Every day it seems like there’s more sectarian fighting within the online left than the day before.
Maybe it’s because lockdowns and social distancing have largely cut us off from in-person interactions. Maybe it’s because generations of government psyops geared at stopping socialism and activist groups have left us all paranoid and hostile. Maybe it’s because of increased infiltration and propaganda as a dying empire approaches crunch time. Maybe we just tend to be a bit more neurotic than other ideological groups. Maybe it’s a mixture.
It feels like a state of paralysis. Someone will suggest some possible way to create movement and then the online left will split into a game of sectarian tug-of-war between two factions screaming “NOOOO NOT THAT WAY!” and “YES, THIS IS THE WAY!” at each other, with the net result of course being that nothing ends up happening and the bastards remain in charge.
And what’s funny is we all more or less agree on what we want our final end point to be: a peaceful and just society in which we are driven not by competition and the pursuit of profit but by the healthy desire to collaborate with each other and with our ecosystem toward the greater good of everyone, each according to their need. A quick glance around the world will show you that we are very, very, very far from this goal, but any time anyone suggests the possibility of taking even one single step in that direction, everyone starts screaming in objection.
Lefties often act as though every movement toward health has to be precision-perfect, as if we were keyhole surgeons cutting out cancer with mere millimeters of room with which to make precise decisions. But we are not millimeters away from health: we are whole continents away. If the tumor was in a hospital in New York, we are in a beat-up truck in Tijuana, screaming at each other about what tiny micromovements to make with our scalpel when we really need to just pick a street that heads vaguely northeast and start fucking driving.
Anyone who thinks we are millimeters away from health and every movement has to be policed with exacting precision has no comprehension of the how far away we are from the hospital, let alone a scalpel. We are thousands of miles from the cancer; take your foot off the brakes and just go.
Imagine if you were on a long trip and your destination is northeast, and everyone in the car is staring at the digital compass on the dashboard and screaming every time it says anything other than “NE” on it. Long trips don’t work that way. Sometimes you’re heading north. Sometimes you’re heading east. Hell sometimes you’re heading south, because that’s the road that takes you to the next freeway you need to get on. What matters is that you keep driving more or less in the direction you need to go.
And you can always course-correct, that’s the other thing. People act like if you take one wrong turn in this struggle you’ll have to remain committed to it forever until you reach Nazi dystopia, and that’s just silly. If you miss your exit you can get back on track without much difficulty. If the revolution heads down a path that turns out to be ill-advised it can quickly course-correct. This adventure isn’t on autopilot, it’s being driven by humans, every step of the way.
So just start driving. Start moving. Not everyone will agree on the exact best course to take, and that’s fine too. Just take whoever wants to come with in your car and hit the gas, trusting that you can course-correct and get back on the road to New York if you make a wrong turn. Don’t quibble about keeping the compass on northeast all the time. Don’t keep smashing the brake pedal while screaming at each other about the correct way to exit the driveway before you even start.
Just drive.
Make big movements. Force big pushbacks from the machine. Ask for something you know you’re not going to get just to show people that you were never going to get it in the first place. Be the squeaky wheel and get the goddamn oil, and if you don’t get the oil, squeak harder.
This is not the time to be sitting around fulminating furiously over the potential differences between imaginary ideologies none of which have ever actually been tried in the real world and for which you have no real-world data. Your fantasyland can’t replicate the dynamics of an ever-changing planet, and you’re alive today. The fantasies of dead men that lived in a time long before technology changed the world beyond recognition have no chance. We need to try things, real things, pressure real politicians to make big changes and when they don’t make big changes, make a noise.
We are so very, very far from the hospital in New York, and we’re screaming at each other like we’re already in the operating room. Stop bickering over small movements and start shoving in massive ones.
_______________________
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68 responses to “Revolution Isn’t Microsurgery, It’s A Long Road Trip”
In the weeks since this thread started we hae seen Texas fall apart.
Our electricity grid is on the verge of collapse apparently. Billions of dollars of damage done rather than a few thousand dollars of preventative spend.
The day the WHO told us to beware a fourth surge of Covid 19 variation our terribly stupid Governor advised us all to stop taking protective measures.
Good Lord, show us the way!!!
‘There is nothing inherently evil about competition and the pursuit of profit, until it becomes predatory.’
Human history would say differently.
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Fabulous writing!
A couple of years ago a friend asked me to fix a dementia care programme she had been unsuccessfully running for some years. She’d noticed my successful work with dementia patients I was musically entertaining to make a living.
What I found was this- cannot fix the basics, cannot fix the biggies.
Within days and then weeks things got better and better but I soon had to resign because of inadequate care of the dying. I tried, to no avail, to get the physician-prescribed nutrition up and running and the staff defied it at every level. Even when the person in charge turned it back on me and I apologised and agreed, to try and mend things between us, the goals were still not met! People were choking on food they were not supposed to receive and the staff were not doing their job not only in the first place but down the chain of responsibilities. Practical and moral.
There was something going on in the situation that I knew nothing about going in….I think behaviourist analysis researchers will call this in the future the Qanon clause! Something’s not right- let’s make it even worse by lack of research and jumping to conclusions.
Which I think I am going to express as current research knowledge in already known lay-terms of ‘people who want to be in control should not be’. They are not self-regulatory. Or any-regulatory sometimes. Or operating in their own ‘Harold Shipman’ biases.
And what finally motivated Dr Shipman? Money money money money money!
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Western society has devolved to a state of too many diverse groups vying for control. Democracy is a crappy form of government. We will soon see the collapse of nations into smaller nation states similar to the break up of the USSR. GB will shatter into their former components and the US will collapse into smaller more functional governments. The EU will dissolve as well. Thus people will more easily congregate into like minded groups of government. There is no resolution over the current system. Thus it must collapse and reform into smaller more manageable groups.
‘Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all the others.’ — attributed to various persons
Do you not see the deliberate actions taken to destroy the system, taken by the system? DO you not see totalistarianism being enstated, a police state being put in place? This has been planned and is being executed deliberately-the elite have made this happen to greatly reduce the world population and to enslave us for their benefit.
As some of us are aware, through first-hand experience, the already totalitarian Western model of corporate capitalism is only a failure for those of us (90%) on the bottom rungs – the powerless. It… “the US will collapse into smaller more functional governments…There is no resolution over the current system. Thus, it must collapse and reform into smaller more manageable groups.”
Ergo, it appears that what you are suggesting is that the only other viable alternative is something like that of the totalitarian Chinese model of ‘people management’ being that – all round, it is way ahead of anything in the West, or on the planet, for that matter.
What with a population at least four times the size of the US, China’s management of its economy, and more crucially at this time, of the COVID-19 pandemic treatment strategy among the people, it is way ahead of any other Nation on the planet. An aside: Of total world population China accounts for 18.47%; India, 17.7% and the greediest of them all stands at 4.25%. China has had five thousand years of tried, and still being tested, cultural learning experience, as opposed to the US’ one size fits all attitude, based on a measly 300 years of living experiment.
“Thus, it must collapse and reform into smaller more manageable groups.”
Q.E.D. “Democracy is a crappy form of government.”?
Has there ever been a truly ‘democratic socialism’ on the planet? It may not be the ideal, but it is, as yet, an untried ideal, way above the greed mongering, hate engendering pretend democratic dystopia that we are now living through.
Oh. Oh. Sounds like Dear Leader has Caitlin confined to her cell again. For your own good, of course. Maybe use your hour a day in the exercise yard to reflect on your bravery. Don’t worry. Mr Gates will free you soon, Comrade.
Actually, it IS time to look at approaches that have never been done – radically new approaches, in fact. Any overall system ever tried on this earth has eventually failed. It’s time to develop one that sees to the needs of the people first and foremost, completely trashes the current system and criminalizes its abuses. It should be one in which political parties serve not purposes, so go virtually extinct of their own accord and one that chooses leadership in a completely different, yet directly democratic way.
That’s just the briefest possible beginning.
Briefest possible, but headed in the right direction for that long road trip Caitlin urges us to take.
The world’s great Liberator and revolutionary leader gave these practical but challenging instructions:
Criticize yourself honestly before criticizing others.
Treat other people as well as you expect them to treat you.
Do not repay evil for evil. Do not resist evil people. Instead expose their crimes and separate yourselves from them.
Actions speak louder than words. Do not collaborate with evil. Do not use their corrupt banks, currencies, services, or courts.
We will never be able to reform and improve our civilization as long as psychopaths are left constantly deceiving, cheating, intimidating and oppressing everyone.
Honest, hard-working, responsible, generous people with insight and foresight are the backbone of society and when such exceptional, hard-working people separate themselves, make a sudden exit from this corrupt civilization and thrive in separatist communities, then the evil empire will cannibalize itself and implode, eliminating all psychopaths as it collapses. Yeshua’s strategy will eventually defeat the evil imperialist empire and liberate oppressed laborers and slaves who will survive the collapse. This strategy is practical, brilliant and destined to succeed when people take note and put His strategy into practice.
read more of this here: http://www.wisdompage.com/2013%20Articles/Molyneaux%20essay.pdf
Oh, dear. Caitlin is blogging about revolution again. Like most lefties, she bemoans the incoherence of the left and its proclivity for breaking up into silos of apparently small differences. There is so much I could say about this.
I think the first point I could make is that these apparent small difference are not really so small. If you listen closely to the rhetoric, these people have really very different aims and ideas, really different “theres” that they want to get to. I think most of them really do not, theirselves, understand where they want to go; they have no real self understanding. Some of them are a bit dangerous.
Yes, the disinformation and propaganda from the security state are a factor, as is the infiltration and disruption. Yet mostly, these people are just neurotic and often have outright brain disorders. There is no way any kind of coherent movement is coming from them.
But they are not where the real left is. A serious left activist, who actually wants to create a society and economy that raises the quality of life, and offers a life really worth living to the people living in it, stays far away from these flakes. A serious leftist will also have little time for most of the theoreticians who write their little papers and hold their little debates about how the revolutionary moment is not here yet.
I have met a few real leftist revolutionaries. They have learned to keep their groups small, to carefully vet new members, and to maintain their own communications systems. They do not attract attention to themselves. They mostly have day jobs which involve building and running organizations.
One of them said to me, referring to an assembly of ultra leftie chatterers; “when the revolution happens, these clowns will be the last ones to notice.” And, when the revolution is ready to happen, the real lefties will know what do do about it. They will keep their heads down until then.
Meanwhile, people like Caitlin will fantasize about a non violent, anarchistic revolution. The concern is that when real trouble starts, this is going to get people killed needlessly and create an obstacle to the actual removal of capitalism.
It is as in the famous advice of serious black community leaders to the “freedom riders” of the American south of the 1960s; “this non violence stuff is going to get you killed.” Their nonviolence stuff got a lot of them killed. Contrary to most Left and Pacifist hagiography, it was the willingness of black communities to finally organize their own defence forces which ended the “Jim Crow” era in the south.
So, Caitlin, I do believe we will know the time is right to heal the sickness when a revolutionary group emerges actually capable of defending itself against the forces of the state. Kindergarten revolutions will go nowhere. If there is a cancer within the corpus politic we need surgeons, not a swarm of faith healers.
You have one thing right here, Caitlin; we are still some distance from the end of capitalism in the US of A. However, I think there are people who have the compass and are moving in the right direction. They are not coming up the interstates in big noisy caravans. They are moving quietly up the backroads.
Another thing you get is that we do not need people spinning utopias for which there are no real world examples. We have the models for the kind of political economy we need. They are not ideal but they can be adapted and improved. That is why the corporate media is so hysterical about discrediting them.
These are what we need to hear more about in online discussions. We need that clearer picture of where we need to go. Less squawking about why everyone is squawking about how to go there. How about that, Cait?
Thanks for a perfect example of the very thing Caitlin was bitching about.
It wasn’t Caitlin breached US government democracy and security recently.
There are no utopias because people are mean and greedy and reject the concept.
Yes, we have the political models for old ways. No they don’t work well for egalitarian society.
Walter Karp has the conceptual antidote to the left’s obscurantist Marxism and post-modernism that has submerged the left in pettiness and incoherence for too long and crushed its vision: simple republicanism, the belief in political democracy, that specific actions performed by specific people based on specific ideas of what should be pursued matter, and do not depend on abstract, large-scale “social forces”, the “class struggle”, or “political science”. Whether as a theory of history it can compete with, say, Tolstoy’s in War and Peace, in terms of its technical accuracy, is almost irrelevant, as nothing else will get the left off the ground until it reinstates its own self-confident belief in democratic principles and the moral responsibility to act on them. After, and only after, this sensibility is refurbished for the age in which we live, then the left also needs to go back to its wheelhouse and generate ideas, of which currently it has only a few, e.g. Medicare for All, reducing the military budget of the United States by $X, etc., and to pursue them uncompromisingly. Even though governments have always sabotaged the left whenever it has shown the least sign of getting off the ground, too many vagaries, too many moronic generalities have undermined the left from within, and made it embarrassingly feckless.
I never realized before that Caitlin Johnstone is a dyed-in-the-wool Commie. “‘To each according to his need” quoted as a moral ideal is a phrase yanked right out the Bolshevik playbook. The Communist Manifesto is a tried-and-true blueprint for the imposition of tyranny and a precursor of economic demise. As evidence of this assessment I offer the history of the World in the 20th Century. That anyone purporting to be a public intellectual would today advocate such a reprehensible philosophy surpasses anything commonplace and the reading public should not be suffered the aggravation of having to deal with the likes of them.
I assume–hope–this is tongue-in-cheek. There have been and still are, of course, myriads of intellectuals of the first rank who draw heavily upon Marxist theory. Linkage of that theory to the former repressive regime of the Soviet Union or other oligarchies, just because they called themselves communist, would be tantamount to linking the theory of democracy to any number of authoritarian regimes, former or current, which call themselves democratic. This applies with equal force to the present U.S. of A., a plutocracy which calls itself a democracy or republic
Any form of government is possibly subject to being infiltrated by power-hungry elitists who want favor and plenty, above others, It makes possible unjust rule. Tribalism with a set of ethics and community mindfulness, and an organized society of self-rule and being mutually beneficial for all members is the way. Democratic socialist anarchy. Self-sustaining agricultural communities
the reading public will decide for itself.
Reprehensible philosophy? Give to others according to your means, according to their needs? Isn’t that also the philosophy of Christianity?
And that was exactly what went wrong with Communism- it wasn’t kind.
Caitlin, Revolution is so ambiguous. Kindly define it. Is it the Marx’s Dictatorship of the Proletariat? Rousseau’s Utopia? Huxley’s Brave New World?
None can even hope for it, much less work for it, if we don’t know what it is. Kindly spell it out.
Love this post. It’s grounded in a way you sometimes aren’t (though I love you anyway). I’m sharing links to it widely.
If you have the time, Ms Johnstone, please read this article.
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It’s all about ground intel
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Now let’s put this all in context. Putin is a master geopolitical chess player. Nasrallah observes there were “a number of relevant military, security and political officials” at the meeting. This implies Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu and most of all top strategist Nikolai Patrushev.
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All of them were vey much aware by 2015 that the ultimate target of having ISIS/Daesh fester in Syria – in tandem with the notorious “Assad must go” campaign – was to create the conditions for a fake Caliphate to reach power, spread to the Caucasus, and destabilize Russia. That was encapsulated in the Russian formula “it’s only 900 km from Aleppo to Grozny”.
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Soleimani’s merit was to produce the definitive sales pitch. Based on his vast on the ground experience, he knew that a resistance front alone would not be enough to protect Damascus. The “secret” of this two-hour Moscow meeting is that Soleimani must have made crystal clear that the next stage for the fake Caliphate would be directed against Russia’s soft underbelly, and not Iran.
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This revealing article can be read here:
Why the US Deep State won’t forgive Russia and Iran By Pepe Escobar
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/56267.htm
aLL WORLD POWERS, EVERY WORLD LEADER, IS LOYAL (DUE TO FEAR OR BRIBERY) TO THE GLOBALIST/VATICAN AGENDA. They have created covid, have locked down the nations to remove power and wealth from the middle class, will kill billions with vaccines and world war. They plan a 500 million world population by 2025- a totalitarian fascist police state. It is all a “game” they pretend all these staged events to give legitimacy to their death agenda.
Many are slated to starve to death in poor countries as the covid shutdown results in food shortages. A rice disease is spreading through southeast asia. Crops are failing. For the first time ever China is buying rice from India. The signs are there for those willing to look.
It will strike us here in the US also. Stock up with plenty of canned goods rice and the like.
The ruling classes/elite’s have been at this since the dawn of agriculture allowed one farmer to grow more than he needed for the family. Elite’s rose up to cream off the extra/profit created by the farmer/worker. They used everything from enemies to religion to make it work and work it does. Chomsky calls it “manufactured consent”; call it culture war’s or whatever you like, it’s cheaper and more effective than the military/police repression that is also practiced on less docile people’s. People are the story believing animal and the more absurd the story the better..ie..the invisible man in the sky that most people at least purport to believe. The latest absurdity is the stories around the trans issue and it’s working just fine. Ditto for the entire woke, BLM etc. agendas. Frankly, if I was going to live a lot longer I would be preparing for the coming dystopian world of climate war’s, the US military is making its plans and has for some time. IMHO we are either at or past the tipping point of runaway climate change so I intend to try and enjoy myself, it really is later than you think and the sociopaths in charge don’t care for their own progeny, let alone you.
Hint: Simple plural nouns don’t take an apostrophe. We used to learn that in 3rd grade. Back when basic education still was practiced.
Yes, it’s basic economics 101.
That’s nothing to do with culture so much as survival.
Unfortunately the powers that be have refused to accept climate change. Even the good ones, as much as anyone does a good job in that field.
Now it’s probably too late.
Isn’t the left/right framework itself a principal psyop at the root of social division and ideological warfare?
This is why it’s so hard to identify with a political label these days? Most political a labels, especially those used by the “left”, have been utterly debased, often into the very opposite of their original meanings. I was a libertarian back in the day when it was essentially akin to “anarchist”. And the reason I had to migrate to the label “libertarian” was because the term “anarchy” had been debased to mean the equivalent of “chaos” (which, of course, it is not). Then I used the term “progressive” until Hillary Clinton and Nancy Pelosi called themselves progressives.
Now I’ve read that Noam Chomsky describes himself as a Leftist Anarchist—so even one of the greatest linguists of our time can’t find a simple, meaningful English term to describe his political positions. What does that say about the impossibility of the task?
There is a “No Labels” movement, but that formal movement is nothing but a smokescreen by imperials who play-act their “neoliberal” and “neoconservative” roles within the theatre that is the Democratic/Republican parties. It’s very clever how even the concept of “no labels” has already been hijacked by the most extreme imperials among us—those who have cleverly figured out how to hide behind the most dangerous political label of all: “centrist.”
The sooner we refuse to force our political thinking into the Left/Right framework, the more likely we are to simultaneously think independently and act cooperatively.
Very insightful and well stated. I cannot disagree with a word of it.
Speaking of surgery… Former Military Surgeon, Lee Merritt MD (skip the first 2-3 minutes of beard-guy) lays out the argument that SARS-CoV-2 is a military weapon, and we humans are the targets, but that the actual aggressor remains hidden in this war. China is mentioned, but she specifically does not say that the CCP is the primary aggressor. Arguments are sound, even if the finish of this piece is nuevo-John-Birch-society.
Understanding that we are already in a war is a useful cognitive tool. Yes, hydroxychloroquine is effective in the early (pre-hospital) stage and also some in hospital, and ivermectin is effective at all stages, and other medicines have antiviral effects, notably vitamin-D as a baseline immune support, and zinc to reduce viral replication when ill. We are not supposed to think. We are supposed to take vaccines. Why?
https://www.brighteon.com/b95f1834-1283-4866-b16e-fb6bf9092aeb
Here is further support for the use of HCQ for COVID-19.
https://www.amjmed.com/article/S0002-9343(20)30673-2/fulltext
I strongly suspect that HCQ was banned to facilitate the spread of the disease, kill off a portion of the elderly, and make way for big $$$ for Big Pharma with a global vaccine mandate.
I have also read many articles speculating that COVID is a bio-weapon. These are from Virologists and Epidemiologists who have been denied access to the MSM, not fringe conspiracy theorists.
covid was developed as “gain of function” research by Dr Shi Zhwengli with funding by US and Chinese governments under supervision of Bill Gates in North Carolina university chapel on a hill laboratory. The vaccines will profit Gates and he has said on Ted Talks that he wants to reduce the world population significantly using vaccines. Vaccines that he funded killed 47,500 Indian children seven years ago
I believe how these new vaccines work will make your immune system overreact to the next released mutated covid virus. This reaction will kill most people. This is why the old, the poor, and the stupid are getting the first doses.
I would definitely not even think of driving to NYC, but drive to Acapulco, San Miguel de Allende or even Bogota or Buenos Aires – far nicer places, cheaper, infinitely better connected people living in a meaningfully cohesive society, much less manic and materialistic than anything American…
That is the problem – too many people have been brainwashed to think USA is the best, the richest , the happiest…exactly the opposite of reality – it’s VERY poor, depressed and depressing, sick, ugly fascist society no foreigner should even go close to (unless they want to be very disappointed, mugged or perhaps killed). Canada, UK etc are similar. All these countries nowadays seem like gulags with aggressive, very dishonest and predatory PR/Propaganda and NOTHING else to offer to anyone, especially their own population living on what’s basically a plantation.
I’ve seen some good solutions recently from corbet report – The Greater Reset. Very inspiring:
https://thegreaterreset.org/
Is in not only that there are misguided people in the movement but that establishment agencies seed the movement with people who deliberately try to disrupt it.
People are the left are usually quite pure. Purity hates contamination, so it’s hard for us to get along with anyone even slightly different. More importantly, while the right or the corporate forces organize according to rank and money, the left organizes by idea, thought, which allows everyone to be a chief without Indians. We need a new organizing principle.
https://www.peacinstitute.org/grp
We DO need a new organizing principle, one that’s elemental yet universal. Albert Schweitzer offered us “reverence for life,” and I’ve never come across a better one.
I think the path forward must begin with a coalition of progressives and libertarians with the goal of stopping the war machine. Only after we stop killing innocents all around the globe, will we be on a moral footing. Then we can have an honest debate about the role of government in a free society, and how much government can or can’t do to move us towards a happy and healthy society that serves the common good and seeks to heal the planet. We can never even begin to move forward while the inherently evil forces of Empire are in control, and its propaganda machine has the masses hypnotized.
Yes, Skip, the war machine is one of the first evils that must be remedied. But since it’s already there, hugely there, intractably there in the short run, what about repurposing it into a machine that wars not against people but against ecocide? The millions in the military would keep their jobs, billions would continue to pour into the machine, but the job of the soldiers, the mission of the machine, would be utterly, beautifully transformed. A major liability would become a major asset. Just a thought, not a squabble.
Great idea, and also one that I have considered previously. I live in the mountains of Eastern Arizona, and all of the mountain west has a HUGE problem with entire mountainsides covered in DEAD standing trees. It is the result of decades of mismanagement in which our Forest Service put out every small grass fire in fire dependent ecosystems. Huge crowning fires that sterilize the soil has been the result in recent decades. There are still huge tracts that have not been dealt with in a timely fashion due to lack of resources and manpower. It would be a perfect job for our soldiers to restore a healthy ecosystem to the mountain west that could withstand fire without intervention, just as mother nature originally had it. I’m sure there are other worthy projects as well, certainly much more worthy than murdering innocents abroad and coming home with PTSD.
Maybe, together, we just offered an example of applying the wise and necessary advice Caitlin gave us all in today’s post. Feels good to connect in a meaningful way.
Back in the 1970s, my friends and I drove across Paris without a map or compass, with very little difficulty. It was around midday and the sun was beaming down. We needed to go south so we just kept sure we were heading more or less towards the sun. Sunny days indeed. It’s relevant only if you get it.
We get it, Bryan. Well and simply said.
IMO the problem with the left is that it is, by definition, ‘inclusive’ – whereas the right is exclusive. That’s great when it all (rarely) comes together but it leaves the left vulnerable at other times.
Firstly, it is vulnerable to infiltration by establishment ‘agents provocateurs’ and fifth columnists of every grade and texture. Look at people like George Monbiot in the Guardian! Secondly, it stuffs the left chock-full nomenclature-purists, communist fanatics/Stalinists, whimsical cloud /animal worshipers, faddists, luddites, tin-foil hattists (eg anti-vaxxers) and magical thinkers. This second point would not be a problem if those people did not derail serious agendas with their own missions. But they do. ALL THE FKN TIME. And they are encouraged to do so by the fifth columnists who often act as pied pipers for them.
One solution might be to create single-mission entities. i.e.. political entities driven by the left that have one mission only: e.g. socialised healthcare.
Sigh. Here people like me have been celebrating the fact that activists are coming out of their silos, e.g. environmentalists talking about racism. And you want us back in our silos. The problem with that is the problem with Caitlin’s whole thesis here. The left is not failing to make traction because we argue too much about the best course. We’re getting nowhere because there is no gas in the car. We can have the driver put the pedal to the metal, we can be in perfect harmony about the best course and we still won’t leave the driveway because WE HAVE NO POWER. The reason for that is, as Caitlin correctly says over and over, because Who Controls the Narrative Controls the World. And the reason we have so little control over the narrative is not primarily that we disagree about what to say–we do, of course, but so does the Right and the Center–no, it’s because the ruling class owns most of the media. Not just the old-fashioned newspapers and TV and radio stations, which are still influential, but the gatekeepers now in Silicon Valley. The fact that they’re working hard to allow themselves to censor us much more lately, is evidence that we have begun to break through with efforts like Cailtin’s and thousands of others.
Great comment. All these questions and issues revolve around power, who has it and who doesn’t. And the left has literally none. Faux progressives have a modicum of power but they invariably submit to the dictates of the Dems. Bernie Sanders as one example. Generally, progressives cut the authentic aims of the left off at knees. It’s the most self-defeating characteristic of the schizoid American political farcical comedy. Except it’s lost all its comedic effect and instead marinates in terminal farce.
There is nothing inherently evil about competition and the pursuit of profit, until it becomes predatory. Which the Psychopaths In Charge eagerly facilitate for their own benefit. As I’ve mentioned before, in a free market the only way to prosper is to serve others, by producing a product or service that people need or want at a price they can afford and are willing to pay. People, that do have at least some social consciousness, most of the time, or at least part of the time. Enter government control of the market, and voila, predation. Eating competition instead of producing a better product at lower cost, that people are more willing to buy and able to afford. The “choice” disappears, replaced by monopoly owned by oligarchs. Who have used government force to eliminate competition. I become ever more certain that corporations, an invention of the state, are largely to blame. The instant, or soon after, a business incorporates, any particle of humanity seems to disappear from it. They focus almost entirely on profit and the elimination of competition, regardless the social costs. They are not people, after all, and have no social consciousness, and are most often run by people who have none, aka sociopaths. Why should one expect them to behave otherwise?
I think you’re making a little mistake here. It isn’t incorporation that causes the loss of humanity–it’s size. Once a business entity gets to a certain size, the decision-making component of the machine–human managers–realize that if they make a decision that prioritizes anything over the bottom line, they will be tossed like any other defective component. Sometimes the machine encounters an obstacle in the form of public concern about its destructive impact, say on forests, or on its workers. The managers need to remove the obstacle but changing course to stop deforesting, or give all the employees a raise and benefits is probably not the cheapest way to remove the obstacle. Instead they get a PR company to help them put out a series of ads with pretty pictures of forests and words about how much the company reveres forests. And if there is a threat that the minimum wage will be raised or they’ll have to give maternity leave or other benefits to their employees, this is easily and cheaply dealt with by bribing a few of the right legislators to shoot down any bill that moves in that direction.
Which rarely if ever happens with non-corporate businesses. Private or partnership business simply does not have the resources to participate in such antisocial action. Curious that you encourage men with guns pointed at peoples heads to force them to adopt “minimum wage, maternity leave, or other benefits”. Never mind that businesses would be more profitable and better able to accommodate their employees if left alone. In my experience, private businesses usually do so, if they are profitable enough in spite of the guns held to their heads. Yes, there are those who look at corporations and want to be just like them. After all, did the corporations not get rich? Not a majority. Charity with the property of others isn’t charity.
Are People Openly Wondering Evermore Raucously, on paper, about historically entrenched, functionally organized institutional structures, backed by the trillion dollar-plus POWER of the most technologically sophisticated military machine on the planet; answerable only to neoliberal corporate capitalist maldistribution of monetary profits, a viable option for real foundational change?
Just another simple question!
from my book ANGRY LOUD AND CLEAR TRUTH
. After much pressure, the Vatican bank (Ior Instito per le Operi di Religone) was formed June 27, 1942. Because its only branch was inside Vatican City, the IOR was not subject to any wartime regulations. It could function anywhere in the world, did not pay taxes, was not necessary to show a profit, did not need annual reports, didn’t have to discuss balance sheets, nor was required to account to shareholders. In addition, it did not have audit requirements, and shredded its files every decade until the year 2000. (“God’s Bankers” pages 117, 118).
Since before 1910, United States moneys have been ruled by England’s banks. J P Morgan, Brown Brothers Harriman, Warburg, Kuhn Loeb, J Henry Schroder, all are under Rothschild. N. M. Rothschild controls the price of gold, and that determines the state of world economies, manipulating recessions, inflations, and depressions.
The Vatican now has investments with Rothschild of Britain, France, and USA; and with Hambros Bank, Credit Suisse, Morgan, National Bank of NY, Bankers Trust Co, and more. It owns billions of shares of the most powerful international corporations such as Gulf Oil, Shell, General Motors, Bethlehem Steel, General Electric, TWA, etc.. Jesus supposedly came up with this truism: “The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.” The bible states: “You cannot love both money and god” But as I have shown, the bible has no foundation of truth, and neither does the Vatican. But the first mentioned quote from the bible does hold verifiable truth.
Caitlin Johnstone wrote:
> And what’s funny is we all more or less agree on what we want our final end point to be: a peaceful and just society in which we are driven not by competition and the pursuit of profit but by the healthy desire to collaborate with each other and with our ecosystem toward the greater good of everyone, each according to their need. . . .
> Stop bickering over small movements and start shoving in massive ones.
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That is, start with the fundamentals. Some excerpts from Caitlin’s “My List Of Demands”:
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“I want to live in a world where war is seen clearly for the horrific and disgusting thing that it is. . . .
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“I want to live in a world where it’s impossible to make a profit out of mass murder. Which means I want to live in a world where it’s impossible to make a profit out of war. . . .
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“I want to live in a world where garbage is not a thing. I want to live in a world where if it can’t be recycled, reused or composted, then it isn’t used.
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“I want to live in a world where resources are considered the property of all living beings and they cannot be hoarded by a few of the most ruthless and predatory members of a single species. . . .
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“I want to live in a world of private citizens and public servants, where citizens are entitled to quiet enjoyment of their private lives, while those that have the privilege of serving the needs of the many do so in a glass house, under intense public scrutiny. Power will not seem so desirable to those who would use it badly if this were the case, and it would be no impediment to those who wish to use it well. . . .
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“I want to live in a healthy information ecology where people are sincerely attempting to describe their pinhole view on the diorama as truthfully as possible, even (and especially) when that truth contradicts their beliefs or their agenda.
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“I want media companies to be tiny, agile, and beholden to no one. . . .
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“I want to live in a world where one person controlling the resources of millions is a cause for alarm, not a cause for idolization.
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“I want to live in a world where people feel as entitled to food, shelter and water as any other animal born on the land or in the sea. . . .
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“I want to live in a world where government works more like organized crowdfunding, where money is collected and used for the common good in the most transparent way possible.
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“I want to live in a world where any attempt to unduly influence the spending of taxes beyond one-person, one-vote is considered extremely antisocial behavior.
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“I want to live in a world where money is for helping people, not for killing them. . . .
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“I want to live in a world without intelligence agencies. . . .
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“I want to live in a world that understands that manipulators are always accusing others of doing what they themselves are doing, and that you can learn about their real motives by simply applying to them what they’re saying about others.
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“I want lobbying to be illegal. . . .
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“I want poverty to be considered a shocking aberration which must be rectified immediately. . . .
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“I want ideas to be free. . . .
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“I want a playful collaboration to begin with each other and with our ecosystem.”
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My List Of Demands — Caitlin Johnstone
https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2019/10/15/my-list-of-demands/
If your ” destination ” is New York City you will need a tanker truck full of ” holy water ” to ward off the corruption that has engulfed everything here. This is ” Satanville ” and the devil is in charge of everything!
Not any different than any big city and you know that Campbell – you traitor clan you…….
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It could be any city, but I’ll list the cities that are most involved in the derivative instrument as best I can…..here they are…….London, NYC, Singapore, ……..hm. That capture the big 3 I think. If somebody knows better, please educate me. Oh yeah, Dubai – add that one in as well.
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Lets get the fact out and then let there be justice.
the Vatican and DC- religious power and influence and the war machines-two most evil participants. Do not underestimate Rome-the Vatican is THE power
OK whatever, it is 2121 and that is special – that is the only reason I’m posting even though I said I wouldn’t. Whatever…..
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Anyhow, what is so important in New York inquiring minds want to know?
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Besides that I agree 100% when it comes to “course-correcting” and getting on with what needs to be gotten upon. Here, how about a clue: take the derivative of a trip from Tijuana to somewhere in NY and divide the derivative by another one of the same power, and then divide it again endlessly. Keep dividing all you want – you will never get to zero. OK, then fine go the other way and multiply things. Do it exponentially, and still you you will never get to infinity. Take infinity if you think you can and flip it over and it won’t be zero but zero will happily take over the show and turn everything into a bunch of infinite nothing.
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Get the drift?
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This is what the derivative financial instrument does when things go unexpectedly, and we should all know that is how things often go in the world of mice and men.
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Screw it – I’m looking forward to some future chaos – I feel a river of it flowing towards my house, but I don’t mind cause I’ve made preparations. What do you feel? There comes a time, when there is no time for a bunch of discourse and seems to me that time is upon us now, so I better go. Good luck everyone, but best of luck to the Irish – I hope they go first in the uniting process of small places!
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BK
OK, I’m listening to the Pogues (Peace and Love – a great Irish bunch of songs….), and it has occurred to me that the only reason your imaginary journey to NY was occurring was due to concerns regarding some sort of tumor – or am I wrong?
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Well, there are tumors all over the place. NY has no monopoly on that.
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I reckon if your making a metaphor that you need to choose a place for it to occur and that is somewhat random, but I’m thinking there is something more to it than that, so I’d appreciate if maybe later you’d expound upon why the vehicle was heading to NY? Why couldn’t have it been somewhere in the UK or maybe even down under somewhere? You know. Tumors are everywhere.
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So take 2121 and add up the numbers and what do you get? OK, that’s easy, so after that take a cube and roll it hard and break it into it’s sides and how many sides are there? Take those sides, each one a 2-dimensional square and combine them as you please – how many possible shapes are there? I’ll give the answer to the last question – there are an infinite amount of shapes unless you want to put limits on how things overlap. If so, the number of shapes is finite, but good luck coming up with limits that anybody else gives a crap about.
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That is why it is good to be Irish – cause the Irish understand luck!
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Cubes are fascinating, but I prefer other shapes and I’m sick of some countries who only vaccinate those they think matter. Sick how some countries turn into the opposite of what they ought be given the history, but I reckon some old ones can’t ever get over the past. Oh well – you get what you give.
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BK
OK, one last little thing on this mind game from above.
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Instead of the cube breaking into six equal two-dimensional square planes, lets say this:
1. The square broke into three shapes.
2. None of the shapes had the same number of sides.
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What were the shapes?
Do I have to tell?
For extra credit how were the shapes oriented – there may be more than one possibility for this.
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They say 6 is a “perfect “number, but 28 is even better in the land of numbers whose divisor equal up to their own value! Personally, I prefer 5, just like I prefer crows over hawks. I like the way the crows circle around.
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I wonder if there are birds like that in the middle of Australia?
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Peace,
BK
CORRECTION
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To #1 above:
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The cube broke….
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Now since I’m here and I already figured it out in my head cause I wasn’t really even sure when I blurted it out, but yes there are two solutions.
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Solution #1 (less likely): Three pieces traveling around in sequence enough to be 270 degrees. Then you have a two-piece, which can only be one shape, and then you have the 3rd piece which is a two-dimensional square.
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Solution #2 is up to you to figure out. I already know so why should I tell?
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how bout some extra credit – what if their were numbers or symbols on each of the two-dimensional squares – what if this was the case on both sides of the two dimensional square? There are many possibilities….
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Get my Drift? If so, please let me know if a friendly way.
“Stop bickering over small movements [dicing mouse turds] and start shoving in massive ones.”
Tacking is a sailing maneuver by which a sailing vessel, whose desired course is into the wind, turns its bow toward the wind so that the direction from which the wind blows changes from one side to the other, allowing progress in the desired direction.
Good suggestion, Lloyd, that tacking may often be the best tactic.
Its zig-zagging. Not some kind of wind god shit.
Excellent example of how knowledge of words doesn’t necessarily equate to literacy.
Also, Caitlin, maybe its just that the vocal, online subsection of any group tends to be correlate with the ‘asshole’ subsection. Most of the actual left dont have time to waste pissing into the wind, never mind the fact that the harder the boot is pressing on your neck the more likely you are to lack an internet connection… And not speak English…
“We are driven not by competition and the pursuit of profit but by the healthy desire to collaborate with each other and with our ecosystem toward the greater good of everyone, each according to their need.” Now Caitlin, I always knew you were left of center but I can see here that you are a full-blown Commie bitch.