The inverted totalitarianism model seems ok. But, still, I can't figure out who's really in control. Corporations lobby for causes and buy politicians. We all see this. The control over government by Wall Street banks, Big Pharma and Defense contractors is obvious.
But, as Glenn Greenwald keeps pointing out, even huge cash making machine…
The inverted totalitarianism model seems ok. But, still, I can't figure out who's really in control. Corporations lobby for causes and buy politicians. We all see this. The control over government by Wall Street banks, Big Pharma and Defense contractors is obvious.
But, as Glenn Greenwald keeps pointing out, even huge cash making machines like Google and Facebook are pushed around by politicians demanding they suppress the speech of their users. And look what happened to Disney in Florida. That's not supposed to happen under a system of corporate control. And California shut Disneyland down for a couple of years straight during the pandemic (unlike Disneyworld, which somehow opened sooner.)
And, even more confusing, Democrats like Hillary Clinton are genuinely fearful/angry at Trump supporters for voting the wrong way. Clinton apparently thought she owned the presidency. But why should voters matter? They don't have control! And of course Trump continues to say his election was stolen -- because he thought HE owned the presidency. And the 3 letter agencies pushed Trump around seven ways to Sunday.
I mean, what the hell is going on? Is anyone really in control? The system is an unholy feedback loop with a big list of forces pushing in different directions. Is it predictable? Is it stable?
I M H O , the whole system is a giant cluster f--k. I don't think there's some invisible hand running the whole thing but there's a lot of hands trying to. Frankly, I find what China has been able to accomplish in a couple of generations since the sociopath Mao died is remarkable for such a large country. Perhaps it's as simple as Deng said..."I don't care if the cat is black or white as long as it catches mice"! Corruption was getting out of hand in China and Xi seems to be determined to bring it back to reasonable levels. China also has control over the financial sector which is our biggest failure in the west; you can't have private banksters creating the money supply because they will use the power to control the whole of society which they do currently. I see a multi generational shift of power from the west led by the USA to the East led by China; hopefully the world survives the shift. Michael Hudson who knows the current masters of our rentier classes and he sees them as fanatics who are willing to blow up the world rather than cede power. The effectiveness of the current propaganda and it's omnipresence proves B F Skinner was right.. scary really.
Yeah, one thing about China (and Russia for that matter) that blows my mind, is the fact that their government can actually push their billionaires around -- and even put them in jail. Amazing!
And the fact that Western political leaders think that seizing the yachts of Russian oligarchs will pressure the Russian government to exit Ukraine is also revealing. Our leaders think Russia's super rich can tell the Russian government what to do because, after all, that's how it mostly works here. (Ha, but I guess this contradicts my earlier theory that no one is in control here in the US. I don't really understand this giant cluster f--k.)
Vladimir Putin managed to take ten's of millions of Russians out of the poverty the Western shock therapy put them with millions of excess deaths and and a male lifespan like the poorest countries in Africa. He also took the supreme power back to the state from the oligarchy although leaving with their ill gotten loot. He had to throw the richest oligarch in jail to get their attention and the banksters still have too much power. No doubt he laughs every time the west weakens his oligarchy. I believe that we're in a 30 years or more change over from the Western financial capitalism rentier system to an Eastern industrial capitalism socialism pragmatism model. I just hope we survive. Our financial parasitic rentier extractive oligarchy is not gonna give up easily.
The inverted totalitarianism model seems ok. But, still, I can't figure out who's really in control. Corporations lobby for causes and buy politicians. We all see this. The control over government by Wall Street banks, Big Pharma and Defense contractors is obvious.
But, as Glenn Greenwald keeps pointing out, even huge cash making machines like Google and Facebook are pushed around by politicians demanding they suppress the speech of their users. And look what happened to Disney in Florida. That's not supposed to happen under a system of corporate control. And California shut Disneyland down for a couple of years straight during the pandemic (unlike Disneyworld, which somehow opened sooner.)
And, even more confusing, Democrats like Hillary Clinton are genuinely fearful/angry at Trump supporters for voting the wrong way. Clinton apparently thought she owned the presidency. But why should voters matter? They don't have control! And of course Trump continues to say his election was stolen -- because he thought HE owned the presidency. And the 3 letter agencies pushed Trump around seven ways to Sunday.
I mean, what the hell is going on? Is anyone really in control? The system is an unholy feedback loop with a big list of forces pushing in different directions. Is it predictable? Is it stable?
I M H O , the whole system is a giant cluster f--k. I don't think there's some invisible hand running the whole thing but there's a lot of hands trying to. Frankly, I find what China has been able to accomplish in a couple of generations since the sociopath Mao died is remarkable for such a large country. Perhaps it's as simple as Deng said..."I don't care if the cat is black or white as long as it catches mice"! Corruption was getting out of hand in China and Xi seems to be determined to bring it back to reasonable levels. China also has control over the financial sector which is our biggest failure in the west; you can't have private banksters creating the money supply because they will use the power to control the whole of society which they do currently. I see a multi generational shift of power from the west led by the USA to the East led by China; hopefully the world survives the shift. Michael Hudson who knows the current masters of our rentier classes and he sees them as fanatics who are willing to blow up the world rather than cede power. The effectiveness of the current propaganda and it's omnipresence proves B F Skinner was right.. scary really.
Yeah, one thing about China (and Russia for that matter) that blows my mind, is the fact that their government can actually push their billionaires around -- and even put them in jail. Amazing!
And the fact that Western political leaders think that seizing the yachts of Russian oligarchs will pressure the Russian government to exit Ukraine is also revealing. Our leaders think Russia's super rich can tell the Russian government what to do because, after all, that's how it mostly works here. (Ha, but I guess this contradicts my earlier theory that no one is in control here in the US. I don't really understand this giant cluster f--k.)
Vladimir Putin managed to take ten's of millions of Russians out of the poverty the Western shock therapy put them with millions of excess deaths and and a male lifespan like the poorest countries in Africa. He also took the supreme power back to the state from the oligarchy although leaving with their ill gotten loot. He had to throw the richest oligarch in jail to get their attention and the banksters still have too much power. No doubt he laughs every time the west weakens his oligarchy. I believe that we're in a 30 years or more change over from the Western financial capitalism rentier system to an Eastern industrial capitalism socialism pragmatism model. I just hope we survive. Our financial parasitic rentier extractive oligarchy is not gonna give up easily.