Author: Keith Preston Obama: “As a college student, I was a shallow loser.”
In many ways, Obama personifies the values of woke capitalism in the sense of espousing a duplicitous cultural leftism on the surface level while fully embracing the values of the corporate class and serving as a functionary for imperialism.
The appropriate advice would be “Get a life!”
By Elizabeth Bernstein, Wall Street Journal
Want to throttle someone you know over politics?
You’re not alone.
Two weeks from an election that has fueled more bitter divisions than America has seen in decades, it feels harder than ever to interact with people who have vastly different views. And as much as we might want to avoid these folks, it’s not always possible—or desirable—especially if they are friends or family.
By Troy Southgate
It is foolish to assume that various forms of political correctness are part of a Marxist plot. In reality, the systematic reinterpretation of controversial issues such as race and gender is a means of re-socialisation. A new model of civic organisation is required to meet the ever-changing nature of technology and the increasingly migrational workforce that is required to maintain it. Apart from the additional fact that such intense environmental adaptation is rendering its citizens both physically and mentally unhealthy, this is all part of the endless maximisation of wealth and resources. Without changing the dynamics of social relations, therefore, capitalism would be unable to profit at our expense.
This is some pretty good commentary FWIW but Van Jones was still the dude that was crying tears of joy when his team won the Super Bowl…err…election…so he’s still playing with a handicap.
By Matthew Adams
While the study of anarchism has undergone a renaissance in recent years, historical scholarship has been a relatively minor aspect of this renewed focus. Presenting an historiographical examination of the main forms of writing on anarchist ideas, this article argues that the predominance of ‘canonistic’ approaches to anarchism is in part a consequence of the disciplinary dominance of political theory in the study of anarchism.
One of the worst things about mainstream “conservatives” is that they give criticism of “big government” or “statism” a bad name. The US energy sector functions on the standard state-capitalist crony-capitalist corporate-welfarist model. Proponents of the “Green New Deal” merely want to shift its focus away from fossil fuels to “alternative” energy. Proponents of “Medicare for All” merely want to shift the model of state-capitalist healthcare away from monopoly insurance companies and professional guilds toward the public sector bureaucracy and healthcare delivery cartels, with the costs being passed on to taxpayers generally rather than employers or individual insurance premium payers. Proponents of “free college” merely want to continue the corporate-educationist corporate-welfare model, only shifting the costs onto taxpayers generally rather than individual tuition and/or student loan debt payers. Proponents of the UBI just want to distribute welfare payments directly to recipients rather than through government bureaucracies like food stamps, TANF, or section 8 vouchers. The idea that Bernie, AOC, etc. are any more “statist” than the ordinary defense contractor-loving Republican is ridiculous.
Krystal and Saager totally lose me with their affirmation of Richard Wolff’s praise for China’s response to COVID-19. China is a test market for the kinds of state repression global and US national elites want to bring to the West. Unfortunately, if you scratch a right-wing populist like Saager, you often find a national socialist underneath. And if you scratch a social democrat like Krystal, you often find a Marxist underneath. They make for great journalists, but crummy ideologues.
Krystal Ball and Saagar Enjeti look back at their favorite interviews from the week including Host of the Kyle Kulinski Show, Kyle Kulinksi on how progressives can push Joe Biden further left on policy. The speak with Economics Professor, Richard Wolff, on America’s approach to handling Covid and Host of the Bad Faith Podcast, Briahana Joy Gray discusses how climate activists can combat the Biden administration’s appointment of Cedric Richmond.
The largest free trade area in the world came into existence over the weekend — and the U.S. was not even invited.
Why it matters: For the first time in living memory, the hegemon at the center of a major global free trade agreement is not the U.S.
The big picture: President-elect Joe Biden is expected to seek a broad multilateral alliance to pressure China on everything from trade to human rights once he becomes president. But China is making broad multilateral alliances of its own.
I consider the most serious issue that currently faces humanity to be the ongoing concentration of power on an unprecedented level: political, economic, military, technological, cultural, medical, scientific, communicational, and legal, with the environment being the wild card in all of this. Anyone with libertarian values of any kind should be opposed to concentrated power of the kind that is capable of forming a singular world system.
We largely have such a system already through transnational governmental organizations, international financial institutions, multinational corporations, NGOs, NATO and the US military empire, and the international legal infrastructure that upholds these. A mere reversion to multi-polarity is not sufficient because Eastern powers like Russia, China, and India are merely provinces in the global system.
A shift to a less American-centric global order in favor as a UN-like world government under the auspices of “multi-partnership” or “multiculturalism” is no improvement either. Instead, we need a multi-order world order consisting of largely disconnected systems.
Paul Ratner,Big Think
Does history have a goal? Is it possible that all the human societies that existed are ultimately a prelude to establishing a system where one entity will govern everything the world over? The Oxford University philosopher Nick Bostrom proposes the “singleton hypothesis,” maintaining that intelligent life on Earth will at some point organize itself into a so-called “singleton” – one organization that will take the form of either a world government, a super-intelligent machine (an AI) or, regrettably, a dictatorship that would control all affairs.
By Lucien van der Walt
Examining the theory and practice of ‘mass’ anarchism and syndicalism, this paper argues against Daryl Glaser’s views that workers’ council democracy fails basic democratic benchmarks and that, envisaged as a simple instrument of a revolution imagined in utopian ‘year zero’ terms, it will probably collapse or end in ‘Stalinist’ authoritarianism—Glaser also argues instead for parliaments, supplemented by participatory experiments.
By Ruth Kinna
This paper explores the ways in which radical utopian themes have been taken up in contemporary anarchist thought and, in particular, the relationship between utopianism and prefiguration. Prefiguration has become a definitional concept in anarchist political thinking, though the meaning of the term is not always clear and it is used to describe a range of positions and ideas. It has a special significance for protest movements, recently the Occupy movement. By probing the meanings that attach to the term and reflecting on the nature of the utopianism that prefiguration describes, the paper considers how utopia limits and extends the possibilities of protest in contemporary radical politics.
So much for the Democrats’ “socialism.”
Founder of The Daily Poster, David Sirota, weighs in on Joe Biden’s potential pick to run the Office of Budget and Management.
Only a Republican could somehow manage to make Alexandria look like a genius in comparison.
Krystal Ball and Saagar Enjeti weigh in on the Twitter spat between AOC and Nikki Haley over paying Americans to stay home. They also discuss spending trends that reveal people are spending more at grocery/discount stores and spending less on restaurants/entertainment.
America’s crisis of political segregation – we increasingly don’t live alongside, associate with or even marry people who think differently from us – is increasingly leading conservatives to congregate together on social media outlets designed specifically for people who think like them.
The recent rise of Parler – as well as other social media alternatives that appeal primarily to conservatives and that got their start largely by attracting the far right – raises the specter of further political polarization through digital means. Parler and others, like MeWe and Gab, are gaining momentum with a promise not to censor their users for behavior that might violate the policies of their rivals.
Eventually, social media companies may end up like television networks where different tech companies simply pander to different audiences.
We will have Parler, MeWe, and Gab for conservatives and Facebook, Twiter, and Google for liberals, just we have CNN and MSNBC for liberals and FOX and CBN for conservatives.
Tucker Carlson exposes American corporations for teaming up to censor political opponents.
FOX is throwing Trump under the bus now that he’s no longer useful. A split between FOX and the Trumpists would be great.
A four-way ruling class splintering between Trumpists, neocons, neoliberals,and progressives is exactly what we need, hopefully with more splintering coming after that.
Plenty of Trumpists have contacted me since yesterday saying Giuliani’s press conference proved the Democrats stole the election. Whatever, folks. The Russiagate of the Right.
The international system may be described as a complex system of social, scientific, political, military and technological systems. This dynamic structure is very difficult to evaluate and it is even more difficult to predict its future.
The distribution of power potential in the international system defines the number of major powers and thus the international system’s polarity. The system would be multi-polar if the great powers are more than two; if they are two it would be bipolar and systems with only one great power are called unipolar.
It can be expected in the future multipolar world that the global economy does not settle with a couple of significant nations but rather with multiple nations of varying capabilities. In the limited arena of affairs pertaining to their country, each state with its particular notable qualities will have decisive say.
By Abdul Rasool Syed
“Make America great again” – a slogan that formed the nucleus of Trump’s electoral campaign vividly suggests that America is no more a great country. It is, in fact, an implicit admission that U.S is gradually losing its clout in international politics and hence, its image as a sole superpower of the world has virtually tarnished. multipolarity
Let me rephrase this connotation; it means that the era of unipolar world is over and the world has now transitioned to a multipolarity.
The emerging transnational landscape
Currently, new power centers are emerging in transnational political landscape. China, Russia, India and Turkey are excessively engaged to carve a niche for them in evolving international order. Most importantly, with China and Russia’s mushrooming proximity, balance of power is now shifting from west to east.
This is a pretty good discussion of the relationship between race and class.
Krystal Ball weighs in on California voter’s rejection of affirmative action.
Now it’s the Repugnicans turn to spend four years whining about a moderate Republican is really a dictator is on the horizon. The same way the Democraps did for the past four years.
![The World in 1800 [OS][1920x1090] : MapPorn](https://i.imgur.com/ULC1A8A.png)
