We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Thursday, November 11, 2021

Posts that I especially recommend for Thursday, November11, 2021

I don't usually post articles from right-wing media corporations; but because the ruling capitalist class has switched from backing the right-wing political party to confuse their subjects (US citizens) from the Republican to the Democratic parties, I feel justified in posting this article. The ruling class changed their backing--of the two political parties that they allow to dominate elections--because they have so ruined any weak tendency for the Democratic Party to back issues favoring the working class and they felt safe to do so. 
 
And it worked! The ruling class has so confused the Democratic electorate, which traditionally supported civil rights and workers, but now supports the dictatorial measures against working people. Furthermore, to add to the confusion, they have also supported the spread of fake ideologies such as critical race theory and "woke" policies via their corporate media.
 
Whether the highly exaggerated and poorly managed pandemic is over is a moot question that will be decided in the future.
This time the corporate faction of the Democratic party deployed the Black political class and its media acolytes to neutralize the rising cry for social democracy and anti-capitalist politics.

What we are seeing is the failure of Democrats’ cynical post Obama strategy of focusing on racial grievance discourse divorced from materialist policy. That strategy was supposed to both shut down the possibility of any social democracy, or Sanders-type politics that would benefit most Black people, while secondly using Blacks as crash test dummies to fight Trump. That strategy has blown up in the Democrats face and is doing nothing but feeding the reactionary right.
 
My reaction: Although he clearly touts social democracy (capitalism with a comprehensive welfare system), he clearly sees through the fake progressives in the Democratic Party for what they are. Can I conclude that most African-American people see this as the usual fakery from the ruling class? Maybe, but I have doubts. I only wish that he and the Black Agenda Report also would see through the fakery of social democracy as the solution to the natural tendency of capitalism to turn into fascism where you won't "own", i.e., control anything (including your lives), but "you will be happy".
... a profound dilemma is visible from the momentum of this movement: a large bulk of liberal politics is driven by precisely the opposite impulses. The most loyal Democratic partisans are frequently venerating prosecutors, advocating for harsh criminal punishments, championing punitive theories of criminal law that have long been rejected by liberal jurists and, above all else, often demanding the longest and harshest punishments in "the carceral state” for a large group of people.

Why are so many Democrats simultaneously chanting radical criminal reform slogans to abolish or greatly reduce the police and the prison state while simultaneously demanding harsh prison terms for so many people under the classic law-and-order ideology they claim to oppose?
 
My reaction: There won't ever be police reform under the capitalist system with the ruling class exploiting those below them, and is worst the farther you go below them. In addition, the ruling class depends on police forces to enforce their interests. Police forces protect the safety of the ruling class, not ordinary people.
  • The Great Resignation from RT's channel on YouTube (00:59). My reaction: Under capitalism, the "owner" can purchase Robots and realize profits from their use. Working people like scientists and technicians built these robots to replace you.
I think the statement introducing this essay is "spot-on": "Bloomberg CIA Apologia Accidentally Vindicates China’s Strict Domestic Policies". 
 
But it does more. It reveals what their response is to this failure to wreck harm on China. The ruling class's directors want greater results from their "intelligence" agencies, and they are willing to spend money to get greater results as is indicated by this paragraph from the Bloomberg article:
 
Some of the people interviewed by Bloomberg said that such announcements are more symbolic than substantive and need to be backed up by increases in spending and staffing to have credibility.
 
I agree with her statement near the end of the essay which states: 
 
So Beijing’s anti-corruption crackdowns, widespread surveillance and strict control over Chinese society is making it harder for the CIA to undermine that nation, and now the CIA is expressing its frustration through the billionaire media. Which shows that China is acting entirely in self-defense when it implements these policies.
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