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It just gets crazier and crazier!
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What’s crazy is that Americans are still buying into a dying Capitalism. Actually, Capitalism is fine and doing well in the People’s Republic of China. The USA is a declining empire and the time is ripe for finally democratizing both our politics and our economics.
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Ah; they have an Obstruct the Vote program!
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There is only one problem with American capitalism as it has been exercised since the turn of the century. Marxist-leaning economists point to economic instability as “end-stage capitalism”. No, no, mon frere: it is end-stage MONOPOLISM! Adam Smith himself conceded for the need to break up monopolies.
Capitalism is a very efficient and powerful social process. It only really is capitalism so long as you always strive to break up monopolies. Monopolists think of breakups as being punitive -far from it! You’re playing the board game Monopoly, one player has hotels on all the luxe-colored properties -there’s no point in continuing the game! Call the game over, put the assets back in the pot, and start a new game. A breakup normally does not come with fines. The only time you are fined is when you have been warned to break up and divisions continue to operate in monopolistic ways.
So why did the US start giving up on antitrust enforcement? Because law enforcement and politicos hand-in-hand liked the surveillance power such monopolies would hand to them. The DOJ would go play golf with Microsoft, Google (they were known to be funded ny NSA seed money, right??), Apple, you name it, and make polite requests for info, intimating that they might have antitrust issues if they don’t cooperate.
Guys like James Comey argue that privacy wielded by tech “breaks a social contract”. But the point him and the NSA miss is that such extraordinary centralized power is too dangerous and lends itself to abuse for either personal gain or political agenda (which can often be a longer-term play for personal gain, but can also be a delusion that you are the keeper of The Truth and must use such centralized power to persecute people of your choosing…) Case in point: the NSA listens in on extraordinary business dealings all the time. Do they really believe that all NSA employees would never share the info with a friend who would park profits from that money in an offshore account? Perhaps most will not, but inevitably a few will. The Petraeus incident with him sharing info with his biographer in his draft folder; don’t think that was somebody in the NSC who wanted him out of the running for the presidency?
So what’s the solution? I would suggest that there be a rotating panel of vetted civilians (much like people you impanel for a jury trial, but with much higher standards for screening given the sensitive info that would be overseen…) who can review the actions of the NSA, DIA, CIA, FBI, etc. If they see something that is problematic, they should be required to confidentially report it to the House Intelligence Committee. No more of this closed-loop “just trust us” thinking. The FISA court is a judge without a jury who cannot possibly be on top of the zillions of requests made of them!
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Back to to the monopolism issue: the recent Google move by DOJ is a baby step. I’ll take it, but they need MANY more (and Microsoft should be revisited!) I would argue that Google software standards have only served to degrade the innovation in software tech. [I won’t glaze the eyes of readers how that is so; but those who are technically adroit can message me for the details…] We know Microsoft standards are harming us too (forced update policies -Crowdstrike, anyone?)
Oh -and do I really need to make a case that Google is a dangerous monopoly after I cited on this forum how the Biden/Harris media campaign was colluding with youtube to shadow-ban civil yet negative comments that contained links to supporting objective info and editorials that were critical of them? [I observed that when the campaign was struggling with the fallout from the first debate.] That’s some tyrannical echo-chamber stuff…
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Ditto, but God forbid that any sort of serious criticism about Capitalism as a System is allowed into any main stream discussion without one being labeled as a raging Communist, who, like you said, appear to be, at least in China, out performing the United States in terms of Capitalism. I have always believed that Capitalism can exist within a Democratic Society, but that Democracy is unable to exist within a Capitalist Society, which is what we have now become with everyone in power and through out the media having been completely bought and sold. I do think that we are reaching a tipping point since a majority of the money is in so few hands. After all, there are far more of us than there are of them and the propaganda machine used to keep the Rabble in line is beginning to malfunction.
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Yes, it’s reaching a French Revolution level…
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The Capitalists kept the workers “in line” by distractions. It is still working unfortunately, as people are still convinced that what is needed is “equal opportunity.” Equal opportunity? For what? For the chance to rise out if the employee class into the employer class.
That’s not any sort of egalitarian or democratic goal. Unless and until we fully democratize the workplace - an example would be worker co-ops) as well as the workings of society (government) humanity will continue to suffer under various unequal and injust and unhealthy forms of civilization.
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Not seeing a massive ad spend by Big Oil yet. We could still see it within a couple of weeks; but maybe they figure it would be a waste and better to bribe the Dems after the election is won…
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Now that you mentioned it we’re going to the ad’s lol
Well said
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