Well, I agree with the fundamentals, as described in your essay.
The problem is that decades of learned helplessness have turned the populace into passive observers, despite their discontent.
Neither party works fir the people, justice is anything but blind, quality of life is average to terrible for 90% of the country...yet we've been bombarded by "American exceptionalism" propaganda for generations.
Even now, as institurions are gutted, the Tradury is being plundered, basic freedoms are decimated, oversight over food and water radically cut, soaring prices, unaffordable housing, unionization under 10%, wages stagnant, an obscenely low minimum wage, terrorization (and worse) of immigrants (now spreading to citizens), cities occupied by unrestrained, unaccountable secret police, the construction of a surveillance state that will monitor and punish any dissent, and the increasingly real possibility that midterms will be neither free not fair...only a tiny percentage are activated.
The vast majority of the country passively watches, expresses outrage on SM, then returns to their lives (assuming someone else will fix the calamity) or tgat midterms will magically make a difference to a regime that ignores Congress.
People won't mass boycott MAGA-enabling corporations, mass strike, place maximum pressure on elected leaders, mass support progressive local and state candidates, or even mass defect from SM (the lowest of low bars).
Either Americans are not who we thought we were, or Americans need to hit rock bottom to take risks and sacrifice for their freedoms and future.
Or maybe, Americans will just acclimate to a dictatorship.
Yes, this. I said back in 2016 that we were being faced with a choice between fascism Trump style and fascism Hillary style. This here is what I meant.
"When a president acts like a thug, everyone he goes after becomes a victim. Even when they’re not"
The Corrupt Democrats and the sheep that follow them deserve Trump and all the thuggery that comes with it! The Democrats could have run fair primaries in 2016 & 2020 .
The candidate the DEMOCRATIC PARTY ELECTORATE actually wanted (BERNIE SANDERS) who was kicking the ass of the hated Hillary Clinton(2016) and IDIOT Demented Old Basement Dweller Campaigner Joe Biden(2020) could have beaten Trump without stealing the elections. The DNC anoints(NOT ELECTS) clowns to represent the party they deserve what they get. All this crying and whining about Trump was self-inflicted. They created Trump. The Corrupt Media, The Lawlessness thuggery trying to take TRUMP out, allowing a man with a rifle on his back to openly walk right through Secret Service security and set up on a roof for a clear shot in PA, in an attempt to assassinate TRUMP, Turning a typical book keeping entry into 34 Felonies, and the constant FAKENEWS unsubstantiated lies, attacks and propaganda against TRUMP on a Daily basis for 10 years now. They created TRUMP. People love the under dog. Especially one that has been under constant attack by a corrupt establishment for 10 years. Every illegitimate attack made him stronger.
The Democrats could have beaten TRUMP easy 2016 IF THEY REALLY WANTED TO. The day that audio came out where TRUMP talked about grabbing a female by her crotch he should have been finished politically. All the Corrupt SCUM BAG DEMOCRATIC PARTY and their puppets in the media had to was stop giving him so much media coverage, and run FAIR PRIMARIES and let the candidate a majority of REAL DEMOCRATIC PARTY VOTERS WANTED Bernie Sanders take his rightful spot as the Democratic Party Nominee in 2016 and 2020.
The DNC divided the party voters and to this day WE have not forgotten about the @DNC betrayal.AND WE WILL NOT FORGET. I believe the weakening of the Democratic Party and their putrid Campaign Platform was all deliberate. Orchestrated by the TOP 1% and Wall Street Democratic Party Donors to do what they are doing now: FINISH the 46 Year destruction American Middle Class and hand it all to a small group of GREEDY THUGS in the Top 1%. Its over. The Top 1% owns both parties now. The TOP 1% and Wall Street have added rules, regulations, debate rigging, and media domination that WILL KEEP any 3rd Party competition from ever getting a chance to defeat the TOP 1% Controlled MULTI-NATIONAL CORPORATE FASCIST Democrats/Republican Criminal Organization. #ThePitchforksAreComing Its the only avenue we have to take our country back from these GREEDY CARPETBAGGERS
Bernie became the sheepdog, shepherding the rubes into voting for corrupt, greedy Democratic candidates. When asked if he would consider running as an independent, he replied, "No, I don't want to become Ralph Nader." That says it all. Bernie is much more concerned about his own political career than the people he supposedly represents.
Americans are consumers, we buy stuff like crazy. So I'm thinking that the fastest, most direct route to real change is to vote with our dollars. Attack the corporate sector with targeted boycotts, and cause them real economic pain. That will get results way faster than just showing up to vote every four years.
I love the boycott strategy in theory the problem arises when poor american can't boycott maybe because of financial constraints, fewer available alternatives and the very plausible inadvertent impact from participation. Boycotting may be a more effective tool for the affluent not absolutely of course but bears considering.
Yes to all of this except the naive bit about Maduro — that’s propaganda, and you fail to mention that the Venezuelan economy is shambles because of sanctions IMPOSED BU THE US. I, like many Venezuelans *in Venezuela*, support Maduro’s return to the country he was elected to lead (and yes, he was in fact elected).
Since Nixon became Ike's VP, and manipulated Ike in the hospital by framing the transportation secretary with hookers and cameramen, leading to the installation of Bechtel and whoom, the Interstate system, 'murkan culture has come to this:
'murkan Culture is a Tragi-comedy Reality Media Show. Media control both the quality and content of the reality most urbanites and suburbanites ingest. Rural folk are not far behind, just with fewer takes of the tragi-comedy. It all is a transactional clown show of Fool Me magic. And radio is a big part in the rural areas, cuz one can listen while working, driving trucks, tractors, etc. Who overwhelms this area? Hyper-conservative religious dogma dog-and-pony talk radio. Limbaugh and all its bastard puppies screaming rage rhetoric at the locals.
Political parties are cults of personality, nothing more. Who needs advertising influence in media? The corporate oligarchy. Who needs cultural manipulation in the media? Corporate oligarchy. Tons of cop shows. Tons of medical stress shows. Tons of urban strife shows about fires, rescues, hospitals, doctors, murders, thefts.
Then we have the Social Media sewer. Too gross to even describe, but it guts the ethical/moral centers of the human brain.
Then we have the incessant Gaming/Warfare/Murder/Alien Invasion media completely crushing the brains of youth, who NOW steer military drones across the planet into apartment buildings, funerals, weddings, battlegrounds, agriculture fields, etc.
Now who will save us them this? The religious reactionary Right on air, cable, streaming, and radio. You cannot be saved by some god's love until you hate, torture, imprison or kill a whole bunch of 'nasty' people who do not look just like you. Note, no one person looks exactly like another, so in Practice, everyone is a suspect.
Now WHO controls all this apparatus? Banking, Wall St., Insurance, Hedge Funds, blue Bloods, foreign Capital. We citizens are just mesmerized dupes staring at some kind of screen or another, jumping when told to jump. Stockholm Syndrome on steroids.
Cannot disagree. Can say that we created systems that are far more complicated than they need to be. Complicated is a negative that reflects poor thinking, poor design, and poor implementation and maintenance. I can say this from deep experience having spent a long career in software engineering at large banking institutions, amongst other institutions. Even, and maybe especially, the programs we wrote were absurdly over-complicated making them difficult at best to maintain. I used to sneak in and rewrite code to make it transparent, far more simple and accurate, and helpful should anything in the system break down for any reason. I never met anyone like me. My peers seemed to enjoy what we used to call "spaghetti code", but I have noticed that it is a male trait that enjoys making absurdly complicated mouse traps for their own pleasure with no thought of who or what was going to have deal with said trap that always broke down. With good design, there's near flawless efficiency and transparency, and it is easy to update and maintain - for the sake of the future. Good leadership could insist on these system development traits, computerized or not, but they do not - and that burns my britches to this day, despite being retired from that field. Yet, it could still be insisted upon, yet it still doesn't happen. Oy vey, the stories I could tell.
We can't seem to hold two apparently contracting concepts at the same time probably has something to with too dichotomous an upbringing. An appeal to our education system where critical thinking isnt some sort of moral defect. The theme for these times is baby out with the bath water. To keep the baby (FED) is to keep the water or the failed system but to toss the failed system we must also throw out the FED which some might argue, undoubted will argue and not very well, isnt so terrible a prospect. I have to admit Powell's video short was moving but it didnt move me all the way over to deciding that he or the fed was somehow christened. Fact is as Corbin has so predictably demonstrated, thank you sir, is that yes, we can redeem this IF we use some brains which may have also been outsourced.
This clear thinking has been needed for years. Leave it to Corbin to articulate it beautifully. Fidelity to principles, not teams or tribes, is the only hope. Let's go!
Born into Republicanism, I can Never go back to that now. A new version is needed IMO (perhaps a Lincoln style party??), but a 3rd party? I am not sure. What I am sure of in these times is:
As I have told others, I have stopped using the term ‘administration’ and started using “Regime” every time I need to refer to the problems ,regardless of Party. To use 'administration' normalizes the current situation AND I just noticed that “Regime " currently also means for Trump and the rest of them to TAKE from me again/over and over. ( re=do again & gime=gimme ) Ok that might be a ‘real stretch' but I am sticking with that.
Sorry Corbin, Trump is not unique, he's an echo of Andrew Jackson.
Among other things, Jackson terminated the central bank charter in 1835, an even more extreme measure than Trump threatening Powell. That meant he had to pay off national debt entirely. It also meant there was no public currency. People did their business with monetized gold (specie) and over 7,000 varieties of private bank notes of varying reliability. It was a business nightmare. The result--as is the case following all significant national debt reductions--was a Great-Depression-sized hole in the economy called the "Panic of 1837."
He also stole the Southeastern US from its native occupants. The Cherokees won their cases in the Georgia Supreme court and the SCOTUS for the title to their land. Thanks to Jackson, they were evicted and marched out in the "Trail of Tears" to Oklahoma--not a state then, but still the same name. The name means "Land of the Red Man" [until the white man wants it back].
More proof of Harry Truman's saying: "There's nothing new under the sun, only history you don't know yet."
This kind of behavior is what you'd expect from conquistadors who exterminated native populations successfully--although, in fairness, it was mostly Old World diseases that did that. Never mind! We'll take the credit!
I believe you’re 100% on target regarding the inadequacy of saving a broken system. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I suggest the central cause of this is Capitalism. The latter is always and only about the needs and interests of capital (as measured by money). People, society, and planet don’t factor in except as resources to be used in service of the former. (Even beyond that, according to Margaret Thatcher: “There is no society”).
I’m working on a Substack post suggesting that a Copernican Revolution-level change is needed in our understanding of money and its use. But the subtitle will probably say it all:
"The Illusion of money’s intrinsic value (vs use value) fuels most socioeconomic problems"
Sounds like a new third party. What’s the platform and where do I sign up?
Well, I agree with the fundamentals, as described in your essay.
The problem is that decades of learned helplessness have turned the populace into passive observers, despite their discontent.
Neither party works fir the people, justice is anything but blind, quality of life is average to terrible for 90% of the country...yet we've been bombarded by "American exceptionalism" propaganda for generations.
Even now, as institurions are gutted, the Tradury is being plundered, basic freedoms are decimated, oversight over food and water radically cut, soaring prices, unaffordable housing, unionization under 10%, wages stagnant, an obscenely low minimum wage, terrorization (and worse) of immigrants (now spreading to citizens), cities occupied by unrestrained, unaccountable secret police, the construction of a surveillance state that will monitor and punish any dissent, and the increasingly real possibility that midterms will be neither free not fair...only a tiny percentage are activated.
The vast majority of the country passively watches, expresses outrage on SM, then returns to their lives (assuming someone else will fix the calamity) or tgat midterms will magically make a difference to a regime that ignores Congress.
People won't mass boycott MAGA-enabling corporations, mass strike, place maximum pressure on elected leaders, mass support progressive local and state candidates, or even mass defect from SM (the lowest of low bars).
Either Americans are not who we thought we were, or Americans need to hit rock bottom to take risks and sacrifice for their freedoms and future.
Or maybe, Americans will just acclimate to a dictatorship.
It's happened before. American exceptionalism is no exception.
DSA
Yes, this. I said back in 2016 that we were being faced with a choice between fascism Trump style and fascism Hillary style. This here is what I meant.
So smart to tie the root cause of Trump to the need to defeat fascism. So easy to continue to ignore the root economic causes of our situation.
Doesn’t make it any easier but is so necessary. Let’s demand leaders that want to address the root cause.
"When a president acts like a thug, everyone he goes after becomes a victim. Even when they’re not"
The Corrupt Democrats and the sheep that follow them deserve Trump and all the thuggery that comes with it! The Democrats could have run fair primaries in 2016 & 2020 .
The candidate the DEMOCRATIC PARTY ELECTORATE actually wanted (BERNIE SANDERS) who was kicking the ass of the hated Hillary Clinton(2016) and IDIOT Demented Old Basement Dweller Campaigner Joe Biden(2020) could have beaten Trump without stealing the elections. The DNC anoints(NOT ELECTS) clowns to represent the party they deserve what they get. All this crying and whining about Trump was self-inflicted. They created Trump. The Corrupt Media, The Lawlessness thuggery trying to take TRUMP out, allowing a man with a rifle on his back to openly walk right through Secret Service security and set up on a roof for a clear shot in PA, in an attempt to assassinate TRUMP, Turning a typical book keeping entry into 34 Felonies, and the constant FAKENEWS unsubstantiated lies, attacks and propaganda against TRUMP on a Daily basis for 10 years now. They created TRUMP. People love the under dog. Especially one that has been under constant attack by a corrupt establishment for 10 years. Every illegitimate attack made him stronger.
The Democrats could have beaten TRUMP easy 2016 IF THEY REALLY WANTED TO. The day that audio came out where TRUMP talked about grabbing a female by her crotch he should have been finished politically. All the Corrupt SCUM BAG DEMOCRATIC PARTY and their puppets in the media had to was stop giving him so much media coverage, and run FAIR PRIMARIES and let the candidate a majority of REAL DEMOCRATIC PARTY VOTERS WANTED Bernie Sanders take his rightful spot as the Democratic Party Nominee in 2016 and 2020.
The DNC divided the party voters and to this day WE have not forgotten about the @DNC betrayal.AND WE WILL NOT FORGET. I believe the weakening of the Democratic Party and their putrid Campaign Platform was all deliberate. Orchestrated by the TOP 1% and Wall Street Democratic Party Donors to do what they are doing now: FINISH the 46 Year destruction American Middle Class and hand it all to a small group of GREEDY THUGS in the Top 1%. Its over. The Top 1% owns both parties now. The TOP 1% and Wall Street have added rules, regulations, debate rigging, and media domination that WILL KEEP any 3rd Party competition from ever getting a chance to defeat the TOP 1% Controlled MULTI-NATIONAL CORPORATE FASCIST Democrats/Republican Criminal Organization. #ThePitchforksAreComing Its the only avenue we have to take our country back from these GREEDY CARPETBAGGERS
yes! Bernie was saying it all! the DNC refused him.
Bernie became the sheepdog, shepherding the rubes into voting for corrupt, greedy Democratic candidates. When asked if he would consider running as an independent, he replied, "No, I don't want to become Ralph Nader." That says it all. Bernie is much more concerned about his own political career than the people he supposedly represents.
he did end up helping the democrats who opposed him, but his message before and after were clearly what we needed.
Americans are consumers, we buy stuff like crazy. So I'm thinking that the fastest, most direct route to real change is to vote with our dollars. Attack the corporate sector with targeted boycotts, and cause them real economic pain. That will get results way faster than just showing up to vote every four years.
I love the boycott strategy in theory the problem arises when poor american can't boycott maybe because of financial constraints, fewer available alternatives and the very plausible inadvertent impact from participation. Boycotting may be a more effective tool for the affluent not absolutely of course but bears considering.
Yes to all of this except the naive bit about Maduro — that’s propaganda, and you fail to mention that the Venezuelan economy is shambles because of sanctions IMPOSED BU THE US. I, like many Venezuelans *in Venezuela*, support Maduro’s return to the country he was elected to lead (and yes, he was in fact elected).
Since Nixon became Ike's VP, and manipulated Ike in the hospital by framing the transportation secretary with hookers and cameramen, leading to the installation of Bechtel and whoom, the Interstate system, 'murkan culture has come to this:
'murkan Culture is a Tragi-comedy Reality Media Show. Media control both the quality and content of the reality most urbanites and suburbanites ingest. Rural folk are not far behind, just with fewer takes of the tragi-comedy. It all is a transactional clown show of Fool Me magic. And radio is a big part in the rural areas, cuz one can listen while working, driving trucks, tractors, etc. Who overwhelms this area? Hyper-conservative religious dogma dog-and-pony talk radio. Limbaugh and all its bastard puppies screaming rage rhetoric at the locals.
Political parties are cults of personality, nothing more. Who needs advertising influence in media? The corporate oligarchy. Who needs cultural manipulation in the media? Corporate oligarchy. Tons of cop shows. Tons of medical stress shows. Tons of urban strife shows about fires, rescues, hospitals, doctors, murders, thefts.
Then we have the Social Media sewer. Too gross to even describe, but it guts the ethical/moral centers of the human brain.
Then we have the incessant Gaming/Warfare/Murder/Alien Invasion media completely crushing the brains of youth, who NOW steer military drones across the planet into apartment buildings, funerals, weddings, battlegrounds, agriculture fields, etc.
Now who will save us them this? The religious reactionary Right on air, cable, streaming, and radio. You cannot be saved by some god's love until you hate, torture, imprison or kill a whole bunch of 'nasty' people who do not look just like you. Note, no one person looks exactly like another, so in Practice, everyone is a suspect.
Now WHO controls all this apparatus? Banking, Wall St., Insurance, Hedge Funds, blue Bloods, foreign Capital. We citizens are just mesmerized dupes staring at some kind of screen or another, jumping when told to jump. Stockholm Syndrome on steroids.
Cannot disagree. Can say that we created systems that are far more complicated than they need to be. Complicated is a negative that reflects poor thinking, poor design, and poor implementation and maintenance. I can say this from deep experience having spent a long career in software engineering at large banking institutions, amongst other institutions. Even, and maybe especially, the programs we wrote were absurdly over-complicated making them difficult at best to maintain. I used to sneak in and rewrite code to make it transparent, far more simple and accurate, and helpful should anything in the system break down for any reason. I never met anyone like me. My peers seemed to enjoy what we used to call "spaghetti code", but I have noticed that it is a male trait that enjoys making absurdly complicated mouse traps for their own pleasure with no thought of who or what was going to have deal with said trap that always broke down. With good design, there's near flawless efficiency and transparency, and it is easy to update and maintain - for the sake of the future. Good leadership could insist on these system development traits, computerized or not, but they do not - and that burns my britches to this day, despite being retired from that field. Yet, it could still be insisted upon, yet it still doesn't happen. Oy vey, the stories I could tell.
We can't seem to hold two apparently contracting concepts at the same time probably has something to with too dichotomous an upbringing. An appeal to our education system where critical thinking isnt some sort of moral defect. The theme for these times is baby out with the bath water. To keep the baby (FED) is to keep the water or the failed system but to toss the failed system we must also throw out the FED which some might argue, undoubted will argue and not very well, isnt so terrible a prospect. I have to admit Powell's video short was moving but it didnt move me all the way over to deciding that he or the fed was somehow christened. Fact is as Corbin has so predictably demonstrated, thank you sir, is that yes, we can redeem this IF we use some brains which may have also been outsourced.
Excellent Post Corbin....
Well THAT was like a splash of cold water on my face! An EXCELLENT eye-opener.
We may be "woke" about cultural things, but we're still asleep at the wheel about the regimes that have been built with our backs and blood.
This clear thinking has been needed for years. Leave it to Corbin to articulate it beautifully. Fidelity to principles, not teams or tribes, is the only hope. Let's go!
Born into Republicanism, I can Never go back to that now. A new version is needed IMO (perhaps a Lincoln style party??), but a 3rd party? I am not sure. What I am sure of in these times is:
As I have told others, I have stopped using the term ‘administration’ and started using “Regime” every time I need to refer to the problems ,regardless of Party. To use 'administration' normalizes the current situation AND I just noticed that “Regime " currently also means for Trump and the rest of them to TAKE from me again/over and over. ( re=do again & gime=gimme ) Ok that might be a ‘real stretch' but I am sticking with that.
Sorry Corbin, Trump is not unique, he's an echo of Andrew Jackson.
Among other things, Jackson terminated the central bank charter in 1835, an even more extreme measure than Trump threatening Powell. That meant he had to pay off national debt entirely. It also meant there was no public currency. People did their business with monetized gold (specie) and over 7,000 varieties of private bank notes of varying reliability. It was a business nightmare. The result--as is the case following all significant national debt reductions--was a Great-Depression-sized hole in the economy called the "Panic of 1837."
He also stole the Southeastern US from its native occupants. The Cherokees won their cases in the Georgia Supreme court and the SCOTUS for the title to their land. Thanks to Jackson, they were evicted and marched out in the "Trail of Tears" to Oklahoma--not a state then, but still the same name. The name means "Land of the Red Man" [until the white man wants it back].
More proof of Harry Truman's saying: "There's nothing new under the sun, only history you don't know yet."
This kind of behavior is what you'd expect from conquistadors who exterminated native populations successfully--although, in fairness, it was mostly Old World diseases that did that. Never mind! We'll take the credit!
I believe you’re 100% on target regarding the inadequacy of saving a broken system. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, I suggest the central cause of this is Capitalism. The latter is always and only about the needs and interests of capital (as measured by money). People, society, and planet don’t factor in except as resources to be used in service of the former. (Even beyond that, according to Margaret Thatcher: “There is no society”).
I’m working on a Substack post suggesting that a Copernican Revolution-level change is needed in our understanding of money and its use. But the subtitle will probably say it all:
"The Illusion of money’s intrinsic value (vs use value) fuels most socioeconomic problems"