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The US Supreme Court continues to be a vehicle for advancing fascism, which comes as no surprise to the left. Meanwhile, though, liberals continue to be surprised, and I have to wonder when (or if) they will finally understand how this works. In essence, the Supreme Court has decided to delay their decision on Presidential immunity until after the election. If Trump wins the election, they can conclude that the President has absolute immunity; if Trump loses, they can conclude that the President does not have absolute immunity.

The court has moved very quickly in prior cases involving presidential power, deciding the Watergate tapes case against President Richard Nixon just 16 days after arguments. Earlier this year, it took the justices less than a month to rule unanimously that states couldn’t kick Trump off the ballot.

Supreme Court seems skeptical of Trump’s claim of absolute immunity but decision’s timing is unclear (AP)

Why oh why can’t they take care of this decision as quickly as those past decisions? Well, if they did the right thing and released their decision now, then one of two things would happen: Either Trump’s legal problems would rapidly become insurmountable (and his presidential campaign would collapse) or the Supreme Court would be giving the Biden administration tacit permission to assassinate Trump.

From Heather Cox Richardson’s April 25 email:

“I am in shock that a lawyer stood in the U.S. Supreme Court and said that a president could assassinate his political opponent and it would be immune as ‘an official act,’” lawyer Marc Elias, whose firm defends democratic election laws, wrote today on social media. He added: “I am in despair that several Justices seemed to think this answer made perfect sense.”

Shocked! Shocked is what Marc Elias is.

Did everyone forget that moment in 2016 when Trump bragged that he could commit murder and get away with it? And the right wing just nodded in approval?

“I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn’t lose any voters, OK?” Trump remarked at a campaign stop at Dordt College in Sioux Center, Iowa. “It’s, like, incredible.”

Donald Trump: ‘I Could … Shoot Somebody, And I Wouldn’t Lose Any Voters’

Central to fascist thought is the idea that they, and their leader specifically, has a sort of political super-legitimacy that allows the leader to literally do whatever they want. As the in-group, the law is supposed to protect them but not bind them, while it simultaneously binds their enemies without providing protection (per Wilhoit). This was described by Nixon in 1977 thusly:

Well, when the president does it … that means that it is not illegal. […] Exactly … exactly… if the president … if, for example, the president approves something … approves an action, ah … because of the national security or in this case because of a threat to internal peace and order of, ah … ah … significant magnitude … then … the president’s decision in that instance is one, ah … that enables those who carry it out to carry it out without violating a law. Otherwise they’re in an impossible position.

Transcript of David Frost’s Interview with Richard Nixon

How did we get here? Well, those naughty leftists didn’t vote for Hillary! I’m kidding, of course. The way we got here was that Barack Obama was elected fair and square and when he attempted to nominate a Supreme Court Justice (Merrick Garland), the Republicans refused to even begin the process of approving the nomination; Obama didn’t fight back (that would have been disruptive). That was in March of 2016, and Trump didn’t win the Republican nomination until May. This was a pre-Trump Republican party which makes it clear that what we now call Trumpism pre-dates Trump; the Republicans have had something very wrong with them since the late 1970’s when far-right Christian racists grabbed control of the party, but as the Nixon quote from 1977 points out, there was something rotten even before that.

Do I think Biden would actually assassinate Trump? No. Democrats have a well-established habit of pulling their punches for the stated purpose of promoting national unity, but I also doubt that far-right conservatives want to risk granting that kind of power to near-right (possibly medium-right at this point) liberals.

The even bigger problem is the decades-long trend of both parties giving more and more power to the Presidency. Now, we are having a serious conversation as a nation about whether the President is a mere mortal or, instead, a God-Emperor. Certainly, the US has a history of authoritarian actions, but they’re usually conducted in secret and then revealed decades later, when that action is irrelevant and beyond the practical ability of the law to address it. Now, though, we are on the verge of having an executive branch that can do whatever it wants, and tell us about it without fear of consequences because the chief executive is immune from prosecution forever and has the ability to pardon his minions.

No Democrat or Republican can be trusted with that kind of power because they both serve a powerful minority group — the billionaire class. Clearly, billionaires do not agree about everything, and they’re not necessarily well-organized, but they’re still the class of people that controls our government, and they agree that non-billionaires just don’t matter.

One of the dangers of conflating liberals with the left is that it creates this illusion that liberal authoritarianism is not possible. It is, however, entirely possible and many American voters are really feeling that right now. The Biden administration started out reflecting the views of the average Democratic Party voter (near right) pretty well, but as time has gone on, it has gotten increasingly right wing, and it seems like the primary reason is Joe Biden himself taking charge of the administration.

The latest thing would be Biden signing the TikTok ban into law which essentially silences the voices of younger Americans who are strongly against the Israeli genocide of Palestinians and creates the precedent for banning any foreign-owned media that the US government dislikes. Given that all domestically-owned media in the US is under the firm control of the billionaire class, this would exacerbate the already dire lack of free (i.e., not controlled by US billionaires) media in the US. To be clear, politicians are making these decisions because their primary duty is to the billionaire class, not the average voter.

One of the themes of George Orwell’s 1984 was about propaganda, and the control of media. Basically, if you control all the media, then you can claim anything you want about today’s reality, and you can portray the past any way you want. The quote is:

“Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past,” repeated Winston obediently. “Who controls the present controls the past,” said O’Brien, nodding his head with slow approval.

On April 23, Biden condemned “anti-Semitic protests” and people who “don’t understand what’s going on with the Palestinians”. This kind of gaslighting is a classic fascist move; though, I suppose someone could try to make the argument that Biden is simply mistaken rather than purposefully evil. Regardless of his intent, though, Biden himself has become part of the flow of misinformation that Americans are experiencing, and the single biggest obstacle to his own re-election in November.

Trump currently leads Biden in national polls, and is significantly ahead of Biden in swing states, which are really what matters thanks to the anti-democratic electoral college. (If you are a leftist living in Missouri, for example, you can vote for whoever you want!) Therefore, my guess is that the Supreme Court will conclude that the President has total immunity from prosecution, like a God-Emperor, and then the Democratic Party will shrug dramatically because their donors would rather accept full-blown fascism than risk the chaos that would result from any kind of effective resistance.

The Biden administration is claiming that it has closed the gun show loophole, but the actual change they made is very minor and will make no difference.

What we typically call the “gun show loophole” is simply the part of federal law that allows individuals to sell their personal guns to other individuals without performing a background check. I said “sell” but this law also applies to any transfer between individuals, including transferring a gun to a friend or relative without any money changing hands. These legal firearm transfers would always be used guns, and they are still completely legal despite the Biden administration’s rule changes.

Specifically, the new rules require anyone who either:

• rents a table at a gun show and sells guns or
• places an ad announcing that they will be selling guns at a gun show

to have a Federal Firearms License. While this may change things hypothetically, my opinion is that it will not affect anyone; I will explain more below. The law states that you can sell your personal guns (any number of guns) without having an FFL. You just can’t engage in the business of selling guns without an FFL, nor can you sell new guns (you must go through an FFL to receive a new gun). However, the law is unclear about what it means to be “in the business” of selling guns, so that’s why there are executive branch rules that reflect how the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (for example) is interpreting the law.

Basically, the Biden administration is taking advantage of America’s lack of fluency in firearm law (which, to be fair, is quite convoluted) to create the impression that they’ve done something substantive here in this election season. Roughly 86% of Americans support universal background checks, so closing the “gun show loophole” (legal personal sales made at a gun show without a background check) might get Biden more votes in November. But the rule change did not close the “gun show loophole”. I’m putting that in quotes because it isn’t a loophole — it’s just part of the law.

Approximately 5000 gun shows happen in the US each year. At these gun shows, more than half of the vendors will be gun stores attempting to sell some guns in a market relatively far from their brick-and-mortar store. These guns stores have a Federal Firearms License. If you buy a gun from them, they will either do the instant background check on the spot or (more likely) they will help you locate a Federal Firearms License holder in your area so they can ship the gun there for you to pick up on the next business day. Your local FFL holder (gun shop) will do the background check and charge you between $20 and $30 for that service. I’ve also seen local vendors at gun shows, and they sometimes offer to put your name on a gun (reserve it) so you can pick it up at their store (after a background check).

At a gun show, there are also other vendors. There might be a vendor who sells army surplus (but not guns), or a vendor that sells knives (which are not regulated in most states). There’s definitely going to be a vendor selling “Let’s Go Brandon” merchandise. In addition to all these vendors (who have rented tables at the event), there are customers, and a few of those customers show up with a gun from their personal collection that they want to sell. The person at the door puts a zip-tie on it to make it inoperable, and they usually wear a sign on their back explaining that they’re selling this gun. This is completely legal, and the Biden administration’s rule change does not affect a person selling a gun in this way.

What the change does affect is a hypothetical (or, you might say, fantasy) vendor who has rented a table at the gun show, and is selling guns, but does not have a Federal Firearms License. Maybe this person exists. I don’t know. I have never seen such a person at a gun show. Gun control groups have a lot of “information” about these hypothetical illegal vendors — which were already illegal before this rule change happened — but it really seems like a very rare occurrence. It seems like gun control advocates are just using this narrative to create a lot of anxiety and justify their position. If these illegal vendors exist, why wasn’t the government doing something about them already?

Maybe the Biden administration rule change would make it slightly harder for this hypothetical (fantasy) vendor to do their nefarious illegal deed, but that assumes that the government is willing to kick the hornets nest of conservativism by showing up and making vendors prove they have an FFL. They could have done this already!

The new rules state that that anyone who rents a table at a gun show and sells guns or places an ad announcing that they will be selling guns at a gun show must have an FFL, so at best, a bureaucrat would be assigned to both contacting gun show organizers to ask them to provide information about the people who rented tables and looking for ads from individuals announcing that they will be selling guns at a gun show. Whether some federal agency will show up to arrest those suspected of violating these rules is unknown (again, nearly half the vendors are non-firearm vendors), but I think it is very unlikely. We don’t want a gun show Waco, after all.

The federal government is very concerned about causing a violent conservative freakout. Specifically, Waco and Ruby Ridge have become rallying cries for far-right psychos who think any government push-back against fascism is authoritarianism. While both of those events were clear law enforcement failures, the federal government learned the wrong lesson. Instead of coming up with better procedures for apprehending nazis who have broken the law, they decided to just not try.

One person it might affect — which, again, I’ve never seen at a gun show — is someone who suddenly needs to get rid of a lot of guns from their personal collection. Perhaps they just need some cash and have lost interest in their collection (or parts of it). Perhaps they inherited a bunch of guns and want to get rid of them without paying a commission to a middle man. Now that the rules have changed, that person will no longer be able to rent a table at a gun show to sell their guns. They can, however, walk around with a bucket full of guns and a sign on their back. They can still sell the guns, they just can’t be comfortable while doing it. They might have to leave some in their trunk until they’ve sold everything in the bucket; the bucket is only so big, after all.

If we get back to that hypothetical illegal gun vendor at the gun show, what’s to stop that person from having an associate walk around with a bucket of guns? Yes, I realize that it is technically illegal now, but, again, these supposed unlicensed gun vendors at gun shows were already illegal because they were engaging in the business of firearms sales without having an FFL. The obvious reason for the rule change is to create the illusion of action to win votes.

There it is. The Biden administration’s pretend closing of the gun show loophole is another example of Democrats in action… or should I say Democrats’ inaction? eh? eh?

There’s a lot more detail compared to what I’ve addressed, but it is all here in the White House fact sheet on the new rules:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2024/04/11/fact-sheet-biden-harris-administration-announces-new-action-to-implement-bipartisan-safer-communities-act-expanding-firearm-background-checks-to-fight-gun-crime/

Just keep in mind that for everything they’re mentioning as being addressed by the new rules, they were addressed by the old rules and could have been stopped by law enforcement making an effort to stop illegal activities at gun shows by physically going there. That didn’t happen and it isn’t going to happen.

Can our civilization survive climate change? There’s no short answer to that.

People are strongly motivated to believe that climate change can be overcome, and not only overcome, but overcome in such way that their standard of living is maintained, or even improved. They are also strongly motivated to reject any conclusions regarding climate change that are sad or that imply that their personal behavior will be responsible for a catastrophe.

As a result, it is hard for anyone to talk about climate change realistically. The IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) is the UN group officially tasked with collating official reports on the state of climate science; it has no power to enforce anything. The IPCC’s method for communicating the perils of climate change is to provide a series of hypothetical scenarios; e.g., if we do nothing, outcome A, if we do this, outcome B, if we do that, outcome C. When people read an IPCC report (or the journalism based on it), they are motivated to think, “Oh, OK, it is under control; clearly, we will do option C because that is the good option.” Then, however, no one does option C. They don’t even do option B.

Joe Biden’s most progressive environmental program in history resulted in an increase in US oil production to the highest level in history! Oil is the primary driver of the overall increase in carbon emissions. While the US did manage to decrease emissions by about 2% in 2023 while growing the economy by 2.4%, this is all largely a shell game with emissions being relocated to the “world’s factory” in Asia (and China in particular). Regardless of the details, the reduction in emissions isn’t even enough for the US, specifically, to reach its 2030 goals.

Look at this graph. That’s world CO2 production from 1750 to 2022. You’ll notice that production is leveling off (almost entirely due to natural demographic processes rather than something purposeful), but at a very, very high level of emissions. Scientists first figured out the relationship between CO2 and climate in 1896. Look at that graph again and the level of CO2 in 1896. As things got worse, scientists became more and more alarmed, including scientists working for major oil companies. In the 1980’s, they started to get a bit panicked. Look at that graph again. My point is that we are far, far beyond the “bad level” of CO2.

In fact, if you read the IPCC reports, they actually suggest that our net carbon emissions must drop to net zero emissions by 2050 or our civilization will not continue. Look at that graph again. That would mean that emissions would have to drop to the 1750 level by 2050.

The word “net” does offer a possibility, though. We could remove CO2 from the atmosphere to get to that net carbon level. However, the scale of the problem is too great for the available technology to adequately address it. In the US, there are currently 15 carbon sequestration projects, but they only capture 0.4% of US emissions. Since the US de-industrialized (sending its production capacity overseas), we really need to look at the total CO2 sequestered globally — or at the very least in China, which is now the world’s factory (because they successfully seized the means of production). Globally, we are currently sequestering 2 billion tons of carbon annually out of 35 billion tons produced. Sequestering enough carbon to solve the problem this way is simply not feasible. Part of the problem is that carbon sequestration technology produces more carbon emissions.

Let’s imagine that we are able to sequester half of global carbon emissions. That’s unlikely, but our civilization would still be ended by climate change under these circumstances. We need to reduce our energy use dramatically (look at the chart again) to get to net zero and save our civilization. This is a problem because our civilization is based on a form of capitalism that requires constant growth (otherwise, you’ll have a recession, then a depression, then a collapse). Capitalism just means a class of people owns the equipment required for mass production of goods, but in our version of capitalism, there is a sub-class of capitalists called “bankers”. Bankers make loans with interest, and the other capitalists want to pay off the loans but also make a profit. This is essentially how our society decides what projects go forward; the bankers decide by making loans. For this process to work (and not collapse), the economy must perpetually grow.

The good news is that everything bankers do can be done with democratic allocation of resources instead. The bad news is that what I just described is socialism — and honestly, pretty close to communism. While getting rid of bankers would solve a lot of unrelated problems with society, the people and nations who are effectively in control of this situation will not allow the banking system to be traded for a socialist economy even if the capitalist class were allowed to continue to exist. Therefore, getting rid of the banking system would require a violent revolution (which would also get rid of capitalism).

Let’s say that we had a successful violent revolution, so we’ve replaced the global banking system (and capitalism) with a socialist system that democratically allocates resources instead of letting capitalists and bankers make those decisions. Let’s also say we have succeeded in sequestering half of global carbon emissions as well. Does that solve the problem? No. We would need further changes, such as:

• Near elimination of compressor-based air conditioning
• Near elimination of air travel
• Localization of food production
• Drastic reduction in international shipping (and trade)
• Drastic reduction in volume of consumer products produced
• Drastic reduction in volume of energy-consuming consumer products in use
• Relocation of people living in environmentally absurd locations (e.g., Las Vegas)
• Drastic reduction in meat consumption

Maybe all of those would not be required. Pick half. You see the problem, though, right?

Unless things are in horrible shape already, we aren’t going to do what is necessary. As far as I can tell, we aren’t even going to take power away from the global banking system. Once things are in horrible shape, it is too late because there is up to a 30-year lag between when we take action and when the full impact of released carbon takes place.

I do, however, think it is possible to make it through this and I don’t think we should give up.

There’s a scifi story by Isaac Asmiov (contained in the book “I, Robot”) called “Escape!”) where scientists ask the world’s smartest supercomputer to design a hyperspatial drive (spoilers ahead). The computer is constrained by Asimov’s laws of robotics, which includes preventing the computer from harming a human being. The robot produces a hyperspatial ship and presents it to the humans, but it is clearly some kind of weird practical joke in that there are no controls in the ship and the computer refuses to explain it. Well, the thing works just fine, but it turns out that the crew of the ship ceases to exist for a moment during the hyperspatial jump. It’s OK — it’s only for a moment.

The question we’re facing is: Can our civilization survive climate change?

The answer is yes. But also no.

This civilization, as it is, cannot survive climate change. The civilization that can survive climate change is very different from what we have now. Perhaps there’s a way to allow the current civilization to blink out of existence for a moment, and something new to take its place. The key might be in working class people deciding that, rather than trying to burn everything down, they’re just going to start doing things the right way. It’s entirely possible to simply ignore the bankers, capitalists and their political lackeys and just work things out with each other directly. This change is by no means inevitable, but if we don’t make that change, there will be no technologically-advanced human society going forward.

I am subscribed to Heather Cox Richardson’s “Letters to America” emails. Each email is a great summary of how well-informed, nice, liberal people feel about a particular idea. They also illustrate how liberalism deceives itself and others through:

1. Omitting important facts. I won’t call this “lying through omission” because I believe that, in most cases, liberals just don’t see some important facts as relevant.
2. Plain old obtuseness. When the facts of the situation clearly counter the logic and narrative of liberalism, liberals will typically become blind to the problem. It’s like they glitch out for a second before they move on.

I see this problem with almost every email from Heather Cox Richardson (HCR), and today’s email is no exception. One of the core beliefs of today’s liberal is that “our democratic institutions” (their term, not mine) are inherently leading us toward a better society, and though they might take a while, they are always making progress. They have faith in these supposedly democratic institutions — even when they are clearly failing to deal with extreme threats to democracy and individual freedom.

In contrast, the left’s position is that liberalism leads to fascism.

Today’s HCR email was about the horrible decision that the Arizona Supreme Court made in regard to the validity of the state’s 1864 law making abortion illegal. I say “horrible” not because I think the court made the wrong decision, but rather because of the consequences the decision will have on everyone in that state — especially women. In the court’s words:

A policy matter of this gravity must ultimately be resolved by our citizens through the legislature or the initiative process…. We defer, as we are constitutionally obligated to do, to the legislature’s judgment, which is accountable to, and thus reflects, the mutable will of our citizens.

HCR’s opines that, “…it’s an interesting spin to say that the new policy is protecting the will of the citizens.”

Like most weirdly obtuse omissions from liberals, there’s a lot to unpack despite how little was said. Her position, essentially, is that:

• The will of the people is for abortion to be legal.
• Our democratic institutions would, therefore, naturally allow for abortion to be legal, so that must be what they are doing.
• Republicans, who are defying the will of the people (and in this case are represented by the all-Republican Arizona Supreme Court), have sabotaged and defied our democratic institutions by making abortion illegal.

HCR explains at length various details of why the 1864 law does not really represent people today, and I think everything she says about that is true and interesting.

Tell me, though: How, exactly, is the court supposed to know what the will of the people is? The answer in the Arizona case (as well as in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade) is that the court should look to the law and interpret it. In both cases, when you look to the law, the law supports: A) the position that the federal government has no position (allowing state legislation to take priority), and B) the position that abortion is illegal in Arizona.

The court is certainly not allowed to base their decision on the results of a poll conducted by Associated Press, nor should they, yet this is exactly what HCR implies that the court should do. Does HCR believe that a poll conducted by a private corporation is more indicative of the will of the people than “our democratic institutions”?

I do believe that most people want the law to allow abortion — especially when you frame it in terms of how the law should apply to themselves and the women they have close relationships to, but that is just my opinion.

If our democratic institutions (again, their term) were working democratically, and if, indeed, the people really want abortion to be legal, then both federal law and Arizona state law would say that. The fact that the federal and Arizona legislative processes both failed to make abortion explicitly legal either means that the people don’t want it to be legal or “our democratic institutions” are not very democratic.

In order for “our democratic institutions” to be democratic, the people running them must believe in democracy. In order to end up with people who believe in democracy running your institutions, the people must believe in democracy. However, neither the average Democrat nor the average Republican truly believes in democracy. They both believe in a limited republican version of democracy that protects certain powerful groups against “the mob” (i.e., actual democracy). In the case of the Democrats, with whom HCR sides, they have explicitly said in court that they have no obligation to satisfy the will of Democratic party voters during primaries or even follow their own published rules regarding how Democratic party candidates will be chosen.

The US Constitution was designed specifically to protect “the opulent minority” — wealthy people — and there are multiple firewalls protecting elite power from the opinions of the common citizen. When you are operating in a system that is designed to prevent democracy, it occasionally prevents democracy in a way you don’t like. This system is meant to be a defensive weapon for protection of the wealthy, but like any weapon, it can be pointed at anyone. The Arizona decision proves that not even our bodily autonomy is protected from the whims of the elites who are allowed to control political institutions and disregard the will of the people.

Related: We’re a Republic, Not a Democracy

Related: Why Liberalism Leads to Fascism

Did you know that the left’s entire pretentious world view collapses without the support of capitalist innovation? Well, that’s what they keep saying over at Quora, which is supposed to be an answers website, but is more like a hell-hole of competing propaganda.

My understanding of this idea is that the capitalist is supposedly special because they are the class of people that has the ability to innovate, and then our whole economic system rewards them for innovating. The implication is that this capitalist innovation is what makes the world move forward, so without a capitalist class, the world cannot move forward. Moving forward seems to mean things getting better, especially in terms of technology. Some people also intend this to mean that the world moves forward socially, but most people who are fans of capitalism believe that there’s an apex of human society that we have already reached and that things cannot get any better because humans are naturally awful and irredeemable — but only at the group level. At the individual level, these people believe that everyone can improve.

There’s so much wrong with this that it is hard to know where to start, but let’s start with the capitalists being special because they can innovate. People like to say that necessity is the mother of invention, but that’s not accurate either. Anyone can innovate if they have: 1) Resources, and 2) Time — and really, time is just another resource. The type of innovation that occurs is guided by what the innovator sees as being needed by society. It’s certainly true that capitalists have more opportunity to innovate in the sense that they are not working, so they have lots of time, and they control vast resources, so they have the opportunity to manifest any ideas they might have. However, there’s nothing magically good and unique about the capitalist’s body or mind that makes them more able to innovate.

The idea that certain people are born better at innovating isn’t just incorrect, it’s also a form of eugenics and a manifestation of narcissistic culture. Eugenics is this idea that you should interfere with society to arrange human reproduction so that certain heritable characteristics are increased in the population and others are decreased. If we’re pretending that some people are naturally (i.e., genetically) better at innovating, and that innovating makes you superior, then you want those people to receive more resources with the assumption that their genetic lines will become more numerous and protected from adverse conditions that might destroy the gene line — and that is eugenics, which is the underpinning of pseudo-scientific racism. Narcissistic culture assumes that some people are just better than other people by merely existing even if they don’t really improve the lives of other people. Within a narcissistic culture, each individual will tend to believe that they are one of the naturally better people, so you end up with everyone thinking they are better than everyone else. It’s a world of assholes.

The funny thing, though, is that despite having all this opportunity to innovate in terms of time and resources, capitalists do not innovate more than other people, and when they do innovate, their ideas are just as likely as anyone else’s to be bad or just a rehash of a pre-existing idea. Moreover, most innovation that is attributed to a capitalist was actually performed by someone they employed. Paying someone to innovate is not the same as being an innovator. Sometimes, the capitalist purchases the right to say they innovated something despite someone else having done the innovating (see Elon Musk and his false claim that he founded Tesla). Some of the best innovations of the past hundred years were in fact created by people employed by the government that then passed those ideas on to private companies controlled by capitalists who then took credit for those innovations.

Related: 5 important inventions you didn’t know were NASA spinoffs

Do capitalist innovations (in the sense of any innovation that a capitalist benefits from) improve the world? Most do not — but you don’t remember most of the ones that were flops. Like Lady Gaga Oreos. Remember that? The only reason I remember that one is that it was so outlandishly stupid. Like, what does Lady Gaga taste like, exactly? What is her flavor? I never found out because I didn’t buy them.

What is it that capitalists do?

Most of the time, capitalists do absolutely nothing of value for other people. In most cases, the talent of the capitalist is having a good eye for investment opportunities; i.e., they don’t innovate, but they do notice innovations of others and attach themselves to those projects in a way that helps the project move forward while also making the capitalist even more wealthy. Again, though, being able to identify a good idea is not a talent unique to the capitalist class! Most people have a pretty good idea about which ideas are likely to be popular, they just aren’t sitting on a mountain of cash that they can throw at those potentially-popular ideas. The only reason capitalists are making the decisions about which innovations to support is because they are already wealthy.

This does not address the American ideal of the innovator, though, and those people sometimes exist. What about them? Let’s say you are Randall Peltzer, and you have innovated a handy gizmo for the traveling professional that puts all the tools needed in the bathroom together in a single device. You call it the Bathroom Buddy and it would be a big hit if only you had a million dollars to start production, get some marketing materials out in the public eye, and so forth. What do you do? Well, you go to the bank where a capitalists decides if your innovation is worthy, and if they decide it is, they get a huge chunk of the profits from your innovation. Under capitalism, the capitalist rarely innovates, but always decides which innovations are produced.

Banking is the core of capitalism, and is controlled by capitalists. Even the US Federal Reserve Bank is largely independent of the government, even though it claims to be “accountable” — but remember that the government itself is controlled by capitalists who are legally allowed to bribe politicians (including the Supreme Court). So, the capitalist bribes the government in order to control staffing of the Federal Reserve, which is then independent from the government so that it can best serve the needs of the capitalists without interference from the voters. The whole point of capitalism is that capitalists get to control everything because they control the capital, and the banks themselves are the most important part of that control.

I’ve seen people say that the moment someone mentions banking (and especially global banking), you should ignore them because they’re secretly antisemitic, and then, typically, they also imply that concern about banks is silly. The whole reason why fascists distract you with anti-Jewish conspiracies, though, is to point you away from the real concentrations of power that affect your life. They want to control those concentrations of power, not destroy them. As a result of their lies, either you end up attacking the wrong people, or you start believing that there are no concentrations of power. Either of those outcomes is good from the perspective of the capitalist, who is real, and probably not Jewish.

Let me say it again: Global banking is a real problem. Bankers do take decision-making power away from you and are anti-democratic. There is no single ethnic group that controls banking. Global banking is not a conspiracy because it is happening out in the open and it isn’t as organized as the word “conspiracy” would imply.

Certainly, investing resources in an innovative project does require people to make that resource allocation decision. Resources don’t just allocate themselves. But why should it be capitalists — who are not smarter than other people and who are clearly more selfish than the average person — are the people who make these decisions? Instead, decisions about how to allocate resources should be more democratic. Even if you disagree that resource allocation should be democratized, there’s no justification for why capitalists should be the group that should make those decisions for everyone. Even if you think the market has special properties that allow it to sort out resource allocation, capitalists are not the market; in fact, they are overly powerful (anti-democratic) actors within the market that distort it and a truly free market would be democratic (in a consumerist sense).

Here’s the thing: People who are in favor of capitalism are against democracy. It’s as simple as that. They think people (but not themselves) are stupid and evil, so democracy just can’t work. The con that we have collectively fallen for is called the Virtue of Selfishness, and by that logic, it is the most selfish of us that are the most virtuous and should therefore be in charge. But in fact, putting the worst (most selfish) of us in charge has created a dystopia that is getting worse every day.

I haven’t been able to look into the Biden’s State of the Union speech from last night yet because I find him so annoying, but I was able to watch the GOP response. The GOP response was very funny, and therefore more watchable.

Republicans are strongly criticizing the response speech which was made by a younger Senator, Katie Britt, for being just cringey and awful. That’s interesting because it really embodies exactly the kind of vibe that MAGA has been promoting for years now in a way that I have not seen before. To me, it was perfect, in fact. Britt’s response speech certainly had a disturbing tone from my perspective, yet criticizing her speech really seems equivalent to criticizing the entire MAGA ethos.

But, if you get beyond the spirit and tone of her speech and look at the substantive issues she spoke on, what is left? Katie and her husband are concerned that the next generation will not have the opportunities and freedoms that they had. OK, neither the Republicans nor the Democrats can address either of those things because they are both beholden to ridiculously wealthy elites (just, perhaps, different subsets of those wealthy elites) and Republicans in particular are absolutely uninterested in individual freedom. Rather, Republicans have proven over and over again that they are interested in individual compliance with traditional culture; what they call “freedom” is the freedom to comply or face harsh consequences for going against traditional culture.

“I worry that my children may not get a shot at living their American dreams,” she says. Not “the” American dream, but “their” American dreams. What if their American dreams are gay, Katie? What if their American dreams don’t include having a lot of children?

Side note: My face hurts just watching how much this woman strains her facial muscles.

Britt does the classic right-wing misdirection — after talking about how her children’s American dreams may no longer be attainable, she shifts to the “crisis at the border” implying that this is somehow the cause of the problem rather than the real problem, which is the wealthy leveraging their control of corporations and the government itself to suck all the money (and power) out of normal working people.

The border is a mess, but it isn’t a crisis (Republicans who went down there to try to do something about it in person found this out first-hand) and it wasn’t the “most secure border ever” during the Trump administration. In fact, the Biden administration has been very authoritarian about that border since taking office (to the chagrin of people on the left). Moreover, as I’ve said before, the US economy requires illegal workers to function normally.

The specific things Britt mentions in her speech did not change the security of the border at all. Halting construction is not the same at deconstruction, and the border wall is not effective anyway; but never mind that, Biden actually built more of the border wall! She’s just straight-up lying about that. Announcing plans doesn’t do anything to change the world (it’s a common Democratic party ploy to make their voters think they’re doing something).

Side note: They’re right — she does seem like the drunk mom you ran into in your friend’s kitchen in the middle of the night when you were doing a sleepover in junior high.

I started trying to go over every little detail of her anti-immigrant monologue, but the truth is the whole subject is a distraction from the real issue: the destruction that the global billionaire class is creating in the US, Mexico, and every other country on this planet. If your 70+ year-old relative is having to choose between food and medication, it is the global billionaire class — not the Mexicans — that created this situation. Our dollars do not go as far as they did because of the global billionaire class, not because of immigrants.

Side note: That’s a really cute faucet, Katie. Looks like it might be the Rohl Acqui, which costs over $500. Yikes! If you like that look, Home Depot has some things that are similar (but not exactly the same) for a lot less. FYI.

When she says “the left” (meaning Democrats, who are actually center-right) has coddled criminals and defunded the police, that’s simply not true. There’s nowhere in America where the current funding for police is less than it was before Biden took office. Regarding “coddling criminals” — I can only guess that means releasing them from prison — our American system of institutionalized poverty to benefit the billionaire class does generate a lot of crime, but those who commit serious crimes are staying in prison. It’s only very low-level criminals who are being released back into society.

She claims that small towns as well as big cities are getting more dangerous, but the fact is that small towns are being emptied out by poverty, and overall violent crime has dropped to an extremely low level (probably because those who were most affected by lead exposure became elderly) and has stayed extremely low since 2012. The only way to really get it any lower would be socialism and certainly nothing the Republicans have suggested would decrease violent crime.

She claims that the problem with Biden is that he is “weak” rather than anything about his concrete policy decisions. It’s the standard dominance culture of the right and its standard assumption that if you aren’t promoting and exhibiting dominance culture, you are instead promoting and exhibiting chaos and ruin. There’s no logical thread that makes that assumption work, it’s just an assumption they hold because anything other than traditional culture makes them severely anxious.

Then, she claims that Biden is somehow not keeping his word in terms of foreign policy, which is just plain bunk. Trump is the one who withdrew the US from Afghanistan; Biden just inherited the decision which was already in motion. Nobody is more pro-Israel than Biden, and nobody is more pro-Putin than Trump.

Side note: She’s a bad actor. Her lies should be completely transparent to everyone. Maybe that’s really why Republicans didn’t like her speech.

She apparently wants to go to war with China or at least do a lot of posturing about China. Trump didn’t face foreign policy problems with strength and resolve. He basically offered to blow every dictator out there. Neat how Britt has forgotten that.

It’s true that we are not better off than we were 3 years ago.
It’s true that we are at a crossroads.
It’s true that it doesn’t have to be this way.

The problem, though, is that the Republican party is no more able to do something about it than the Democrats are because both parties are beholden to billionaire donors who get whatever they want. Sure, those billionaires disagree internally about how best to suck the rest of the wealth out of the working class, but they all agree that exsanguinating us is a great idea.

Side note: Katie Britt and her husband have a net worth of between $1 million and $5 million, making her part of the millionaire sycophant class that services and promotes the billionaire class just like a vampire’s bug-eating familiars (per Bram Stoker’s Dracula). Yes, the rest of the US congress is basically the same.

I had to stop watching Britt’s speech at about 13 minutes because the comedy wore off , and then it was just really boring and stupid, but apparently, the Republican party is the party of hard working families and parents. If that were the case, they would support taking some of the money and power away from the lazy billionaire class and putting it back in the pockets of those hard working families. They can’t do that because they serve the global billionaire class just like the Democrats. In fact, they have to strongly oppose anything like that so that the Democrats can pretend to support a more democratic tax system, and then shrug and fail.

Republicans: If you really want to vote for a party that supports hard working families and parents, here you go.

The following statements appeared on Resistance News Network on Feb. 26, 2024.

We, in the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), express our heartfelt condolences and our full solidarity with the family and friends of the U.S. pilot Aaron Bushnell, whose name has been immortalized as a defender of humanitarian values and the plight of the oppressed Palestinian people who are suffering due to the U.S. administration and its unjust policies, like the U.S. activist Rachel Corrie who was crushed by a Zionist bulldozer in 2003 in Rafah, the same city for which Bushnell paid for with his life to pressure his country’s government to prevent the criminal Zionist army from attacking it and committing massacres and violations in it. 

The administration of U.S. President Joe Biden bears full responsibility for the death of Aaron Bushnell due to its policy that supports the Nazi Zionist entity in the genocide war against our Palestinian people, as he gave his life in order to highlight the massacres and Zionist ethnic cleansing against our people in the Gaza Strip. 

The heroic pilot Aaron Bushnell will remain immortal in the memory of our Palestinian people and the free people of the world, and a symbol of the spirit of global humanitarian solidarity with our people and their just cause. 

The tragic incident that cost pilot Bushnell his life is an expression of the growing anger among the people in the U.S. who reject their country’s policy that contributes to the killing and genocide of our people, and rejects their government’s violation of global humanitarian values, by providing cover to ensure the impunity of the Nazi entity and its leaders from punishment and accountability. 

Central Media Department of The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine

The act of a U.S. soldier sacrificing himself for Palestine is the highest sacrifice and a medal, and a poignant message to the U.S. administration to stop its involvement in the aggression.

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine affirmed that the act of Aaron Bushnell from the U.S. Air Force by setting himself on fire in front of the Zionist embassy in Washington, D.C., in protest against the war on Gaza, in which he called for the “liberation of Palestine,” confirms the state of anger among the people in the U.S. due to the official U.S. involvement in the Zionist genocide war being waged on the Gaza Strip. 

It also indicates that the status of the Palestinian cause, especially in U.S. circles, is becoming more deeply entrenched in the global conscience, and reveals the truth of the Zionist entity as a cheap colonial tool in the hands of savage imperialism.

The Front expresses its full solidarity with the soldier’s family and all the U.S. sympathizers who took a honorable stance and whose struggle and pressure to stop the genocide on the Strip have not ceased, confirming that the act of a U.S. soldier sacrificing his life to draw the attention of the U.S. people and the world to the plight of the Palestinian people, despite its tragic nature and the great pain it involves, is considered the highest sacrifice and medal, and the most important poignant message directed to the U.S. administration, that it is involved in the war crime in Gaza and that the people in the U.S. have awakened and are rejecting this involvement, calling on the administration to stop this support and bias for the Zionist entity.

The Front sent a message to the Arab soldier to take this U.S. soldier who sacrificed his life for a noble cause like the Palestinian cause as an example and role model, and to leave the trenches of waiting, incapacity, and move to the trench of confrontation in support of Palestine and its people who are being slaughtered, besieged, and starved in full view and hearing of the world and just a few kilometers from Arab lands and meters from the borders.

Palestine will be victorious as long as it has deeply engraved itself in the consciences of the world, and history will record in golden letters the names of all the sympathizers and free people of the world who stood with it and sacrificed their lives for its sake.

Votes in red or blue states don’t really matter thanks to the anti-democratic electoral college system. Sure, go vote, but it’s only the swing states that really determine the results of a Presidential election. For 2024, those swing states are:

• North Carolina
• Georgia
• Arizona
• Michigan
• Wisconsin
• Pennsylvania

If you’re in one of those swing states, you should fully think through the practical impact of your vote. I’m not saying who you should vote for or even if you should vote — I’m just saying your vote really matters if you live in a swing state, and you should give this decision the attention it deserves.

But for the rest of us (and by “us” I mean the left), there is no reason to play this idiotic electoral college game according to mainstream rules. You can vote for whoever you want because it doesn’t matter. You can vote for a socialist. You can vote for the libertarian. You can vote for your dog. You can vote for yourself. It’s freeing, I think. I do recommend that you show up, though. It’s a lot more powerful to metaphorically write “fuck you” (you could do this literally as a write-in candidate if you want) on the ballot than to just not show up. Not showing up communicates apathy, and they’re fine with apathy.

I’m not 100% sure that I even want Biden to win, but since I’m not in a swing state, I don’t need to think all the way through it. But, if Biden winning is the best thing, then it does seem like it would be really good if Biden won the electoral college but also got very little of the popular vote. Seems like that would accurately communicate to the Democratic party that they need to stop choosing these neoliberal, quite-possibly-fascist candidates if they want to remain relevant.

The flip side of this is that Biden needs to be physically going to those 6 swing states and really kissing the asses of the voters there so he doesn’t pull an HRC and lose the electoral vote. If he loses the electoral vote, it will be his fault for being a terrible candidate — it will not be the voters’ fault for not voting for the terrible candidate.

In terms of who to choose for your protest vote, let me suggest Claudia De la Cruz. She is running with Karina Garcia as her VP as the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL) candidates.

Claudia De la Cruz is a mother, popular educator and theologian born in the South Bronx who has spent her life organizing for justice for working people at home and to end U.S. empire abroad. Karina Garcia is a Chicana organizer, popular educator and mother who has spent her entire adult life fighting for the rights of immigrant workers, women and the whole working class.

Go ahead and explore the details if you like; just remember, it isn’t possible for them to win an election in the USA so if you’ve got some small nitpick about their politics, it absolutely does not matter.

Liberals are always talking about reaching across the aisle. The metaphor imagines that there is an auditorium (or perhaps the congressional chambers) and that all the Republicans are sitting on the right side of the center aisle and all the Democrats are sitting on the left side of the center aisle. The metaphorical “reaching” is really the “two sides” finding common ground that will allow them to make concessions and reach an agreement on how the United States of America should be governed.

On the surface, reaching across the aisle is a good idea. People getting along is good. People having conflicts that might lead to a civil war is bad. (As long as you ignore the details.)

So what is the common ground between the Republicans and Democrats? And what are some concessions they might make to one another? These are questions we might all want to consider before we seriously consider reaching across the aisle.

Let’s admit first, though, that reaching across the aisle automatically excludes the MAGA extremists on the Republican side, and the pro-democracy, anti-genocide extremists that often end up voting Democrat (i.e., “the left”).

Common Ground

Both sides support unquestioning support of Israel no matter how fascistic and genocidal the Israeli government and, apparently, a majority of Israelis might be. Sure, there are people who vote Democrat or Republican that do not support the Israeli government (e.g., some Republicans are antisemitic but really want the Temple in Jerusalem to be rebuilt, and leftists don’t think the Holocaust justifies the Nakba), but nobody is reaching across the aisle to those folks.

Both sides support the existence of homelessness, starvation, and deprivation of medical care within the richest country on Earth. Democrats believe that capitalism is the best possible system, and thus believe poverty is inevitable, whereas Republicans believe someone else suffering is a desirable outcome.

Both sides support the idea of the United States of America and its institutions, such as the Constitution. “Our institutions” is such an empty value as to be comical were it not for the fact that Democrats and Republicans both swoon over this nebulous idea. We’re talking about a Constitution specifically designed to protect the “opulent minority” (rich people) and allow for the institution of slavery. This is not a document to be fetishized, but rather one we should be criticizing and reforming, as FDR intended with his Economic Bill of Rights. Moreover, there is nothing about the Constitution that would prevent the conversion of the USA to a fully fascist government and society despite what liberals like to pretend.

Both sides support increasing the carbon production of our country. Yes, the Biden administration has made great strides in promoting alternative energy, but at the same time it increased US production of fossil fuels such that the US is now the biggest producer in the world. That increased production will produce more CO2 than the CO2 cuts created by the Biden administration’s “green” policies. As always, the goal of liberal governments is to increase GDP and private profits at any cost. Analysis: Biden-Approved Fossil Fuel Projects Undermine IRA Emissions Cuts

Both sides support a militarized police force, criminalization of poverty, and a privatized prison system that holds the highest percentage of the population of any country on Earth.

Making Concessions

In order to really reach across the aisle, the reacher must be willing to make some concessions. The Republicans never talk about reaching — only Democrats espouse this as a good course of action. In fact, when the Democrats take a step to the right, Republicans respond by also moving a step to the right; that’s been going on since the Obama administration. Or maybe since Bill Clinton.

What concessions could the Democrats make to the Republicans?

The Democrats could offer to privatize Social Security. Social Security is universally loved by normal Americans and universally hated by the wealthy. Republicans like to pretend that if we privatized Social Security, the program would do much better financially, so this is something those vultures might like. In fact, they almost did this in 2011-2012, calling it the Grand Bargain. Fortunately, popular opposition shot it down. It was a great example, though, of how the Democratic party elite are willing to lose on purpose to support the wishes of the donor class — as long as they can get away with it.

The Democrats could offer to end gay marriage, substituting the less offensive “domestic partnership” scenario. They could also end or reduce protections for any and all minority groups, basically legalizing discrimination. While Democrats would never legalize genocide within the borders of the USA, they could certainly agree to defund programs meant to investigate and prosecute hate crimes. They could change the emphasis of various executive branch departments; for example, they could focus the FBI on “finding illegal immigrants” and instruct them to ignore hate-based crimes.

(Believe me — I don’t want to give conservatives ideas, but you people keep trying to make deals with them.)

The Democrats could actively support the Christianity-centric (theocratic) view of the USA that Republicans would like to see re-established, including moving funding for public institutions to church-run institutions, like private religious schools.

The Democrats could agree to end their campaign to provide federal funding for child care for working moms while simultaneously providing bigger tax credits for children, thus forcing mothers out of the workforce. If the numbers were right, this could effectively end feminism as we know it in a single generation. Remember, Republicans don’t really care about being frugal — they only care about promoting their culture and preferred power hierarchy.

Democrats could end their campaign to reform gun laws. They could even allow Class 3 weapons (machine guns, suppressors, short-barreled rifles, etc.) to be sold using the instant background check system instead of the months-long and overly complex current process. If this sounds absurd, consider how adding an electronic fingerprint scanner at each FFL (funded by the US taxpayer, of course) would make the current system seem pointless to the average voter.

Democrats could agree to bomb Iran. This is one of those things the Democratic donor class really wants anyway, so it is very appealing.

Democrats could agree to a rigorous law enforcement campaign to destroy antifa, who are obviously doing something illegal by existing (they’re not).

Democrats could agree to truly shutting down the southern US border in violation of US and international law. Yeah, I know I just said it is illegal, but the Refuge Act of 1980 can be repealed and Americans mostly think they are above international law. This would also be morally deplorable, but Americans definitely don’t care about that.

The right to asylum was enshrined in 1948’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights and then again in the Refugee Convention of 1951 and its 1967 Protocol. The United States passed its own federal law in the Refugee Act of 1980, for people who are fleeing persecution on “account of race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion.”

ACLU

The Democrats could sign on to a bill allowing US police the right to execute anyone on the spot if they believe they have committed a felony.

Am I being hyperbolic? OK, then you tell me — what exactly should Democrats offer to do for the genocidal, hateful lovers of suffering and domination that are the Republican party? Quite literally, no good can come from Republicans getting even a small part of what they want. If you want to make a deal with the Republicans, why not go straight to the Devil instead?

The Other Aisle

If Democrats really wanted to bring the country together and promote policies that would ultimately be popular with nearly all Americans, they would reach across the other aisle — to the left.

The left knows where to find the funding to help people train for new and more rewarding jobs.

The left knows how to get resources to mothers who wish to stay at home with their children as well as mothers who wish to follow a career path.

The left knows how to fully fund Social Security without increasing your taxes.

The left knows how to make small towns thrive.

The left knows how to leave a survivable planet to our children.

The left knows how to build a world where everyone gets along and thrives — except the rich and bigots.

The left knows how to decrease immigration and make it so we no longer require it for our economy to function.

Problem Solved

Another way of looking at it is that as long as we are unwilling to aggravate a tiny minority of ultra-rich assholes, we will not be able to solve the real problems that most Americans face. America’s two-party system is really a debate between two cabals of powerful shit sacks regarding exactly how the average American’s life should be exploited and controlled. The rest of us are being forced to choose between them, but this is like asking the condemned man how he wants to die, and then giving him two gruesome options; it isn’t a meaningful choice, even though it seems rather important in the moment.

In the non-metaphorical real world, this means giving a person two shitty options, and they are left to determine which option is best for them. You can’t ever have financial security, but you get to choose between screwing over some specific minority groups (e.g., women, Black people) and screwing over everyone equally. You can’t have peace, but you can choose which conflicts and genocides to fund. You can’t have a job where you are respected and do meaningful work, but you can choose to make some other group of people have it worse than you do (or not). One side offers nonsense and suffering, the other side offers nothing but I guess having dystopia painted in your favorite color is worth something.

I realize people are going to read this and say something like, “well, communism is bad because…” That’s fine. Whatever bad features you think communism or socialism has, let’s not do those features. Let’s do the other ones instead. You don’t like how Soviet Russia was anti-Christian? Fine. No problem. We don’t have to do that bit. You think communism steals your toothbrush? Fine. I formally propose that we do communism without toothbrush stealing. Easy peasy. Do you think small businesses are all run by the state under socialism? OK, no problem. Under our version, small businesses will be independent of the state — and the banks and the landlords. They won’t even be taxed. Problem solved.