor the request of anyone else in your regard, but out of our own sole largess and certain knowledge and out of the fullness of our apostolic power, by the authority of Almighty God conferred upon us in blessed Peter and of the vicarship of Jesus Christ, which we hold on earth, do by tenor of these presents, should any of said islands have been found by your envoys and captains, give, grant, and assign to you and your heirs and successors, kings of Castile and Leon, forever, together with all their dominions, cities, camps, places, and villages, and all rights, jurisdictions, and appurtenances, all islands and mainlands found and to be found, discovered and to be discovered towards the west and south, by drawing and establishing a line from the Arctic pole, namely the north, to the Antarctic pole, namely the south, no matter whether the said mainlands and islands are found and to be found in the direction of India or towards any other quarter, the said line to be distant one hundred leagues towards the west and south from any of the islands commonly known as the Azores and Cape Verde. With this proviso however that none of the islands and mainlands, found and to be found, discovered and to be discovered, beyond that said line towards the west and south, be in the actual possession of any Christian king or prince up to the birthday of our Lord Jesus Christ just past from which the present year one thousand four hundred ninety-three begins. And we make, appoint, and depute you and your said heirs and successors lords of them with full and free power, authority, and jurisdiction of every kind; with this proviso however, that by this our gift, grant, and assignment no right acquired by any Christian prince, who may be in actual possesssion of said islands and mainlands prior to the said birthday of our Lord Jesus Christ, is hereby to be understood to be withdrawn or taking away. Moreover we command you in virtue of holy obedience that, employing all due diligence in the premises, as you also promise—nor do we doubt your compliance therein in accordance with your loyalty and royal greatness of spirit—you should appoint to the aforesaid mainlands and islands worthy, God-fearing, learned, skilled, and expeienced men, in order to instruct the aforesaid inhabitants and residents in the Catholic faith and train them in good morals. Furthermore, under penalty of excommunication "late sententie" to be incurred "ipso facto," should anyone thus contravene, we strictly forbid all persons of whatsoever rank, even imperial and royal, or of whatsoever estate, degree, order, or condition, to dare without your special permit or that of your aforesaid heirs and successors, to go for the purpose of trade or any other reason to the islands or mainlands, found and to be found, discovered and to be discovered, towards the west and south, by drawing and establishing a line from the Arctic pole to the Antarctic pole, no matter whether the mainlands and islands, found and to be found, lie in the direction of India or toward any other quarter whatsoever, the said line to be distant one hundred leagues towards the west and south, as is aforesaid, from any of the islands commonly known as the Azores and Cape Verde; apostolic constitutions and ordinances and other decrees whatsoever to the contrary notwithstanding. We trust in Him from whom empires and governments and all good things proceed, that, should you, with the Lord’s guidance, pursue this holy and praiseworthy undertaking, in a short while your hardships and endeavors will attain the most felicitious result, to the happiness and glory of all Christendom.
QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION
Read the introduction and the document transcript in order to answer these questions.
By what authority did Pope Alexander VI claim the power to give Spain nearly exclusive possession of the New World?
Why do you think Spain wanted exclusive rights to the New World?
Along with the right to possess the land, the Papal Bull also indicated that Spain had specific responsibilities. List and explain these duties.
Why was it impossible for Spain, or indeed any other European nation, to realize the extent of the territory Spain controlled after May 1493?
A printer-friendly version is available here.
Holy shit!(facepalm) I literally gave you a very condensed version of exactly this as it applied to the Christian Crusades. Spain was called Al-Andalus for a reason before the date at the top of this decree. Nothing like brainwashed agenda driven narrative to omit pertinent parts of history. Your ilk always shit the bed with the crybaby BS of the Christian Crusades blessed by the pope to drive out the poor poor muslims and kick their asses back to where they came from. WTF do you think the muslims were doing there IN SPAIN? Painting pictures and gardening? Why do you think the Pope whipped out the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch and blessed this decree? I explained it above.
The "Inter Caetera" was the first official document by Western ruling elite to promote and promulgate "Disaster Capitalism."
I think I see Madjack's point. So-called diversity ISN'T diversity of ideas/thinking reasonably. It's the opposite, fractionating people into superficial tribal categories, i.e. white=oppressors, blacks=victims, questioning trans ideology's enforced demands=transphobia, etc. And so it goes.
I think you could argue there's two completely different word senses of 'tribalism' now. One is political tribalism (diversity being ONLY ONE of the many totem poles of a particular tribe, say, "protect the borders" would a the right-wing totem pole) and the other is actual tribal behaviors in real human contexts (like, tribes in Africa, etc.).
You make a good point about indigenous American tribes though.
I believe "antonym" is the word you're searching for, rather than "synonym."
Would that have worked out better for them? Both Persia and China were centralized empires and they didn’t fare any better against the guns and cannons of industrialized Europe. The Chinese empire had some outdated respect for the land due to their old Shamanistic beliefs and didn’t want to mine coal for industrialization. Same thing happened to the native Americans. Only when China had arms production on par with the Western countries did they start winning wars.
I always thought they should have hired themselves a good New York law firm.
Thanks for a chuckle -- reminded me of some of the, um... pragmatists in Chayefsky's "Network"!
And who did 'The Natives' take the land from? Other natives...
American Pioneers in the 19th century who actually lived life without servants respected American Indians and their ways, our 'beloved' government decided to remove them much like their efforts on the middle class these days.
"And who did 'The Natives' take the land from? Other natives"
That's not what happened.
The continent was literally unoccupied when the ancestors of Native Americans came to the continent from Asia over the Bering Land Bridge during the last Ice Age, around 12,000 to 30,000 years ago. Did they then compete for territory, here and there, sure. But nothing like happened when the colonisers came.
You're agreeing that they arrived across an 18,000 year time span. So either they were the slowest walkers in history, or there were multiple waves of people coming across.
We are not sure of the exact date hence the wide range.
It's all a matter of history. Feel free to read up. No need to speculate. Thanks.
Oh I have read up on it. Have you?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-18770963
That's a bad rewrite of history.
Well, not familiar with who was here first. I guess you didn't watch those cowboy and Indian movies I watched on TV where the message was this is our land not your's even though you were here first. You cannot excuse what we did to the indigenous people of the America's. Sorry, nor the permission given by the church, which was not restricted to the Americas. Trail of tears, lets see you justify that.
Conquest has been a human condition since the first caveman stepped outside his cave, looked across a valley seen another clan and said I want their stuff. Asian descendants that built grass rafts set out from their mainland and went island hopping would occasionally bump into others that did the same and wanted each others stuff. Humans did it as a matter of survival and advancement for living conditions. Not excusing what we did to each other as humans but as another commenter pointed out(Danimal28) the Indians weren't exactly living together in peace and harmony either. Some tribes had their own versions of conquest, genocide, slavery, robbing each others food stores, warring over hunting grounds, kidnapping females to breed. I'm not impugning Native Americans just pointing out an uncomfortable truth of human nature that even Indians were prone too.
You seem to be very focused on the church/ christianity. If that what floats your boat, fine, but don't let it skew the truth of history.
Trail of Tears? Justify what? Allowing the Indians that were paid to relocate force their 800 black slaves (some of the Cherokee/Creek elites among them owned) to have to go with them or the misfortune that befell the actual members of the tribe on the way?
I don't want to continue this conversation about how bad the Indians were, and let me just say that your understanding of the Trial of Tears is really off. I am not focused on the church, and it's a thing of the past. Why don't you focus on our Muslim wars, and the millions we displaced and killed then you can focus on using Ukrainian lives so we can keep the number one slot in the world. More timely.
What 'we' did to the native peoples was one of the greatest crimes against humanity in history.
There are no excuses.
Good thing you're good lookin.'
I hate acolytes of violence who claim 'violence, conquest, genocide' are part of 'the human condition'. Yes, humanity has a violent history, but if you actually look closely you can also see that different tribes and ethnicities have co-existed peacefully adjacent to each other in many cases for very, very long periods of time, and there were many more peaceful cultures that would never have had it in their conception to launch genocidal wars of settler colonial conquest. By saying conquest is part of the 'human condition', you are both lying and making yourself an apologist for the grossest acts of inhumanity that have been committed by our species, usually acts spurred on and driven by a small minority of sociopathic leaders. Inhabitants of the United States, which has committed some of the grossest violence imaginable during its history, might be especially vulnerable or even dependent on this idea that conquest is 'natural' or inevitable, because it ameliorates and lifts any potential stain or responsibility or duty to correct or change our path. Just keep turning the crank on the violence.
Acolyte of violence? F U. Can you guys actually f'ing read? I know I suck at English Comp but FFS. Good job Captain Obvious at pointing out SOME tribes of people were capable of living next to each other in peace......of course this usually always came after violent conflict. All part of being a lefty idiot right? Can't tell the fucking difference between accepting the fact that every civilization/society on the planet at one time or another has done atrocious shit. I'm not apologizing for any violence you dumb fck, I believe it should be avoided at all costs until you are forced into it as a matter of self-preservation. Of course you lefty idiots always come back around to America bad as if it's the only place inhabited by the only people that have of course owned slaves or done f'd up shit to people.
The only acts of violence right now being committed in this country, spurned on and driven by a small minority of sociopathic leaders is within the left and the Transhumanist movement. The only crank being turned on violence is within the blue city cesspools that turn felons loose on the law abiding innocent public and politicians on the left that cheer on antifa, Janes Revenge and BLM. I guarantee the violence lays firmly in your camp, not mine.
I watched them; I will never excuse what we did to indigenous people, but that is the way of the world - and governments(not the People) are responsible for all of it. Just like when they locked you down through the use of force a mere three years ago.
Didn't mean to say they were, it's not just us, look at how Europe used Africa as it's backyard. We used South America as ours. However people, do look the other way or too easily go along with their government's policies. Look at how Americans went along with our Middle Eastern wars, and I bet if those were Christian or Jewish countries I don't think they could have pushed those wars.
Governments ARE the people, pal. Uncomfortable to contemplate, but there you have it...
I think I have a far better handle on this. Government is force, nothing more. It is supposed to protect our rights and negotiate in good faith and that hasn't happened since prior to 1860 for the most part. Government signed treaties with the Native's, reneged, and then used force to conquer them. Not that the Native's were always honest and forthright.... There have been many periods of peace, of course. Today is not a period of peace as the government is using force again to silence and censor Americans.
Well here is yet another example of what the government has done to natives
https://elizabethnickson.substack.com/p/the-left-immiserates-the-north-american
Not true Jerry, absolutely not true.
It depended on the tribe. The Comanche were horrifying. They ran a robbery, kidnapping, murder protection racket on horseback, and they maintained their power with a fearsome level of intimidation, including torture. https://scgwynne.com/product/empire-of-the-summer-moon
The Iroquois vs. the Huron, terrifying. Ghastly. https://historyweblog.com/2017/06/tortures-of-the-algonquin-prisoners/
When Hernando de Soto arrived in the Southeast US, he found captive slavery and torture were as widespread among the tribes of southeastern North America, including the dominant civilization- the Coosa- as it was among the Spaniard conquistadors. The author does not whitewash the atrocities of the conquistadors, either. They were unimaginably cruel in those days. https://www.amazon.com/Hernando-Soto-Savage-Quest-Americas/dp/0806129778
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captives_in_American_Indian_Wars
Nobody's clean. It's a sobering thing to realize.
So John Wayne was right to shoot them down like pop bottles?
Good to know.
Not to excuse the taking of most Native American lands by Euro settlers, but yes indeed the same thing was happening broadly between Native American communities. The West, at the time of European agression, was largely inhabited by Native nations that brutally pried lands from Native predecessors. And slavery was commonplace and widespread. The Southwest was largely inhabited by Athabascan and southcentral (Comance) peoples that slaughtered their way to their final homelands at the time of Euro conquest. Plains tribes had been eradicated by midwestt newcomers like the Lakota, who suppressed and eliminated their predecessors in Canada, the Dakotas, the middle west. It simply is history, and the final victors were simply the last in line of imperialist aggressors.
As long as our leader doesn’t wear goofy hats or Captain Crunch uniforms at official events it can’t happen here!
never confuse the country and the government. 2 very different things.
Well we’re a democracy. Just kidding.
The United States is neither a democracy nor is it a democratic republic, but an oligarchy featuring unlimited political bribery for those who can afford pricey lawyers.
Preach.
Notice that the establishment's phrase is "our democracy," not "a" or "the." Tells you all you need to know.
duh- mocker- see!
I’m agreeing more and more with Andrew Willow’s take on democracy.
Educate me, please. The Google wasn't helpful.
Whenever you read "our democracy," understand that it refers to democracy for them and not you.
I've switched to Yandex for any "controversial" or "dissenting" searches.
https://twitter.com/orangeferreter
P.S. I think he might have misspelled the name. It's possible he was talking about a right-wing talk radio personality named John WilKow. Seems to be a common mistake after doing some light research on the matter.
For fun sometime do a "controversial" search in Google and then run the same on Duck Duck or Brave just to name a couple.
Things that I used to find easily on Google are now hard to impossible.
Sergey Brin has a long public history of collaborating with intelligence agencies going back to at least 2001 when he volunteered to help find the perps.
ChatGPT is totally rigged too. It's so obvious.
For example, try this one on for size. See Comments Section.
https://open.substack.com/pub/read/p/the-active-voice-robert-reich?r=p3vha&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
I had a lot of respect for Reich from his doc on income inequality until someone pointed out that he was the Sec Labor under Clinton during the NAFTA negotiations. That man is a quisling in that he bears a signifcant responsibility for the hollowing out of the USA's industrial base.
The situation described in Hillbilly Elegy rests (in a large part) on his shoulders. Both Reich and Arnand Ammawhazizname are such posers. Empty suits crying out empty platitudes, thinking their 'La Resistance'. Ugh
And the plethora of removed comments? WTF?
NOW I understand why SS contribs are moving to Locals.
If I could electronically zap everybody who quotes Robert Reich, I could say that I lived a life of true happiness.
I like Robert Reich's ideas, some of the time. He's really wrong on Internet free speech, though.
He was a small socialist bent thinker posing as an intellectual
Standing up to bullies is the hallmark of a civilized society. - Robert Reich
Censors are bullies. heh
I thought J. D. Vance's point in Hillbilly Elegy is that the crucial responsibility for the situation he described was on the people who lived there and just refused to change the self-destructive component of their life ways. Including his homefolks.
And Robert Reich did not negotiate NAFTA as Secretary of Labor under Clinton. The agreement was negotiated in the Bush I administration, and signed by President George H. W. Bush as an international agreement. The only thing that Bush ally (on the down-low, of course, although it's become much more obvious over the years) Bill Clinton did was to forcefully endorse its ratification by the Congress, the final authority on certifying treaties, and sign it into law after Congress had passed it.
Clinton was able to successfully articulate to his fellow democratic faithful, in coded speech and phony backwoods bluster refined by Yale Law, what the republicans had discovered a few decades previous. Money got you elected, and even more money kept you in office.
Anyone with a real interest in what's really going on in politics in the year 2023 needs to read the 1996 book Partners In Power, by Roger Morris. Especially the chapters entitled "Washington I/II/III"- and the one entitled "Mena" too, of course. And after that, the chapters in between. And to really go for the extreme sport trophy, read the entire book. https://www.abebooks.com/9780805028041/Partners-Power-Clintons-America-Morris-0805028048/plp
But the three chapters entitled "Washington" alone will tell any perceptive reader more about the way National Politics is currently practiced inside the Beltway than ten years of reading Twitter.
Read free on Archive.org https://archive.org/details/partnersinpowerc0000morr_c3r1
Reich is a partisan propagandist who supports everything they do. He is even trying to sell 'biden' as a functioning entity who is doing things. Unbelievable. I will be banned here for truth speaking. It's inevitable.
Reich is loyal to Team Blue, despite having most of his personal suggestions ignored and disrespected in the Clinton years. He was only appointed Labor Secretary as window dressing. No one who counted paid attention to his recommendations.
That's what the fake narrative framing of Team Blue and Team Red encourages. Ironclad team loyalty and partisanship. There's no third position, in the absence of ranked choice voting. Team Blue is terrified that they would be doomed if ranked choice voting got out of hand. And orthodox CNN/MSNBC American liberals are okay with that, because they buy into the neoliberal narrative that continues to insinuate that a 3rd Position could only be Fascist. The GOP establishment doesn't want ranked choice voting, either, because their leaders suspect that Team Red would be doomed.
Hence, America's got BOTH kindsa politics...
In other words, both parties are well aware that their grasp of the electorate is tenuous at best, and evanescent in reality.
If the voting system weren't rigged to limit "viable candidates" to the two established parties, at this point they're both about ready to fold up like cardboard suitcases in a typhoon.
Ranked choice voting would be a bit of a battle royal, at first. And I'd anticipate that one of the major party candidates would still win- at first. But the victorious candidate, his handlers, and his campaign would have to have actually listened to the points of the outlier candidates and parties. Politics, being the art of the possible, is about triangulation. Ranked choice voting provides another, crucial dimension to it.
Right now, the only triangulation either established party candidate requires is to beheld as slightly less bad, by slightly more voters. And after that, they can do whatever- grandstanding, punting, kicking cans down the road, private agendas getting into petty power plays with the private agenda of the other side....
"Getting the money out of politics" alone is not going to make any difference to improving politics under the current voting system. Because it isn't ever going to happen, unless we get a ranked choice voting system where outlier candidates can make their case for it, as political rivals. And ultimately, a ranked-choice result is always a majoritarian system. There would never be a party administration that didn't have at least some conditional assent by the majority of voters. Compare that to what we have now- cornered into the sham appearance of unconditional assent for one of two choices...and look at how that's worked out for us.
I think that even a two option ranking system would be an infinite improvement over what we have now.
Much censorship is coming to substack where Reich, (spits) is held out as a big catch and some kind of soothsayer.
Next up? "Obama is coming! Wow! So happy!"
If Substack wanted to shoot its value proposition in the ass, introducing mass censorship so as not to offend the delicate sensitivities of The People Who Matter is the way to do it, right there.
“Goebbels was in favor of free speech for views he liked. So was Stalin. If you’re really in favor of free speech, then you’re in favor of freedom of speech for precisely the views you despise. Otherwise, you’re not in favor of free speech.”
― Noam Chomsky
I agree. Liberals though, are not like us.
Consider Robert Reich's presence a test. Principally a test for him, not for those of us who have adopted it as a base for preserving freedom of speech and reasoned dissent.
If I want to read another of Bobby reich’s articles on how it’s horrible that we don’t do exactly what he says, I have about five dozen outlets that will deliver the exact same low rent lefty punditry. Maybe if he ever had an original thought he wouldn’t be so offensive. It it’s the same formula all the time “how dare we let billionaires live when people are dying every day!?”
Has he ever criticised the ultragarchs? Where?
He might have, I cannot even read him anymore. Like you said, his message never changes anyway. He's like one of those billboards in They Live. "Obey" "Consume"
LOL wow. Every other comment removed and/or user banned. Wonder what they said. Guess we'll never know because we're not allowed to read, much less engage with "wrongthink." 1984 all the way.
Somebody probably pointed out what a useless douchebag Robert Reich is - and a bunch of people took exception to that statement of fact.
Yeah. Thing about Reich is he talks a good game (or used to), but where the rubber meets the road he's a major fucking hypocrite.
When Reich went all in on the trans-rights stuff I realized that he was full of shit from the very beginning, total establishment tool, much like what Bernie turned out to be.
The whole trans thing is yet another entirely manufactured controversy to get people arguing about something that is not genuinely important.
The last time I said this someone called me an "out of touch old man". Just as she had been programmed to.
It is important to those afflicted, to the the future of humanity and the world? Not at all. That would be war, over-population, the wealth transfer, the collapsing environment...
Reich and Obama both excel at presenting a pretty, civilised face, even as the bombs fall and the babies explode and burn.
But hey, "be civil!" "Stifle"
Substack as 'safe space'. No that doesn't work for me.
Reich is a charlatan of the first order. A government shill distorting young minds with lies.
He's an insult to little people everywhere.
I had to look it up.
Reich is diagnosed with multiple epiphyseal dysplasia, also known as Fairbanks disease, and stands at 4 feet 10.5 inches (1.486 m)
I had no idea as we are not supposed to discuss these matters.
O to have copped a look at the comments section before Substack stepped in!
Must have been an epic response to a puff piece so gushing that it made a high school mash note look like a model of restraint and measured praise.
Hamish says he wants "civility".
And on that cold black rock in the roiling sea, freedom of speech founders and dies.
I saw some of the early comments. They were unanimously anti-Reich. Hilariously so.
And that should be absolutely fine. But it's not.
When does the great purge of malcontents here begin I wonder?
Looks like the founders here would be thrilled out of their minds to have supper with Clinton and Obama.
When Glenn moved to Locals, I thought that was a mistake.
I was wrong.
Would love to have supper with Obamas and Clintons, if I could get a word in edgewise....... on second thought.......
They seemed no more harsh than some seen here, but .......
The comments (including mine) were mostly innocuous. Example: he claimed there was book banning, my comment was "can you named the banned books"? It was deleted. In fact "Heather" turned off commenting on the whole post, the only time I've ever seen it on Substack.
And even if they are harsh?
I see people here loving on the proxy war on Russia. I find that outrageous, dangerous and vile. Why can I not say so?
To protect Lord Reich's "beautiful mind"? Because "civility"? Maybe they promised him a safe space? Poor thing.
"Why should we hear about body bags, and deaths... I mean, it's not relevant. So why should I waste my beautiful mind on something like that?" - Barbara Bush
a lawyer who tells you he's an economist. What could he possibly get wrong? Other than everything
Yep. The two phoniest careers around are lawyer and economist. Most people still don't know that the Nobel Prize in Economics needs scare quotes around "Nobel" to be accurate.
Wow! I've never seen so many comments removed in a comment section!
Go visit CBC in Canada sometime!
I read that. I threw up. Robert Reich should be in prison for treason.
So it begins.
And so it ends.
I had some hope. What a fool I am.
Makes me wonder.
Has there ever been an eloquent defense of censorship? I’m talking a truly beautiful piece of writing or speaking.
Eloquence in the defense of censorship could only be beautiful as satire.
Beautifully said.
A certain pithy partisan could write it. Now *that* would be beautiful.
All of the defenses of censorship I've seen are eloquent. Censors-in-waiting regard themselves as noble, and their messaging is rife with fawning self-elevation to heroism.
Censorship only “works”when there is only one game in town. In the US media ecosystem this is long gone, no matter how hard the Ds, neo-cons, Deep Staters, and corporate wokesters may try.
Remember kids, pithy comments with no actual point or content always rise to the top.
Except places like here, where (1) people think, and reward it in others; or (2) as in your case, they use structural and rhetorical tactics to game the system, while thinking they are convincing anyone.
Huh?
Where's the "thinking" in regurgitating a widely-circulated, century-old platitude? And given how much time Democrats spent calling Trump a fascist during his term, I would love to know which Americans OP thinks aren't aware that "it can happen here".
It's just feel-good pablum.
I'm pretty sure it's a large amount of Americans on both the left and the right who think authoritarianism could never happen here. To a large degree, it's believing their side won't be the one that does it.
Which is naive.
It's also the a-political and apathetic, grown fat, happy, and oblivious with Western Capitalist wealth, even the poor slobs.
I'm confused, are you saying they think it *can't* happen here, or they just think it won't be *their* side wot does it?
lol
You are right about the always regurgitating (I like that!) M. Finster, who I suspect really *is* a Russian Western-media-plant.
But M. Anti-Hip is right about the substacks.
Clearly you don't spend as much time here as I do. 90%+ of the comments are so bonkers they could support an insanity plea in court. Most of the top comments are 1. inane platitudes, 2. manic rants, or 3. brown-nosing the author.
Right-wing partisan sentiments and anti-establishment paranoia (and I mean paranoia, not just anti-establishment points of view) are consistently upvoted and defended. Anyone who criticizes right-wing partisan sentiments, or expresses other views, is mocked and derided, under the implicit premise that dissenting views don't belong here.
It's a cesspool, is what I'm saying.
This from a man who told me to "go eat a dick." If only the other commenters were as brilliant....
LOL, you are such a piece of shit. Why are you, and not back on White People Twitter on Reddit or some Maoist city sub like r/Austin.
Hey, I also heard there is an Eastern European Border War that some elites are trying to sell. Good place to go get blown up for a terrifyingly stupid military alliance that only benefits wealthy Europeans and the military industrial complex, all the while America rots. I know you "progressives" are all in on war now.
I respectfully disagree - but feel free to hold forth. I will defend and respect your right to do so. The pithy banter is fun, and a more subtle way to make a point, and god forbid self-reflect.
So ignore those 3 categories, M. Dwhy, and stop calling for self-censorship.
One of the great things about substack is posters are free of your type of censorship, and so come here to fulfill the need to 1) emote, 2) practice writing, 3) support the writers they like (and you don't get to choose for others, I'm sure you agree), 4) express anti-State sentiment that would get them censored elsewhere.
Why don't you go there?
Why do you hang out in a "cesspool," idiot.
You wouldn't know pithy if it kicked you in the ass.
How pithy.
Fully agree with your take. I get VERY tired of shopworn tropes like that above which seem to be designed to simply get likes. And why "kids"?! It is so gauche! No real contribution to the discourse, just social media-esque attempts for "likes" (love?). And unfortunately it works. I have noticed that a lot of Matt Taibbi's Substack commenters post things like "You go, Matt!" "We got your back!" "Give 'em hell, Matt!", etc. I for one would prefer more substantive comments. After all, aren't those rah-rah sentiments most efficiently captured by clicking the thumbs up icon? No need to type out a cliche!! Now watch how my post will be vilified by the same people who purport to hate similar vilification of dissenting voices in the mainstream media!!
What is the problem with complimenting a writer on their work - or in the case of Matt Taibbi - for their bravery in reporting on the shit-show that is our current government ? Let me be the first to apologize to you on behalf of everyone on this Substack who has wasted your precious time saying what they wanted to say - and not giving a shit if their comments offend the sensibilities of those who thought they were here to weigh in on a Ph.D. dissertation defense.
I normally sort by "New First", just thought I'd try something new today. Variety is the spice of life!
"Remember kids, pithy comments with no actual point or content always rise to the top."
Upvotes have never been a priority for me. In fact, I find downvotes more illuminating.
Diawhy! Keep posting like it's your job!
You rock dude!
Pot, Kettle, Black.
?
It's a shortened version of "the pot calling the kettle black", in other words, he is engaging in the same thing he is accusing others of.
Right, but how does it apply?
Satire sometimes necessarily takes the form of the thing it mocks. My goal is to shame the airheads who mindlessly smash the heart button whenever they see a shallow platitude that plucks at their willy.
You didn't satirize, you simply attempted mockery. To satirize you would have need to do a lot more work bringing in the people who click the like button and playing off of why it is so silly to support such an idea. But, in your quickness to riff of of an idea, that of simple platitudes that bring likes or "plucks at their willy", you do the exact same thing.
Someone on notes was just telling me that there is no "real" censorship on Subtack, because he grew up in communist Poland. Not sure what fallacy that is exactly but it it is fallacious.
Opinions are like assholes.
The mrówki tell me that the censorship is more pervasive than in Communist Poland, as more famously did Andrzej Łobczewski.
Thanks! I had to look up Łobczewski.
Sounds very interesting.
“if an individual in a position of political power is a psychopath, he or she can create an epidemic of psychopathology in people who are not, essentially, psychopathic.”
― Andrzej Łobczewski, Political Ponerology
That happened!
I'm writing about this as well, with the added bonus of how the paid-off press like the LA Times will literally submit their questions beforehand -- and the president has a little notecard telling him who to call on.
It really tells you everything you need to know about the state of the media these days. Play along and you get rewarded. Dare speak out, and you're unemployed. (Tucker will be fine, but how many reporters will duck their heads back down because they wouldn't be fine?)
Edit: Article is out https://simulationcommander.substack.com/p/tucker-unleashed
Really not a question of Tucker being fine, or not fine, but what it says is, we're not.
Greenwald on Rumble this past week really explained what was going on very well.
Right. My point was that they aren't really after Tucker, but every Tucker-lite out there who will be cowed into submission.
I didn't vote for trump in 2016, always a registered democrat, although not loyal. Bad enough I saw the democrat's growing authoritarian stance during the Trump years, but the media and so called left fell into line, like little soldiers. Asses.
I'd say they were/are after both. Tucker was more than pulling his weight. I was certainly expecting his firing.
So was he, Maté and Dore posted a recent video of him predicting his own demise.
This.
And David Dayen was Tucker-lite. He wrote about the Great Financial Crime Spree and he now caved to the establishment. During the GFCS years, he uncovered many crimes the government/financial coup were doing. Now, he replaces an article favored to Tucker with one opposing Tucker? That shit is horrible! What a coward!
Greenwald's report on Monday was first rate. The best explanation of what could be happening.
GG is always on point, and has been on fire about this from the start.
It's too bad he's on locals now :(
I think it's worth it to see what he has to say.
Yeah it's just such an inefficient format. His articles were concise, but in his videos he repeats the same thing two or three times and the transcripts approach unreadability.
GG is not a good speaker. He needs to stick to writing.
System Update is free on Rumble.
I happily pay for GG's stuff, even though the "free transfer" won't let me comment on articles or read them from the webpage. At least I still get the emails.
Locals is fine, it's the information that's important, not the platform.
M. Fran, you water down M. sim's excellent point by picking out the *unimportant* part of a *parenthetical*.
Your comprehension is as bad as your choice of political party.
...."unimportant" part of a "parenthetical." Oh you sound so smart, now who is M. sim's and what is his excellent point? Four degrees with bad comprehension and 2 in science. What an accomplishment for someone with no comprehension. Now if you could take a minute out of your day and rephrase your nasty ass comment maybe I'll condescend to answer.
Nicely credentialed you are.
"...maybe I'll condescend to answer."
You just did, and thanks!
Adios Mr. Stables, and I hope that's forever. You're attitude deserves nothing more.
Don't let the barn door.....[SLAM]
Dang. Well, at least I got the last word in.
I sincerely apologize for offending you, M. Fran, and I confess to a certain amount of over-protection for one of my favorite 'stackers, not that he needs it.
The Times denied giving Biden the questions. Does that mean the White House gave the questions to the Times? He clearly had the questions so it has to be one or the other...oh wait, one of the three letter agencies tapping in perhaps?
There's a very easy explanation for all this.
The Times lied. As they do about pretty much everything.
I saw that! The questions are obviously present, and if the Times didn't give them to the White House in advance, the only other possibility is that the White House gave THE TIMES the question in advance..........which is even worse.
For plausible deniability, it may have gone like this: White House tells certain reporters what specific aspects of certain specific topics the president would be addressing in questions today. Those reporters then submit the questions.
Just like the tabletop exercise on the "Russian Disinfo" that was rehearsed the month before the Post released the story on Hunter's laptop, these agencies (WH, intelligence) will always attempt to keep some veneer of deniability, which then their lapdogs in the MSM will highlight to say that assertions of their collusion/collaboration are not proven (and thus are lies).
Exactly how it is done.
🛎
Biden got tripped up by a couple of children today because that's the first time he's faced questions that weren't pre-planted in ages. Literal toddlers tripped him up more than the WH press corp has. If that doesn't tell you all you need to know about our current media, I don't know what will.
The question was pretty hard (what was the last place you visited or something like that). He was in Ireland a week ago, but he was stumped. Another child stepped in to help him out. This is where we are today.
Please give a reference?
https://nypost.com/2023/04/27/biden-cant-recall-visit-to-ireland-he-took-two-weeks-ago/
We used to speak of “regulatory capture”. Our whole country is captured. These are the times that try mens souls.
yep. its one giant global cartel. there isnt anything that hasn't been monopolized. we live in a world of illusion that appears to have choice, but not too many of any real consequence.
Tucker is rare in that he has his own genuine talent and following meaning he doesn’t need a Fox or CNN brand to survive. Like a Megyn Kelly, he will be able to find a very prosperous new path. But that’s him, not most media people. And so his firing had a real sweeping effect to send a message to the rest.
Actually, this manipulation of the press in briefings started with Regan. If a reporter asked him an uncomfortable question, he didn't get a seat at the next press conference. And now no one asks the President or whatshername anything they don't want to answer or they're brushed off or attacked for even approaching a subject.
I don't remember where I saw it (it might have been right here, honestly) but somebody mentioned how the press complains that without being inside the velvet rope, they can't do their jobs -- but they don't realize they were never supposed to be inside the rope in the first place.
I'm just disgusted that the media/journalists don't do their jobs any more. Perhaps they never did, but there were just enough rogue journalists to actually dig in and find the truth so we were lulled into thinking we had a watchdog press of sorts. Now the ones in the mainstream are just lackeys for their controllers, and nothing original comes out of any of them. Do they know they have controllers? Do they bristle at being told what they can and cannot write about? It doesn't seem like it.
So you're just here to shill your own substack? Cool.
This place needs a better system for surfacing top comments.
LOL everybody can see you trolling, dude.
And I've been commenting on Taibbi articles long before I had a Substack.......
Ignore Dwhy, CDR. He's still sour about the time he got absolutely bodied in my comments section.
LOL
You mean the time I pointed out that you published a wildly inaccurate statistic in huge banner font in one of your articles, and in response you closed your comments to non-paid readers?
Talk about living in a dream world.
That's called the price of admission for trolls. Give me $5, you little spaz. Do you really want me to dig up the exchange and post it here so I can embarrass you again?
See what I mean? "Trolling", to dimwits like you, means "pointing out massive factual errors that undermine the whole point you're trying to make".
Do your worst.
It's amazing to me how "trolling" and "saying things I don't like" seem to be interchangeable concepts to dimwits like you.
Tucker didn't get fired for speaking out, he got fired for 1. telling lies that cost his company $$$, and 2. allowing his staffing to be run in a discriminatory, abusive way. Rupert Murdoch is not exactly a bastion of woke leftism... when that dude wants his top earner gone, you know the guy REALLY fucked up.
LOL the good thing about trolls is that you know exactly what they're going to say. I love how the woman suing Tucker for a hostile work environment never even met him.
Tucker was actually the guy who went on TV and said Powell was full of BS. The media made fun of FOX for losing viewers to NewsMax. You can still read the articles today.
But now since it's politically convenient to rewrite history, that's what you do.
Fox is going to lose far more $$$ in the wake of firing Tucker than it did in the Dominion settlement. His positions on Ukraine and vaccines are what sealed his fate. The powers that be insisted he be muzzled before the next election cycle fully kicked in. There will be no major mainstream media platform for RFK, Jr’s presidential bid now.
You don’t have a clue what you’re talking about. In fact, Tucker was not a top earner because all of the left wing boycotts of his show scared off major advertisers over the last few years. Try again.
Fox News doesn't rely on advertising to make money. Try again.
Fox doesn't rely on advertisement money. Fox is one of the lefts boogeymen they have been trying to take down for years. The battle cry has always been boycott their advertisers and hit them where it hurts. Now its not advertising? Seriously WTF? Do you just pull these lies out of your ass at random?
It has been reported that he was being paid approx. 20 million a year. He had the largest audience in cable news.
That’s meaningless if large advertisers won’t spend money on your show, and they wouldn’t.
Sources?
I'm guessing you don't consume much news. lol
LOL, indeed!
He's actually complimenting you. By accusing you of trolling, he's implying that you're smart enough to know better, but are deliberately posting bullshit. The alternative is that you are being genuine and actually believe what you write.
Have to disagree on point 1. Carlson was not a large part of the 20 examples Dominion cited in the actual coverage. I think it was one for him. In fact, Carlson made it very clear, on the air, that he asked Sidney Powell to come on his show and show the evidence that the election was stolen. She declined, and he pointed this out. It was almost heresy to do this on Fox News at the time.
That's fair.
Tucker certainly did bend over backward to feed the narrative about voter fraud and election-rigging. He did trash Sidney Powell, and good on him for that, but the fact remains that he was cited in the Dominion lawsuit, and contributed to Fox having to pay out almost a billion dollars.
Nobody *really* knows why he was fired, except the people who made that decision. But I find it highly unlikely that his "principled" (lol) stand against wokeism and the Ukraine war were his mortal sins.
Yeah and then they paid off a complicit part of a stolen election, a pretty large part, by offering them a billion dollars. You're a funny girl, dwhy
Stupid as always I see.
What lies are you talking about? Name the most recent ones that got him fired...
Abby Grossmans lawyers confirmed that she has never met Tucker Carlson as he does his shows from a separate location in a different state. Maybe Tucker went to the Matt Lauer, Chris Cuomo, Don Lemon school of charm and how to promote a hostile work environment.
Rupert Murdoch and his sons are avowed leftists. Murdoch only tolerated Ailes because he made them money in a niche market. Shock; leftists like money too. Who knew!
Rupert Murdoch a leftist? I worked for him briefly. He's as much a leftist as I am the King of Neptune. Murdoch is a right-winger who loves money and does whatever he deems necessary to make it.
He may not be an avowed leftist but his kids certainly are. Either way, no logical reason to get rid of Tucker and he did the lefts bidding.
"Rupert Murdoch and his sons are avowed leftists."
LOL
Seriously, that one almost literally made me laugh out loud.
And yet, no rebuttal, unless you consider early grade school stylee as the best you can do. Why are you here, ma'am?
Substack so desperately needs a silence function. This has always been true. But they did get rid of the #1 troll, so I thank them daily for that.
I suppose the irony of suggesting a "silence function" in the comment section of an article about the perils of preemptive restriction of speech is lost on you.
If by "silence function" you're recommending an "ignore" capability, you should realize that all you're doing is giving an edge to the people whose comments you refuse to read, who are still able to reply to anything you post for the wider audience to read. It's sort of like putting a paper bag over your head and imagining that you're invisible.
If I find another comment writer's post(s) to be worthless, I know how to use a scroll mouse. I don't feel any requirement to block everything they say forevermore.
You clearly missed the Gene Frenkel phase...
You know you can just... not... read it... right?
Dwhy is obviously some kind of agent provocateur, and most likely paid to be here.
You waste space and air.
You’re just full of smart ass comments aren’t you? Talk about adding nothing to the discussion
NOTHING wrong with pointing us to other writers who can expand the conversation..
Is that your way of prompting me to write a "smart ass comment"?
I know. I keep seeing yours.
In top comments? I find that hard to believe.
Even more, it needs better system for submerging worthless ones like ...
An ignore flag would be perfect. And no, It's not censorship if each individual reader has to make the decision for themselves that a certain common terrorism not worth listening to.
Well said, Commander.
Regarding AOC: if the establishment is good at nothing else, it is very good at determining who can be co-opted, who can be bought off, who is to be neutralized, whom to safely ignore.
How quickly she was co-opted, and now is just another culture warrior, and establishment sycophant. Man, that was quick. SMH. Wealthy elites love easy "turns" like this one.
I doubt she was ever who she claimed to be. That Netflix "documentary" was all scripted. Most likely she is a plant. At least that is what I believe now. A newcomer doesn't win against an establishment unless they want you to.
As a former constituent who followed her from before her first election, I have wondered what her "community organizer" tenure actually consisted of, for nearly a decade out of college. Did she go to the same school as Obama? Was it in Langley VA?
After Obama and AOC, "community organizer" may as well be a code-word for "deep-state shill"
I wonder if the CIA conducts "community organizer" classes? HAHAHAHA
I'm convinced that's exactly what they do. Look, if they were infiltrating left-wing news organizations fifty plus years ago -- that is, back when they were considered by leftists to be all but Satanic ...
AOC is not an inner city kid. she grew up in solidly middle class Westchester suburb, Yorktown.
Not that I am too interested in defending AOC at this point, but I don't see this as a strike against her, at least not without being supplied much finer-grained detail: Have you had working-class origins, but then been plopped into an upper-middle-class environment, especially as a child?
My point is that she allowed the impression that she was inner city bred when, in fact, she spent most of her upbringinging in Yorktown, NY. It's like Biden's disingenuousness in floating a hardworking family background. LOL
She organized her bar patrons, b/c, like, everyone will listen to a hot bartender even one spouting lefty claptrap.
Remember how people pointed out that she responded to a casting call, but all the 'fact checkers' said that was fake because the organization that put on the event does these types of things all the time looking for new talent.........
That's a casting call.
Oh, I must have missed that. But, yes, I think she is a plant to bring around the youth vote.
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/aoc-actress-playing-lawmaker/
Mr. Reagan repeatedly used words such as “role,” “audition,” “casting call” and labeled Ocasio-Cortez “essentially an actress” in this video in an apparent attempt to paint the congresswoman with the same conspiratorial brush used to promote “crisis actor” and “paid protester” conspiracy theories. Ironically, the only actor in this scenario is Chris Kohls, who plays the character of Mr. Reagan.
The “Brains Behind AOC” video correctly states that Ocasio-Cortez was recruited by the Justice Democrats to run for office. However, this fact is presented in the video as if it were an unprecedented act of political malfeasance. In reality, it is quite common for Political Action Committees (PACs) to recruit candidates for office. The Justice Democrats made no attempt to hide this effort and openly discuss their recruitment process on their website and in videos published to their public YouTube page:
I think it goes deeper than the Justice Democrats. They most likely wanted Crowley out and replace him with someone who could garner them the youth vote. I wonder now what Crowley did. We should look into that.
Look up her handlers. That's all you need to know.
Y'know, I never considered that. But...I remember seeing her do a livestream before the primaries, and...its hard to put my finger on it...but...there seemed to be a sort-of un-natural buzz in the room, from the commenters, etc...the whole thing seemed just a little too good to be true....And the fact that I was even alerted to that stream in the first place speaks volumes, since I typically don't even follow local political primaries in states/districts far away from me. That it was put in front of me at all to begin with is a little bit suss.
she never was. she’s an actor who responded to an ad, looking for someone to play the part she played well, at first. throwing her own words back at her...”and so, when you elect a politician, and then they let you down, it feels like rejection. it feels like heartbreak. it feels like betrayal.”
LOL remember when she was complaining about not being able to find an apartment?
And then the issue went away when she "miraculously" ended up with some sweet digs?
I wish I could link to an article I read in 2008 about Obama's nice digs on Lake Shore Drive overlooking Lake Michigan when he was sent to Chicago as a community organizer. After a hard day of speaking about asbestos in black neighborhoods, he would retire to a nice apartment. Maybe it was Paul Street's book or on Black Agenda Report or Adolph Reed, JR. Of course, the church ladies were doing most of the organizing and baking.
She was a socialist. Of course she was going to take the money and screw the little guy. Name a socialist country that doesn't, and if you say Denmark I will scream.
It’s really disappointing cause back in 2018 I has high hopes for her
Part of me wonders if AOC fell into the trap of being more concerned about selling a brand/image than pushing for actual change. Because once you are more concerned about brand or image, it's a lot easier to co-opt you and get you to toe the line.
Shant Mesrobian has pointed out that when AOC first came on the scene, she branded herself as an anti-establishment radical but quickly realized that doing so left her with no future in the Democratic party. So she pivoted to staking out the most radical edge of party advocacy, routinely advocating for the censorship and deplatforming of Party critics and enemies and hoping that the difference in these two radical postures would go unnoticed. It's been a remarkably successful strategy considering how it's provided her so much approval and popularity within the liberal-left base, allowing her to have a future in the Party while continuing to maintain a differentiated political brand premised upon a more youthful, activist, radical mode of politics.
Ironically, her 2018 campaign touted the need for elected officials to exercise "courage". And now she's a subservient little mouse, unable even to buck the remainder of "The Squad" rescinding their Ukraine plea for negotiations.
Nancy took her into the woodshed very early in her career, and AOC has been an obedient soldier ever since.
I saw a really good meme about what happens to people like her (idealistic, naive) after they get to Washington. They are beaten down and brainwashed, especially when it comes to the bloated "National Security Apparatus." She no longer even seems to have a soul anymore. It's all so staggeringly corrupt and anti-human in some ways. Totally out of hand.
Like the real-world version of "Mr. Smith Goes To Washington".
"A working class hero, is something to be." Unfortunately, most fail.
For sure AOC got "the talk".
AOC has no principles whatsoever.
She calls Pelosis, "Mama Bear"
My god.
Yet advocating for censorship is antithetical to a true liberal or progressive who fights for freedom; so AOC will criticize book banning but not deplatforming of conservatives. Politicians do this hypocritical game which is so obvious but that’s part of the job I suppose. She tries to be the moral one but politics and moral integrity just don’t mix
Does anyone remember so far back in time when AOC protested outside Pelosi's office?
Fancy dress for the ball (gala) is now the price for admission?
Seems she was an easy pushover.
Just took a soft fascist breeze.
All it takes is a little power and even those who pretended to thumb their nose at the boss are fast to jump in the passenger seat when it’s offered. It’s easy to turn into the Establishment.
Reminds me is the man who offered a woman a million dollars to sleep with him. When she assented he offered 100$. Offended she asked if he thought she was a whore. In reply he said” we’ve already determined that, now we are just negotiating price”
George Bernard Shaw
AOC who is nothing more than a pretty face and an empty bag of faux integrity. Cortez reminds me of Conrad's the brickmaker, whom Marlowe described as some, "papier-mâché Mephistopheles, and it seemed to me that if I tried I could poke my forefinger through him, and would find nothing inside but a little loose dirt, maybe."
Yes, just remember to wear a "tax the rich" gown at the Met. And forget all those things like.....oh.....protesting Mama Bear's office.
And the classic picture of her in that stupid dress and in background, the wait-staff masked while none of the celebrities are. The message was crystal clear -- "we are somebody and you are nobody and don't forget it."
My point is what the hell is a supposed "for the People" Representative doing attending a MET GALA, where tickets cost FIFTY THOUSAND DOLLARS???? And up against the ticket cost you have her stupid "tax the rich" outfit. She is beyond ludicrous.
She is, the truly terrifying thing though, is how many fall for it and lap it all up.
AOC spends lots of time on her ‘packaging’, her look....
She is also not exactly an "inner-city kid" - she spent most of her childhood in an affluent small town in Westchester.
Unset, I was very surprised that Matt did not know that.
I can't even blame the establishment for her. She is really just a shallow individual who won a primary campaign (what was the vote turnout for her to win). So now the generous government world of Democratic rule is her oyster. She really is just an internet influencer, whatever that is. "Evita," the Broadway musical, meets Tanya (Patty Hearst) meets Social Media. Pretty sure Her AOCeminence is unschooled in those first two references.
"She is really is just an internet influencer, whatever that is."
Not a bad summary.
If they can’t “co-opt” you you are in read danger. See Trump, Donald.
Seems to me most politicians, that is the vast majority, can be bought off in time. I also think there should be more accountability for those so called lefties, even those speaking out now in light of Tucker's firing. They too, should be held accountable since they showed no objectivity during Trump's time in office. They were in almost total complicity with the democrats, the mainstream media in that regard and they are equally culpable in making this country more authoritarian. They were literally feeding into what many of them are complaining about now.
Given how precarious jobs are these days, I would think it doesn’t take much to co-opt someone.
Substitute Ruling classes for establishment and BINGO!
We'll argue semantics later.
After Tuckers firing, she went on to brag “de-platforming works”.
And then she calls others fascists.
God, I miss old school liberals who were all about freedom.
As bad as what AOC had to say is, I'm not giving her any credit for what happened to Tucker.
On the other hand, it wouldn't surprise me if it was the GOP establishment types who wanted him gone, because how dare Tucker question what the hell we are doing in Ukraine when he could talk about, for example, abortion.
Yeah, I can't help but think Paul Ryan had something to do with this...
Yup - it’s about Ukraine & the 💰💰💰of the military industrial complex
I'm still amazed he got away with it this long. He was on mainstream television spouting anti-war rhetoric that would have given McGovern a hard-on. He slammed the military industrial complex again and again and again. It was beautiful. Especially when we started sending our TANKS to Ukraine. And he meant it, too.
I'm a bit mixed about my assessment of Tucker, but Jesus did he ever get the war stuff right.
This heterodox thinking is exactly why I watched him regularly. Then, I turn off FOX.
Totally agree. More likely Cocaine Mitch vs AOC
AOC, lying piece of shit that she is, is all in on a full scale war with Ukraine now. She's such a tool.
Glenn greenwald pretty much said that : in nutshell he dissented from mainstream republicans
Yeah the real power in the republicant party is by doing the lefts dirty work, and maintaining status quo and their fucking miserable little jobs. I have been a conservative since the debacle that was Vietnam, and renounced my membership in the gop in about 1977.
Saw a clip of R. Weingarten testifying before Congress yesterday. Is that an American flag crossed with a Ukrainian flag pin she was wearing? Hilarious.
She's beyond stooge.
yeah, Paul Ryan and his ilk happy to give him to boot. They will follow I up with 4 hour segments on Bud Lite and Disney and hope that makes up for it with the audience.
There is an old saying: "scratch a liberal, reveal a fascist".
An older one is "Scratch a Liberal, find a Tory."
When you strip away the feel-good rhetoric, Liberals are only about Free Markets and the sanctity of private property rights.
Not even private property rights. WA State (bluer than blue) just passed SSB 5077 that will eviscerate property rights.
Yeah, that's not fascism. Go read a book.
"Ex-government employee interviewing current government employee about how the current government should crack down on 'wrongthink' while the ex-government employee nods along'" -- totally not fascism at all.
Trump saying "you are fake news" -- THAT is fascism!
Trump sending his mob of thugs to overrun the capitol is a lot closer to fascistic than anything Dems have done. But you'll note that I never called Trump a fascist.
What you're describing simply isn't fascism. That said, I would love it if you and all your right-wing turd buddies would keep saying that, since it makes clear to the rest of the population what mush-brained lemmings you people are.
Dude you're still in your 2021 talking points. We know the Metro PD was in the crowd. We know the feds were in the crowd. Nobody was surprised by anything, it was a set-up from the start, and that's why the video remains locked away.
https://www.scribd.com/document/631445713/MPD-Report
Notice they have a complete schedule of events and coordinated attire so they can spot one another at a glance.
It was a very well run set up to stop the objections to certification. The left is great at stealing elections and working in concert with our dangerously broken Security state.
Yep. Over and over I point out how this stopped all the presentation of election fuckery and moved the whole process to a secret location.
Sure is "lucky" for some people, isn't it?
"We know the Metro PD was in the crowd. We know the feds were in the crowd."
Well, yes, *you* know that. See my "mush-brained lemmings" comment above.
I literally posted the link to the operational document of the event.
This is how we know you're trolling.
Well it was Mussolini who invented the system and the word --and who basically said it is what he says it is!
It’s symbol was a group of sticks bundled together and wrapped tightly as one. One stick is easily breakable. The bundle is impossible to break. The theory is everyone working together --going in the same direction, by force if necessary, makes the state strong. Dissent and difference of opinion make it weak.
So actually, the government working with business to wipe out unpopular speech is indeed textbook fascism.
"Everything in the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State."
That is Mussolini's take on fascism. Corporations and the government working together just ain't that.
"It’s symbol was a group of sticks bundled together and wrapped tightly as one. One stick is easily breakable. The bundle is impossible to break. The theory is everyone working together --going in the same direction, by force if necessary, makes the state strong. Dissent and difference of opinion make it weak."
I'm glad to see that you've actually done some research into fascism. But you neglect the totalizing aspect of it... "cracking down" isn't by definition fascism, or else every nation with a police force and laws is fascist.
Dude, I KNOW you learned this in your 20th century history course at Antioch, but c'mon. The fakewokeleft of the current moment is as close as this country has come to fascism probably, ever. Fascism emerged from dialectical materialism as it is and was very embedded in the "progressive" movement of the 1920s and 30s.
Also, CISA called again. Sigh. Your Mom needs you to tend the basement cat, didn't I tell you that!
Corporations and government working together --to censor / de-platform citizens and journalists with unapproved thoughts (as Matt so gloriously exposed in Twitter Files). So again --it may not be 1930s Italy but it’s not consistent with our 1st Amendment.
What an incredibly stupid remark. Wow.
"Dwhy" also goes by "Feldspar" and is a complete dumbass.
I'll take it that means you have no rebuttal. Thanks for sharing!
Nothing is ever "fascism" and nothing is ever "socialism" when you can constantly move the goal posts/change definitions to suit a narrative. Fascism? Well that's me(by the lefts definition and labeling), Mussolini and Hitler and Socialism is something in Amsterdam.
"Everything in the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State."
That is the quintessential definition of fascism, as stated by ol' Benito himself. It's a totalitarian worldview... it's not just about *some* control, it's about absolute, *unescapable* control.
If you can escape fascism by just turning off the TV, that's not fascism.
Right! Now maybe you can explain employing intellectual gymnastics and pretzel logic just how the hell you guys label people like me a fascist when I share no philosophical beliefs with your kissing cousin Benito and his buddy to the north you guys tie yourselves up in knots trying to hang around the rights neck. LMAO! You know when I'm not out in my white hood burning crosses, lynching, oppressing women with my girthy patriarchy and chasing atheists around with my Bible quoting scripture! LMAO! Such d-heads with your BS, f'ing old and beat.
Fascism is when you turn on the TV and the political philosophical opposition of a news network that has been this political oppositions object of removing from a market place entirely has someone removed for no logical, reasonable, rational explanation.
None of you freedom loving leftists have been calling for that right? That's the difference between me and you. I am all for the left having a platform and spewing their BS. I don't want them removed I want them all to be seen for what they are as an example of what not to be. Problem is you run from debate or lie your asses off as a tactic because by any means necessary and the ends justify the means. Yell liar or fascist or racist or copy n paste articles you do not read or comprehend yourselves as some sort of argument or refutation.
Excellent!
Yep. You should look up Wikipedia's "fascism" entry on the Wayback Machine.
When you do, you’ll discover that what we have is textbook. Government and “private” orgs collude to control the rabble.
The left cognitive dissonance to their own fascism is amazing to behold. There are no mirrors in their parallel universe.
Yeah, that's not fascism.
beep boop
The best part about making baseless accusations on the anonymous internet is that you never have to feel like a shithead when it turns out you're wrong.
I'm not sure they ever really were about freedom. Matt says liberals "didn't want to ban things" but cites The American President, the climax of which has the president, glorying in his own power, promising to go door to door confiscating people's guns. Hard to be pro-freedom and anti-ban when you want to ban and seize lots of things and effectively delete 10% of the Bill of Rights. They're up to at least 20% now but they were never at 0.
I miss the old-school liberals who understood the definition of irony.
I’m still here. But I still have dial up....so.
Another great piece. My whole life (in my 50s) I've never liked the puritanical pearl clutching of the religious GOP but I also caught the scent very early for the totalitarian leanings of Democrats.
Political correctness was a start of it, the race baiting of Sharpton's Tawana Brawley era in NYC, Jessie Jackson and on and on. Manipulating people for ever increasing power and intrusion into day to day lives by the ever growing government. The obsession with disarming the public...it all spelled tyranny for years. Here we are now, my worst nightmares realized.
Look at the fanatical obsession with the smoking ban, another left mob driven cult expression. The issue was distorted in the extreme so the mob could join in othering a target that they knew was not going to be defended. The pattern repeated and escalated. Everything is always sold as the "greater good" when it means mob rule under a violent and oppressive government that will stop at nothing if you resist.
It's always been clear that conformity and compliance were something fundamental in the "liberal" orthodoxy. I've never known a Democrat in my life that had any respect for individual freedom and liberty.
The disgraceful false racism agenda is probably their most shameful exploit, causing utterly needless division using baseless fear driven nonsense. The censorship is a close second and equally disturbing, however without total information control they cannot ensure the falsehoods will propagate. With an open dialogue, their entire platform, their entire premise, baseless, will disintegrate instantly.
The fact that all of their motions are clearly mapped in Mao's Red Book, and all the Frankfurt School and other historical writings and that people can't even see it is probably the most distressing. They have so decimated education that people are woefully ignorant participants in something they don't even understand.
Keep going.
Excellent comment! An old friend of mine said years ago that the government outlawing smoking with ever encroaching laws was the first step in control of more aspects in private life. At the time I thought she was overreacting but now see the wisdom and foresight in her observation.
From what I can see, the government picks the issues to amplify (Trump indicted for paying off a prostitute), or gives minimal lip service to others (invasion at the border, fentanyl crisis) and in the case of Carlson, punishes those who bring up topics left ignored by them.
It's a slow walk to train people to accept the control.
I've always agreed it resembles Maoism. Nothing about it resembles the Old Left that I once knew, and loved, the Orwellian variety.
On many fronts, I'm a Classic Liberal, but I've never once felt those ideals represented by Democrats. The idea that the government of my lifetime would ever effectively create and deliver on major programs like universal healthcare is just ludicrous. I'm not opposed in concept to a nation as wealthy as ours providing social services like healthcare or subsidized education, it's our _actual_ government that leaves me where I would never support it.
You last sentence hits the nail on the head. Our healthcare system, in and of itself, is fine. The payment bureaucracy and associated politics is the nightmare.
I'm close to health services via my family and many relatives and friends. The current system is badly eroding due to incompetent regulation and the market consolidation in care providers. Add in DEI viral infection in accreditation bodies and physicians are running, retiring early and leaving the industry.
It is in a bad state and it will take time to be more visible to average people but right now it's crumbling and crumbling fast. In rural America it is almost impossible to find basic General Practitioners or OBGYNs, in more concentrated urban areas it is becoming impossible to get a simple appointment. I live rurally now and to get in to see a GP, you only find 30yr olds that have just ended residency accepting new patients and appointments are months out in booking and frequently canceled.
The heavy handed regulation, price fixing and other measures that were put in since the Obama administration have created an anti-competitive environment that was constructed to favor massive consolidation under just a few behemoth health provider networks. It's a bad scene.
This x 100. Here in a rural community in Illinois, we are losing our health care options. Whether GPs, eye doctors, dentists, . . . hell, veterinarians, the health care system for us used to be great. We knew our doctors, no problem getting an appointment, and so on. Now we have to go through Central Command to see if we need a prescription. Thanks, Obama.
Yes, and how did that Maoism work out for China?
Basically like woke authoritarianism is working out for America: turning it into a fucking dystopia
Smoking as an act of resistance has actually crossed my mind in more irrational moments
Mao's Red Book says "political power grows out of the barrel of a gun." How GOP can you get?
About which Biden said "they have their guns, and we have the F-15s". We're all waiting to see what form Schumer's "sensible F-15 regulation" will take.
The Iraq war was the political event that most shaped my childhood. I learned to take anything the government says with a healthy grain of salt, and never trust those who would seek to censor or silence opposition viewpoints. Last year I took a First Amendment class in law school. Probably fifty or so students in the class. I figured there would be at least one other principled civil-libertarian in the class. I mean, after all, we read all the major free speech cases: Pentagon Papers, Times v Sullivan, the Flag-burning and draft-card-burning cases, obscenity doctrine, Skokie march, Wesborough Baptist Church, etc. Somebody had to come around to the obvious position that censorship does not work and it is foolish to trust the government with the power to decide which opinions are on and off limits. I’m 30 now, so I’m was a few years older than most of the other students. Nevertheless, it was pretty depressing to be literally the only student who fit into the old-school ACLU mold. I got the sense that myself and my professor were probably the only two people in the room who had even heard of Ira Glasser. I believe there are very few millennials, let alone gen Z, who value freedom of thought. They believe corporations and the government have a responsibility to protect us from wrong-think and, the most laughable phrase in vogue today, “harmful speech”. It’s bleak, man. I don’t see how this leads to anything besides ever-increasing polarization. I don’t see how this ends well.
Unfortunately many value freedom of speech as long as it’s theirs or one they agree with. Wait till the speech police come after them. Their values change from general to specific and are at odds.
When the speech police censor viewpoints they don't like, it's "holding people accountable". When they censor viewpoints they agree with, it's fascism. I have argued vehemently in effort to convince young people that the transgressive ideas they support (ie boycott divestment and sanctions, radical ideas about police and prisons, etc) may one day become to target of cancelation. The response is usually along the lines of, "Well then we will deal with the fascists when that happens".
Isn't it weird?
I'm old enough to remember when police would go out into the streets and bash gay people. My parents are old enough to remember when police unleashed dogs on peaceful black protestors during the civil rights movement.
Now they think they'll be on the right side of "democracy" forever?
I don’t think you were attracted to liberalism per se then, you were attracted to the libertarian aspects of pre-2000s liberalism. Modern liberals are authoritarians, because there is nothing about either liberalism or conservatism that mandates whether they be authoritarian or libertarian, it varies by era. But don’t make the mistake of associating liberalism with tolerance or free speech -- those may be liberal values in some eras, but they are always libertarian values. Because “liberal” and “conservative” change their meaning over time, no one should establish a permanent identification as one or the other. In particular, you have to see if “your side” is using authoritarian means to achieve their goals -- if they are, they are probably the bad guys.
Always best to minimize labels and discuss individual topics
Absolutely! Sick of the labels and the isms...let’s go issue by issue.
Libertarians are basically Classical Liberals. They're one and the same.
Basically, but modern liberals have substituted something different for “liberalism” than classical liberals or even liberals of the ‘60s and ‘70s understood as liberalism. It is another example of the nominative fallacy, mistaking the label for the thing, without realizing that the underlying thing identified by the label has changed.
Not true. Libertarians are the right-wing sect of Classical Liberals.
The whole right, middle, left paradigm is a crock. You're either for ordered liberty or for some form of tyranny.
I love all of the malleable labels, definitions, stereotypes and caricatures people can come up with on the left. I seriously don't know how the hell you can keep up with it all.
Plato had it right. You can have Oligarchy, Tyranny, or Democracy. I assure you though that there also is indeed a Left and a Right. The basic tenets of Leftism: the common good is more important than individual property rights. Natural resources should be used for public benefit, not private gain. All people should be provided with medical care and housing. Monopolies should be nationalized, turned over to the workers, or broken up. Banking should be a public utility, not a privately managed interest-taking sector. All peoples of the world share a common humanity, war is just the elites sending the working class to die so the elites get richer and get more sphere of influence control. Workers of the world unite. THAT is Leftism, which is very very distinct from centrism or being on the Right.
I agree with your definition here but at best left/right are place holder/identifier words for the sake of discussion. Many beliefs claimed to be of the "right" by leftists that I do not harbor or have never encountered here on the "right" side of the isle.
It's dumb luck that someone hasn't been within arms reach of me to call me a fascist, nazi or racist with all that's been going on in society especially the last few years.
The basic tenet of Leftism is fairness. (And of Rightism, freedom.) The rest is details, but of course there the devil lies...
The basic tenet of Rightism is tradition married to power, not freedom. Not by a loooong shot.
Indeed, "Freedom" is quite the tricky thing. Freedom to own property and accumulate wealth? Social, cultural and intellectual freedom? Freedom to consume? I think the most powerful conception of freedom is: "Feedom is participation in Power." But I shall spare additional digressions! :)
The left/right paradign describes centers of power. You can be philosophically opposed to one side or the other, but still support them for some reason or another.
Libertarians and Conservatives just happen to overlap in a majority of views and policy positions, and tend to vote almost exclusively Republican. Go figure.
"Because 'liberal' and 'conservative' change their meaning over time, no one should establish a permanent identification as one or the other."
Yes, agreed. Just as with "Democrat" and Republican" (in the US).
But "Left" and "Right" have essentially fixed meanings, and for that reason, I think it would be beneficial to beef up our understanding and use of them.
I don’t think so -- “left” and “right” are relative to the then-current status quo, so modern leftists for example are focused on race over class, in contrast to the leftists of the ‘30s and 40s. What is “progressive” in one era becomes conservative in the next, like how rock ‘n roll was once seen as edgy and progressive but is now considered staid and reactionary. Or, to put it another way, Woodrow Wilson and AOC are both progressives relative to the society of their time, but would hate each other and don’t have much in common viewpoint- or policy-wise. “Libertarianism” and “authoritarianism” however are not relative to the the current status quo, as libertarians in every era prioritize small government, free speech, due process and other civil rights etc. and authoritarians do the opposite.
Modern progressives love nominative fallacies, where people get attached to the label of a thing without realizing that the thing it identifies has changed. This is why many “old lefties” continue to support “progressivism” even though modern progressivism is antithetical to many of the things they believed in -- anti war, pro free speech, deeply suspicious of government, etc. In my view, no one should identify as permanently “progressive” or “conservative” under the assumption that those things are immutable, because they aren’t. The liberals of the ‘60s were largely libertarian progressives, modern liberals are authoritarian progressives, and it is important to keep that distinctions in mind rathe than simply reflexively identify as “progressive” or “conservative”, as those descriptors by themselves don’t capture all the relevant dimensions. As Orwell said, the real division is not between conservatives and revolutionaries, but between libertarians and authoritarians.
As a historical record, I agree with that. Thank you. I also see that "Authoritarian" and "Libertarian" are persistent impulses, what ever they are called, in contrast to shifting labels and label-to-label-associations.
But what is a great need today regarding political language? Allowing important words to constantly change meaning at the whim of thought leaders is just one type of potential poison to society. It is well-recognized that the pace of change is certainly driving us crazy today, turning us into a tower of Babel. But there's no reason to assume it is even necessary...
"'left' and 'right' are relative to the then-current status quo"
That's a fair conclusion from their origins in the French Revolution. But curiously, that era also produced what persists today in the French national motto -- Liberté, égalité, fraternité -- where the first two terms neatly reflect persistent fundamental Rightist and Leftist values over the centuries since: Freedom and Equality. So it's important that they persisted here *combined* in a national statement, even as they are assumed to be opposed in Western political ideologies.
I'd tweak the second to what I think is a more widely palatable concept, Fairness, and then you've got two essential, complementary components of societal needs: (individual) freedom and (social) fairness. The third component is one that has been disparaged in recent years, and now with woke politics supposed to be completely dispensed with: Brotherhood, or sense of community, where societies are permitted to define and support themselves in contrast to other societies. It presupposes no necessary hostility, despite what globalists promote.
I think the libertarian/authoritarian distinction frequently gets subsumed into or conflated with “progressivism” or “conservatism” because the progressive or conservative movement in any snapshot of time may seek to achieve their ends through libertarian or authoritarian means, and people living in that time assume that “progressivism” or “conservatism” always support those means. But in a broader historical perspective this is not true. Governments on both the left and the right can be either authoritarian or libertarian, and extreme political movements on both sides tend to converge on the authoritarian end (e.g., Stalin and Hitler both united at the authoritarian end though one is on the left and one on the right). I think it is important to disentangle the two axes to make sure you are not reflexively identifying with a tribe because it is nominally “progressive” or “conservative” if they are using authoritarian means (assuming you disapprove of authoritarian means) to achieve their progressive or conservative goals.
There is also the conundrum that some people, maybe a majority, sincerely like to be told what to do (authoritarianism, though they don't call it that), and likely will not, and cannot, ever be cajoled into becoming full-fledged citizens (i.e. those who, from our POV, do sufficient homework and thinking to justify their votes) -- especially in an unprecedentedly complex world with unprecedented aggregate power (via technologies). I'm confident in fact that's exactly how our quasi-democracy descended to its current state.
Don't misunderstand me -- I'm certainly NOT advocating rights removal, I am attempting to face uncomfortably realities. "Don't shoot the messenger." By raising consciousness about reality, only then can we find ways, including democratic ways, deal with it.
Yeah, when deluged with too much data, people fall back on heuristics like in-group identification and pattern matching to come to conclusions. That’s why a lot of modern propaganda just keeps repeating the same message over and over, once you put a pattern in people’s brains, they tend to revert to it when indecisive. Basically it’s the political version of what what web companies do with “dark patterns” to motivate desired user behavior,
' "Left" and "Right" have essentially fixed meanings,'
Tell that to the media.
... who work for perpetual shapeshifters barreling toward their their own secret goals. "Change is [always] good!" "Change is inevitable! [even when humans make the change]"
Coco I appreciate this reflection.
I just texted a couple friends yesterday when I saw that AOC interview and said "I am ashamed I once thought AOC was our political future." Seriously, the Democrats are going to force me to vote Trump in the next election. We've really sunk so far.
The lady doth protest too much, methinks
What has happened to the anti-war left, and the left in general, is mind blowing to me every single day. The two things that basically attracted me to the political "left" as it were; basically in a nutshell three things in the 1980s: it was still the place where the anti-war movement had traction, especially as it pertained to our actions in Central America and other places. It was definitely, 100% for free speech and free expression (I was a punk rock fan and especially found the Minutemen and other totally anti-war and anti-establishment bands transcendent). Finally, it opposed apartheid in South Africa and we longed for racial harmony in America, AKA the Martin Luther King Jr. variety.
These are all gone from the left now. The last professional conference I attended there was a "BIPOC Affinity Room" that white people were not allowed to enter, and the elites and liberal professional class scream at the residents of the most poverty stricken counties in America in Kentucky, which are mostly white, that they have "white privilege." The left is, in some ways, even more warmongering than the hated neocons of the 1990s and 2000s. But what really blows my mind is how much they want to literally censor everything.
I've never been more politically homeless in my life.
Smith - in the words of Noam Chomsky, the Democratic party is the only hope this country has to remain a democracy. The GOP are fascist.
So I can understand your concern that like 90% of Democratic leaders are corporate tools. They are. But 100% of GOP leaders are corporate tools as are most of their voters. Big difference.
If you want a home, fight for power in the Dem party. If not you are just naval gazing
Lifelong conservative here that unfortunately has had to vote R a few times in my life. 100% of Dems have been and always were corporate tools while railing against corporations as 99% of Republicans have always been corporate tools too. LMAO, fight for power in the Democrat Party? You guys already have the power. With the exception of a few red state legislatures you guys have the culture, institutions of higher learning, Hollywood, the media, FBI, DOJ and cancel culture is a whole owned subsidiary of you. As I commented elsewhere here and will pass along to S Smith. The whole right, middle, left paradigm is BS. You are either for ordered liberty or for some form of tyranny. There is no being kinda sorta for both. Taibbi has literally been documenting and reporting on this very thing. Maybe you should actually read his articles.
All the two political parties are is the Harlem Globetrotters vs the Washington Generals. Good cop, bad cop. Corporations need more regulatory power to stifle innovation and upstarts....vote(fund) Dem one cycle. Need corporate tax breaks vote(fund) Rep the next cycle. The GOP and Dems are fascist economically and use communist tactics in the streets(antifa/BLM).
Chomsky is a political idiot and should have stuck to his field of expertise, linguistics.
Jeff - No, the Democrats don't have all of the power. Hollywood has been screaming for things like Universal Health Care, Less Corporate Power, Higher Taxes for the rich for decades and law makers in the GOP and DEM party ignore them as well as the majority of voters that want these policies.
You say 99% of GOP have been corporate tools. The majority of GOP voters want to ban assault rifles. Can you name the 1% of GOP leaders that would vote the way GOP voters want on this issue. The majority of GOP voters want the government to fund health care. Can you name the 1% of GOP law makers that are willing to vote for government funded health care? 100% of GOP law makers vowed that they don't believe in climate change. Do 100% of GOP voters think it is fake?
Who are you kidding?
GOP law makers are 100% controlled by big business. They have ZERO % that are not controlled by big business.
As the former president of College Republicans in college it is very telling to hear that you have been a life long conservative. You need to wake up and smell the coffee... Yes most Dem law makers are terrible. But there is a huge difference between MOST and ALL.
Assault rifles have been illegal for civillian use for a very long time.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assault_rifle
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assault_weapon
"Assault weapon" is just a scare term used to motivate people who answer poll questions.
Dwhy - I should have used the word weapons not rifles. My bad.
Assult weapons are banned in only 7 states and polls show the majority of GOP voters want them banned.
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/08/07/poll-most-voters-support-assault-weapons-ban-1452586
Also:
"55 percent of GOP voters were COMFORTABLE with banning assault weapons" (emphasis mine)
There's a big difference between "comfortable with banning" and "want to ban".
I appreciate the correction, but "assault weapon" is still just a made-up category invented by politicians. There's no such category of weapons in reality. The people who answered "yes" on that poll are just showing their ignorance.
In practice, "assault weapon" tends to mean any semi-automatic weapon that can fire more than 10 bullets without reloading, but with a hundred thousand loopholes and asterisks, because banning semi-auto weapons that hold more than 10 rounds would most definitely *not* be popular on a poll.
The definition is so vague, the 1994 Federal Assault Weapons Ban bill resorted to arbitrarily banning specific models.
These types of weapon bans tend to focus on guns that are popular, like AR-15s and AK-47s, for example. But these guns are popular because they're reliable, accurate, and safe to operate. Banning them doesn't really make sense... it just forces responsible gun owners to use less safe, less reliable weapons, in the hope that that somehow reduces mass shootings.
Who am I kidding? I don't know what parallel universe you are living in or echo chamber you reside specifically but nothing, zero, nada of the shit you claim GOP voters want is true. I suppose you'd sight some obscure polls as proof. You're intellectually dishonest and do not debate in good faith. The GOP which is made up of the establishment has kept and preserved Obama Care after campaigning endlessly on repealing it. The GOP voters want to ban assault rifles(facepalm), I can't even entertain that obvious bogus claim. Yep, GOP lawmakers are controlled by big business as is the entirety of the Democrat Party. I mean how intellectually dishonest can you possibly get? Your side has been pimping the BS narrative as the party of the little guy, unions, the working man. Taibbi has done yeoman work in pointing this out to his own ideological brethren. He's now saying shit we've been pointing out for years. Big business/corporations and government work hand in hand while both parties point the fingers at each other.
I'm sure you were the president of College Republicans(eyeroll). Sounds about right as there isn't much difference between the Checked Pant Country Club Republicans and Limousine Liberals/Progressives.
My family was Goldwater conservatives even before he put out Conscience Of A Conservative(or Buckley's God and Man At Yale) of which I still have my Grandfathers hardcover first edition. My mother helped organize a fund raiser in Reno , Nv for Reagans 80' presidential run where I listened to the adults talk to Paul Laxalt and heard him explain how the Bushes were a huge problem/obstacle. Too bad Reagan feared he needed Bush to win. I'm sure you already knew that Laxalt was who Reagan wanted as VP and not that limp dick GOPestablishment Bush being a president of the College Republicans and all.
He’s a tool.
<< I'm sure you already knew that Laxalt was who Reagan wanted as VP and not that limp dick GOPestablishment Bush being a president of the College Republicans and all.>>
Reagan was the definition of limp a limp dick. Bush2 had the balls to stand up to corporations far more than Reagan. Reagan was their puppet. They told him to hop and he said "how high" Who are you kidding..
After Reagans tax cuts and wild spending exploded the deficit Bush had the balls to increase taxes and reign in Reagans wild spending.
Who are you kidding. Reagan was the ultimate limp dick.
<<Your side has been pimping the BS narrative as the party of the little guy, unions, the working man. >>
I 100% agree with you here. But i can point to many in the party that are fighting for the little guy. Bernie on health care, Sherrod Brown on unions, Warren on banks. And there are more. Yes, the Dems have totally screwed the little guy and unions. But some of them are still fighting for them.
Please name the GOP law makers that are fighting for the Unions or for the little guy to stop getting screwed by banks or by the health care industry. Pleas feel free to name those GOP because i don't know them
<<The GOP which is made up of the establishment has kept and preserved Obama Care after campaigning endlessly on repealing it>>
The GOP voted on Repeal and Replace of Obama Care. The House passed it and the President would have signed it if McCain had not stopped them.
So it would appear that you are the one living in an alternative universe.
Polls show the majority of GOP voters want Assault Weapons banned.
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/08/07/poll-most-voters-support-assault-weapons-ban-1452586
So yes, GOP are totally controlled by corporations. Name one GOP that is fighting to ban Assault weapons. Name him/ her
No way, man, I'm done with the Democrats forever.
The Tea Party is an example of organizing. The Justice Democrats are an example of organizing.
If you can't get your ideas adopted by either the Dem or GOP party you are just navel gazing. Parties change quite a bit over time. Southern Democrats in 2023 are very different than they were in 1973. Trump Republicans are very different than Bush Republicans.
If you want your ideas adopted you have to organize and get them pushed through an effective political organizing group.
The Tea party is now the Trump party. All they ever really stood for was bringing down the old school Bush GOP. And at that they have succeeded. And they did it pretty quick.
Ideas are just naval gazing if they are not aligned with political power.... LBJ did not sign the Civil Rights bill because he was a true believer in MLK. He did it because MLK organized and brought VOTES to the table. and that is what LBJ wanted more than civil rights for people of color.
Why do you imagine that me, an apostate in the party now, as I viciously opposed lockdowns and vaccine mandates, in addition to opposing the madness of sending billions to Ukraine, and a huge free speech advocate, would even be accepted in the D party now? For these views, over the last 3 years I have been called a fascist and worse. I have been threatened with violence toward myself and my family for opposing the ludicrous mask mandate here as well. I hate the Rethuglicans, but sorry, man, the Dems hate my views as well.
The Justice Democrats are an example of sheepherding
In the words of Burt Reynolds "Do the letters F O mean anything to you?"
Please mention some of those "leaders" in that 10% category?
Sanders, Warren, Porter, Khana, i can go on
Do you know how much money Big Pharma and Banks have spent funding the opposition of these Law Makers?
Tell me, what GOP law makers are GUN MAKERS or BIG oil spening big money to defeat?
You can't. I rest my case.
Just because you don't like their politics it does not mean big business has not targeted them.
My god she is simply awful. That is all.
Just gross.
The "tax the rich" gown wearer at the Met Gala. That was when I knew she had jumped the shark and could not see she was now just a meme.
It's very bad that there is uniform silencing of all those who vary from the Establishment narrative.
It's even worse that those granted the megaphone by our betters are so dull and stupid. When's the last time you watched a CNN or MSNBC and said "Wow, I never thought about that, I need to evaluate my underlying assumptions and thought process."
"When's the last time you watched a CNN or MSNBC..."
If you cut off your question right there, I could honestly say "on 9/11." Ditto with Fox News. And I highly doubt I will ever watch any of them (or any other TV news show) again.
Which reporter on 9/11 watched Bldg 7 go down and said "looks exactly like controlled demolition"? I can't find that even in the way back machine.
Ron Insana, CNBC.
Has he been Tucker'd yet? Or was that just a misstep and he corrected himself?
I found it on duckduck go.
Try the Brave browser.
Fun fact; DuckDuckGo is just a skin for Bing.
Oops!
All of them looked like controlled demolition
Yes, they did. But I specifically remember a reporter commenting on Bldg 7 looking like "controlled demolition." I've looked at the way back machine on the video coverage of 9/11 and can't find it.
It was a controlled demolition: https://youtu.be/7ZiMG84hws0
Was this commentary from the day of? I didn't see any date stamps.
Probably not remembering it correctly.
https://www.metabunk.org/threads/debunked-ae911t-cnbc-anchor-ron-insana-claims-building-7-a-controlled-implosion.10929/
Holy cow!!! I knew I was remembering things correctly. Dan Rather:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aeHUe3AdoQM
Given your screen name I understand why you do not watch network news. True TV news died after the final "One on the Town" aired.
My toxic relationship with Floyd Robertson also soured me towards the business.
Uniform silencing? What do you think is happening right here, on this Substack? Silence? Joe Rogan gets 100,000,000 views a month, while CNN and MSNBC both hover at or below 1,000,000. Your "dull and stupid" comment is spot on, but that's probably why *nobody watches those networks*.
Jesus christ.
I have never watched any TV news, ever. Except in airports. That makes 60 years worth.
In Nov 2017 I decided to boycott the New York Times, and shortly afterward extended that to all non-independent media. I trust only those who are reader-supported, like the newspapers used to be.
“Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth.” -Marcus Aurelius
Luckily, civilization has moved on since the Roman Empire.
If your definition of "fact" defines "facts" out of existence, you should probably get a better definition.
Exactly. Every human is mediated from reality.
We were dumbfounded that uoung people rolled over and just accepted being locked down and not being able to go to graduation, play sports, see live music, go to bars, etc. Our generation NEVER would have accepted that!! We were, in our late 50's, few of the rebellious folks that went to the grocery store, were out the first night of restaurants re-opening, and out anywhere that it was "allowed" during the lockdowns. But the narrative "you'll kill granny" worked on the youth! Why should we be surprised? Today's youth believe they only have 12 years left, thanks to AOC and others!
One of our few voices was Tucker. It appears even our only one conservative network rolled over. Thank God there are still courageous voices like yours, Matt.
Yes, but can you imagine how pissed off they're going to be when they finally wake up? I think that whole generation will become the greatest defenders of freedom in American since 1776. We just have to find a way to explain to them what's being taken from them. That should be something we can do. The dogs that end up as biters are the ones who grow up from the bottom of the pack.
"Yes, but can you imagine how pissed off they're going to be when they finally wake up?"
Chris Hedges was in Yugoslavia. Many people could not believe anything was going to change. That is, until they got put in vans and taken away to camps.
The real test of whether someone is truly anti-authoritarian and pro free-speech is whether they still believe either of those things when they are in charge.
"What we have instead is an increasingly pissed-off population that needs to look about eighty results down in every Google search to find its point of view represented. Who thinks that situation is going to hold? "
Who thinks that is going to hold? That's easy. Google, Facebook and their enablers in the administration think it is going to hold as long as they control access to opinions.
SE are almost useless now.
That's more due to search engine optimization than anything.
I'm increasingly becoming convinced that the internet is an overwhelming force for bad in the world... you almost couldn't conceive of a more effective tool for shifting power to the establishment and away from individuals.
USG "watch-out" lists aren't helping, though. As for the internet being a force for bad--I tend to agree, but I don't think those people who we all think control those platforms and data can really control them. They've evolved to function beyond their creators' purview. Those systems are all semi-autonomous and feedback-driven, so who knows what kind of shit will hit the fan in the future.