The top article on the left of the page is "A U.S. Attack on Iran Would Show the Limits of China’s Power" (NYT)
To me this is disgusting, exploring the potential benefits to harming another country by having a war with another country. It's disgusting.
I think I need to cancel my subscription.
"China has much to lose from a runaway conflict."
Um, the world, USA has too much to lose from conflict.
Iran presents itself as innocent, attacked for no reason.
Israel doesn't even care anymore what others think. Not even it's own people.
USA and Russia are corrupt and bankrupt, supporting this proxy war is the hight of their corruption and desire to distract.
Iran deserves nuclear weapons because they stop people from attacking a country. Who wouldn't want that? Iran is not righteous attacking Israel. Israel is not innocent or blameless.
Israel is involved in a long term racial, social, religious survival in hostile territory with lots of history, and many slights. How to make Israel safe?
The corrupt and incompetent regime in the USA is the opposite of helpful. Russia never pretended to be a helpful and unselfish nation.
And yet somehow we seem to be headed for war.
I can't help but think of the social media that got right wing people to think a vote for the left would inevitably lead to war. Another "I told you so," won't help.
My spirituality says you don't harm other, you don't kill others such that I aspire to a plant based diet. War is out of the question.
My brain can analyse the situation, see where Iran is coming from, Israel is coming from, the region is coming from, the "super powers" coming from. What is the most helpful perspective? Fight war with everything you've got, wage peace as a puny individual? The Buddha couldn't spread enlightenment to prevent war in his time. Is it selfish to just take care of yourself. We're interconnected, puny, but maybe peace ripples can grow.
Is it possible for Iran to point to Israel's wrong?
Is it possible for Israel to develop their own ideas of safety, and preservation?
Can't the USA inveneve as they see it in world affairs, even if we're currently under a corrupt regime?
Can't Russia pursue it's interests vigorously, according to their traditions?
Here's the playbook.
Step 1. Announce some horrific policy attacking vulnerable populations, like that Transgender have to give their sex of birth, not their identity. Then try to implement it--he and his regime are wildly inept at how government works and they see that as a strength.
Step 2: Get blocked by judges. He fights the block, a few steps perhaps or quits and gives up with the PR victory of terrorizing and imaging he's powerful.
Step 3: Move onto more successful gifts and terrorizing. The terrorizing proves he's powerful and scary and if there's a money tree to shake, he'll shake it. TV channels and government give him money for considerations and to be left alone in his protection rackets.
He's a sheep in wolves clothing, he's the emperor in no clothes, he's the little boy who can't persuade the military to like him.
In the tit for tat wars in the middle east, Israel struck at Iran yesterday, and today Iran is striking back at Israel.
I came across this: "According to Hamas’s plan, after its attack on Israel, the remaining components of Iran’s axis of evil — Hamas in the West Bank, Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen and the Shiite militias in Syria, Iraq and Iran — would join in a regional war with the ultimate goal of destroying the one and only Jewish state." (NY Times by Benny Gantz)
I've read that Russia and its allies just want to sew the seeds of disunity in countries that aren't ruled by strong men, ie functional western democracies. They don't have to win asymmetrical wars, they just cut into the unity of open democratic states, drain off some of their unity and power by sewing chaos. Iran agreed to join the battle once Hamas launched the missles.
"Iran’s religious leadership is devoted to exporting its fundamentalist ideology, driven by the pursuit of hegemony and captivated by the thought of its opponents’ violent subjugation." (op cit).
Every justification for war is flawed, because the outcome is mass death. Sometimes you have to fight back even if you don't want war, it takes more time to neutralize waring nations and undercut motivations for war. In a way war is the best problem solving given a situation, and you'd have to back thing up to different antecedents to create peace.
The waring narratives casts Iran as already planning something, but we honestly have to look at a nation and what they do. What are the circumstances that undercut and stop war, end ongoing wars.
You can see the waring building up (Current Affairs). The article in Current Affairs by Nathan J. Robinson goes into deeper context about the waring articles in the Times, and asks some questions those articles can't answer. It brings in international law, completely ignored in the waring articles. Everyone in the UN wants to relax the situation except Israel and the USA. This is not good. I fear we are heading towards something that will spiral out of control and have negative consequences for everyone.
It's really quite amazing to see the government carrying out illegal and unconstitutional actions of ICE, and the people are risking everything to fight back. This is government against the people in real time, played out in video after video on social media.
This is one of many sparks that started with protests that are ongoing, a chronic thorn in the side of the administration that is going to be toppled. Americans are rising up to fight this regime. This can only end bad for the regime.
It's happening in NYC too (source)!
6/13/25 Ongoing. It's totally manufactured by the unreasonable, unconstitutional ICE actions, and escalated by the current regime.
The regime has created this violence, but I like to see it out in the open, people were passively accepting the regime before. I don't think they've understood what they've started.
ICE isn't about immigration or justice, it's about terrorizing people. Going into graduations, like this post says, going into schools, and hospitals, often deporting citizens. They decided birth and citizenship isn't enough, they're just deporting people willy nilly. And detention centers are terrorizing children. It's an abomination. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is really the the special forces of the current regime's terrorizing the citizens.
The gestapo were the secret police under Nazism. The SS were special troops under Nazism. I'm not sure which ICE agents are more like.
One of the ways the far right is advancing in dismantling our government that we're about to see how it supports the life of others. They're OK with the death of others, it's a death cult, among other things like white supremacist. It's a death and hate cult. Death to others, because of their hate. Wrapped up in pretending to talk about truth.
Joni Ernst puts for the truth that we're all going to die, but what she's not saying is that we're OK with you dying if it means I get lower taxes. I would love to have a capitalist discussion on how the fact of death is hidden in our society and how that supports the illusion of infinite growth and the virtues of unfettered capitalism. That's not what she's doing, she's saying it's OK for the poor to die.
Sneaky political evil wrapped in a bacon surrounding truth. They're changing things, pulling the rug out. And this is just one more chip in the destruction of the facade of America the compassionate. It's America the death cult, not compassionate, hate, racism, sexism, classism.
This fits right in with the particular interpretation of the constitution, which they cherry pick, regarding guns.
Fits right in with the narrow concern for life that ends up killing the mothers of babies who were not going to live.
You know when I read about Freud's death instinct, I couldn't understand it. Now I can. People want to kill others. And it's sanctioned by the government.
I'd also say the so-called "pro-life" stance regarding abortion is both a manic reparation and about controlling women's bodies.
Like taking 400 billion dollar planes from Qatar. It thought that stuff was outlawed, but it turns out it was just a norm. Nobody is interested in enforcing any of the rule, I thought we had.
I thought he got away with emoluments the last presidency, this term is just off the charts in comparison.
Thinking about Israel gives me a headache most times, but I found a Reddit post interesting. It was a list of all the places in the Middle East where Jews were cleansed from. Does that give Israel the right to cleanse their space?
Iran isn't even listed there, they kicked out 60K Jews in 1979 (Wikipedia).
Nothing gives anyone a right to kill anyone in my opinion, but I'm a peace lover, I'm not going to do any killing, but I'm not the only type of person in the world, and who knows how I develop under different circumstances. What do you do with all the people who feel the urgent need to protect their kind, however they define their kind, and how they define protect?
When they launched missiles and killed over a thousand people, given the history of Israel and the Jews on this planet, you might imagine that there would be a retaliation, considering it's within their own country. They don't have to go to war with another country, there is war within their country. They want to win the war. So they smash the opponent to smithereens. You can't say the Palestinians didn't bring it on themselves, if someone punches you, you try and stop their ability to punch you. I walk away, but some people want to root out the problem, and that might be killing them.
They say an eye for an eye leaves everyone blind. Tit for tat is what you do ethically, with occasional positive and good thrown in to try and break the patterns. Patterns of kindness can be developed. What if there was a ritual of giving your different neighbors gifts?
The people who left Iran who were Jewish, some settled in Long Island New York. Their descendents are doing well. They live in a nice affluent neighborhood. Not sure you can say life is better outside of Iran, nobody wants to be forcefully moved, they've had to switch from Farsi to English. The problems of Long Island are still problems, no place is perfect. Great Neck and Kings Point isn't a bad place to live. I have a friend in Iran and life is hard there. Parents kill their daughter once a month, the women were hanging out with a man, and they decide to murder them. There's weird violence that confuses me, and I'm not sure I understand the country. Wanting to understand a country and culture is important to learning. I don't really know the other countries on that Reddit list of places where Jews have been driven out. You can't say things aren't connected if you can see this treatment of Jewish people leads to that treatment of Palestinian people. If you want peace, don't oppress or treat anyone poorly. One problem about groupthink is that you want revenge on people who hurt your group. Tit for tat.
People rail in America about identity politics, but show me a place in the world where identity isn't a factor in a war? Identity can form around sexuality, race, ethnicity, religion, regionalism, even a neighborhood. Who are you and what is important to you?
So my question is if your people were driven out of 10 places, can you drive people out of one place that is the one place you want to feel safe, within the one country where being you is more than OK? It's OK to be Palestinian in Israel, as long as you don't launch bombs. There are many Palestinians in Israel who tend to Jewish kids, that do all sorts of positive and productive things for Israel without warning, but there is external support for making problems, and launching missiles, which exaggerates a problem. It is a kind of anti-semitism to have all these attack groups surrounding Israel. The Hezbollah in Lebanon. It's not official policy to allow them there, but they don't really have the will power to root them out of there, and if you somehow lost a family member, you might be radicalized, and plot against Israel. The endless war of tit for tat goes on forever. How do you make steps towards peace if there are literally many groups that keep launching bombs at you. Iran shoots of missiles and they don't even share a border with Israel. Everyone can justify violence, because look at history and x, y and z! How do yo justify peace, it looks weak, it looks like you're ignoring provocations! Which side am I talking about? That's exactly it, you can't really stop the war if you can't stop seeing how each side is being provoked. They are locked in a cycle of wars. If you're a soldier, a killer, you're going to just keep fighting. All these stories of people suffering in Gaza, who refused to leave, how can you blame them for feeling aggrieved. You erase the ability to launch missiles within Israel, but how to you erase the revenge someone wants to get for all the family they lost? I would just move, but people don't want to move. I'd rather live on Long Island, than live in a war zone. Supposedly there are a lot of Palestinians who live in Chile.
You move to another country and there's the same problem. In NYC the Jews and the Palestinians are in conflict. My Afghan friend follows the plight of the Palestinians and the whole Muslim against Jews thing is fueled by the religious wars. My friend doesn't shot anyone, he lives his life, but there's a conflict inside him, maybe he passes it onto his kids, maybe they secularize. My stepfather is a secular Jew, I went to a passover once, went to camp Shalom, but I don't feel Jewish. I don't feel Baptist or Episcopalian either, I'm Buddhist. Now the Buddhist have a right to be upset at the Muslims who destroyed Nalanda, but then when great Islam empire was cut into in Iran, that is what kept Rumi moving eastward from the rampaging armies of Genghis Khan who was nominally Buddhist. Genghis Khan was Tengrism, a indigenous Shamanistic religion. When you look at the history of the world, you see religions rise and fall, wax and wane. The really good religions don't really sustain themselves long, everything has to get watered down and confused.
There's still Protestant versus Catholic in America. People want to purify a country, make it all just one thing and they think that will solve all the problems. Where is the country where everyone is supposed to get along? Is it America? Right now we have a white supremacist regime. No country stays the same, things always change. America was a quite stable example of a democracy, but it's rotted from within. The open society will always be susceptible to external and internal regression. At present the Jewish people feel safe enough from two sieg heils by Musk, to keep driving their Teslas. When I go for a walk in the Jewish neighborhood, I see lots of Teslas. They admire Musk, he is a great businessman. They admire the right, they want less taxes. A nice sweet father in the park, doesn't really think Trump killed 400k people with his inaction around Covid. "Maybe" he says skeptically.
The divide between conservative and progressive in America has led to lost friendships for me. I haven't quit being friends with anyone because of their religion, but because of their politics. I even have lots of right wing friends, but Trump has brought out something that is unacceptable to me. I quit going to a AA meeting because 5 guys talked like Trump lovers before a meeting, and I just don't feel like expressing myself in recovery in front of Trump lovers.
I knew a Serbian girl who married a Serbian soldier to perpetuate the culture. In Wisconsin. America is remote enough to not have all out war between opposing sides, but we grow cultures that cling to past grudges. Many people let go of that stuff, let go of culture, just join the great materialism scramble of capitalism in secular America. That is a vapid choice, too, doesn't have the meaning of a deep culture. I wish I had more Buddhist culture. Today is Vesak Day, and I'm just going to go about my usual day, even though it is the high holiday of Buddhism. I'll meditated for 2 hours, and read some Dharma and blog about Buddhism, but I'm not connected to a sangha, and there is no gathering ritual I will take part of. I'll text my Buddhist friend in Iran. It's a strange old world.
I don't have a religious culture, and a group that has people killed, and is at war with others. I have a vague affinity for other Buddhists, I don't like what China did to Tibet, but I don't hate Chinese people. I don't like the Muslims destroying Nalanda, but I have a Muslim friend, have had various Muslim friends. I had a Muslim friend from Sri Lanka, who moved away.
Honestly comparing myself to the experience of an Israeli, I have to say I'm not sure I know what it's like. I know there are many Israeli and Jewish people who don't agree with what Netanyahu is doing. It's hardly a group of people who have a uniform way of thinking.
Today I meditate on compassion. Compassion might be an ingredient for peace. Not compassion for who, but a universal compassion. Maybe religion and spirituality were meant to be a private thing. Trying to present a public facing spirituality that can be used in the machines of war is just a capitalist creation. Any religion worth its salt would be all about peace.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders have been raising lots of money for future elections, and going all over the west, campaigning against rule of the oligarchy.
Cory Booker broke the record for filibustering, previously held by someone trying to block civil rights legislation.
Maine Gov. Janet Mills beats Donald Trump, gets school meal funds restored while defending trans kids. She said she would see him in court. She did. She won.
Heather Cox Richardson keeps writing about what is really going on. She's just a historian who reads the paper.
JD Pritzker is fighting the regime as a governor in many ways, countering virtually every move. Protecting autism data, inviting Canadians to visit, criticizing enshitification in federal government with flunky cabinet choices.
Annie Andrews is running against Lindsey Graham! (Source).
My grocery store stocks items, one is popular, but there are 6 flavors. My daughter likes the white bag of potato chips, but there's 5 others. I like the amish kafir, but there's 5 other that are always in stock, and the amish runs out.
Netflix got your used to online streaming without commercials, and then cuts into password sharing and adds commercials.
Food, retail, and other desserts. I live next to a grocery store, which is lucky, but it's not well stocked up on vegan products, it doesn't pay in my neighborhood. I walk 30 minutes to my ex's and her grocery store is filled with vegan expensive items. Richer neighborhood. You can get nooch there, not in mine.
Apple used to be a great product. No so much any more, switching cords, not sending the bit that plugs into the wall, and on and on.
Idiot voters through a reboot of the current regime was a good idea.
Whatever election interference by purging voter registration and offering a million dollar prize, China and Russia's social media troll farms undermining America, I'm not aware of any election corruption yet. America voted for this regime.
He was impeached twice but it was followed through, there are enablers in government. They could write a law today that say no exporting prisoners, or they could have some noble lawyer sue the administration.
The supreme court could have allowed Colorado to take him off the ballot, and others could have followed.
The biggest disappointment are 2 guys I know saying there's no difference in the corruption of Obama and the corruption of Trump. The otherwise nice retired school bus driver, who thinks they're hounding Trump with all his prosecution of real crimes. They don't see his convicted felonies are real. I can't wait for this fever dream to be over.
I said Trump killed 400K by his inaction to covid to someone in the park and they could only just say maybe. I pointed out Musk's 2 sieg heils to a woman in the park, she said not to think about that. The Jewish people in my neighborhood who drive Teslas.
Why does the right have moral clarity when it comes to the murder of abortion, but not the murder of inaction of federal government. Why are they so willing to stoke fear of communism then drive on roads we all own, have their banks protected, and trash taken away for the common good?
It's boring to go over the current regime leader's rap sheet: Pedophelia, rapist, he's a felon, he killed people by his inaction with Covid, and not taking proper steps. He's destroying democracy, the rule of law, destroying the environment, sending immigrants and indeed citizens out of the country to concentration camps without due process. He should be in jail right now. He threatens every institution that he doesn't like, and he's enriching himself (remember the emoluments clause in the constitution?). He constantly lies, imagines himself as the pope, and he's the least spiritual, most transactional person ever. His white supremacy and othering of immigrants, destroying of democracy isn't a deal maker for some of his followers. It's old hat. The people who don't see him as any different than Democratic presidents is willful ignorance, and also a lie. That is crushes aware and woke people is a bonus to sadists and people who like harming others. He's not lowering taxes, he didn't fix egg prices or gas, and he blames Biden, lies or whatever for any attempt to make him accountable. The civics lesson everyone is learning has too high a price, and they're probably not learning it. The enablers in legislature who blocked rehiring veterans, the court not following through with it's decisions, and on and on. We now know how Hitler got away with what he did in real time, people are blind about the horrors of what he's doing until it happens to them, and then they get it, but it's too late, too little. He's a elderly ball of vengeance, and he's stocked his administration with dead eyed liars and crooks like himself. America's reputation has been ruined, American exceptionalism is over, Democracy died. The persecution of marginalized groups is horrible. The tanking of the economy, the killing of tourism. It's just boring at this point. We're heading into a depression where the only solution is socialism, he's creating the very thing he rails against, which is communism.
The current regime thinks his attacks on being held accountable to the constitution and laws of the USA--not nearly enough for what he's done--begging for 11k votes in Georgia would have gotten him locked up if I had any say about it, and his not calling off January 6th attempted insurrection, and funding it, also still has him needing to be held accountable, and all the emoluments from his first presidency, and all the corruption and graft he's been doing so far this term.
He's pretty horrible, but now they're arresting judges, and saying ICE officers don't need warrants. He's the one who bends justice. He basically ran for office to avoid being held accountable.
He's trying to get Ukraine to give up territory to Russia, and well, why?
He supports the genocide in Israel. I think Israel has the right to defend itself internally, but snipers picking off children is just too much.
He's killed the economy, and tourism with his ways.
The car guy lost a lot of imaginary money with stock dropping 71%, which is alright with me, hope it gets worse for him. Sieg heil twice and there are hopefully consequences.
It's hard to explain to the Egyptian roofer I was talking to the other day, who though Biden stole the election from Trump.
Turning allies into enemies, everything he has done to extort money. It's just sickening. Corruption, harm, lies.
The legislature and judiciary and press that ennabled him will be held accountable.
Retrenchment and regression happen, progress isn't always a straight line forward. And the opposite contains some wisdom unfortunately. All the right wing people who believe this reset is healthy have to know it's not going to stay that way. The dialectic of the left and right means that things will swing back and forth.
I'm so far left that it seems to me to swing from far right to center, and back.
There are two ideas. Don't get along with government, government needs to be cut and limited. The other idea is that we should redistribute money through taxation and programs, and ameliorate some of the excesses of capitalism. We should promote the common good through healthcare, education, transportation, infrastructure, and even defense and foreign policy.
I do think America gets over it's skis with ideas of exceptionalism. The Marshall Plan was a good thing to do, in our own best interest.
Clearly what is going on in America is very destructive at the moment. After Woodrow Wilson came FDR, and his years as presidents created the Reagan voters and over and over again. I don't know if I'll see the end of this great depression or not, I'm getting older. I don't know if I'll see the booming 90's again, seems unlikely.
Humans are stupid and limited and selfish and short sighted, and can be amazingly spiritual, kind, generous, wise and insightful. Their politics reflect that.
I don't mean to be blase and abstract about all the people dying. It's hard to imagine people straight up dying because of this regime but it's happening. From the loss of due process to life giving benefit cuts, to withholding health care, and on and on. Supporting the genocide in Gaza, to shifting to voting with Russia in the UN.
I keep coming back to the 2 humans who said to me they don't notice a difference between Obama and Trump. So willfully ignorant and proud of it.
America has been lucky, in the presidents in my lifetime. Lyndon Johnson was president when I was born, then Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, GHW Bush, Clinton, GW Bush, Obama, Trump, Biden, Trump.
None were not as for sale, venial flim flam men, soft shoe shufflers as the current regime, wannabe gangsters, running illegal protection rackets. I wish the legislature, courts, press and people would hold him more accountable. Or even a little accountable.
He's running a protection racket, from himself. Threat, shake the money tree, see who pays for protection. In a way it's amazing the idealistic rhetoric.
I've never really believed in exceptionalism, that was too boastful and not humble. You get hubris. Hubris is over arching pride that leads to your downfall.
Humility, being right sized, isn't built into the American ethos, but as we mature and find our place in the world, it would behove us to find some. Most people didn't buy into America's hype, they witness too much to the contrary.
American politics is what we create, how we react, and what we discover our virtues and values to be. I pretty much ignored politics, always leaning left and voting Democrat. I voted for a Republican sheriff in Madison because I went to school with his son, that's the only Republican I voted for, in my memory. My memory isn't that great, life can be long and I've always struggled to cope with the flurry of information out there.
Democrats aren't perfect, and some people see them be venial for sale politicians like the Republicans and see no difference, but I see a huge difference. That try not to be so corrupt, and resign quicker. To deny the difference is a radical political stance, two neighbors have said that to me. These are the kind of people who feel like Trump telling the truth about his grifting is somehow noble. They feel Trump is being persecuted for his politics, instead of him just straight up being a criminal and being held accountable.
I'm OK with more people choosing not to vote, that enlarges my vote, but voter suppression is evil, and I really hope the courts prevent Trump from doing what he hopes to do by making voting harder.
It's hard to know which is the distraction grift in this house of cards, the rope a dope, the gish gallop.
To me Jasmine Crockett, Cory Booker and AOC are stepping up the most to fight this nonsense.
The shock doctrine is the idea that throwing the USA into turmoil will benefit the hyper rich, and make the workers more willing to be exploited.
The Atlantic has an article about how people try to ideologically justify this turmoil.
People balk at giving Trump sophisticated ideas, he's a dolt, a dummy. He's a toddler trapped in the genital phase.
One thing I've noticed, his autocratic style, he doesn't feel like explaining, justifying or even persuading the people, he just wants to do what he wants to do. His anti-social ways are about cutting corners and not following the rules. He's not excited unless he's getting away with something. He's still angry at his father.
It's really hard for me to read about all the business that are being ruined, lives, and when the economy goes down, aside from ruining things,
Protests all over the USA are voicing the urge not to just do things for the oligarchy.
The principle Trump doesn’t understand is that fascism isn’t good for business. Enough people understand that and are educating others.
Crashing the economy through layoffs, tariffs wars, tourism is crashing, Tesla is crashing, education is suffering because of Trump’s attacks.
The people who voted for Trump because they wanted to wreck things up, don’t hold life dear can watch the kakocracy as RFK does the opposite of what would be helpful and good information. The greed of lying that pays. RFK gets kickbacks from a lawfirm that sues based on the misinformation he peddles. And on and on.
Gross incompetence isn't quite as bad as disappearing people off the streets and sending them out of the country, without due process because if there was a process, they wouldn't be sent out of the country. Trump is punishing people for protesting against Israel. He likes strongmen doing horrible things like him, he's using it as a pretext to be a bully, sew fear in the air. His multi-pronged attacks on the economy, freedoms of the citizens and guests, and threats to overstay his constitutional welcome with another term, are egregious. Ignoring the court, the cowardly legislature is dominated by republicans, and are complicit in his crimes.
Lying fucks say there’s no difference from Obama. That’s the most offensive rancid lie. You can not like government but it’s murderous. So killing others through deny, depose and defend is insurance murder. Cacking up government kills people.
Cory Booker stepped forward to do something to resist. He stood up and put on the record the big bowl of wrong that is happening.
This Saturday there are protests nationwide.
Past republican criticism isn’t sincere, mostly just hate for progressive ideas and government redressing the excesses of capitalism, they like the hard realities of no interventions, the death that ensues, and while they can be quite nice individuals in person, kind and caring to people they meet face to face, they don't trust the government. They have been disappointed, there are examples where they wanted action and none was done, or not the way they wanted it done, and so better not to have any government, throw the baby out with the bathwater. For the life of me I can't understand the perspective, but I am selfish, even though I'm trying to curb that, so I do act in ways that are ancillary to the conservative vision. Ways of drawing out the conservative vision is that people need to be maximally selfish and not taxed, every grubbing cent to the person who has it. OK, maybe roads, but nothing else. Oh well, they do currency and defense. Well, nothing else. Well it turns out that when the conservative whoop up alternatives to the liberal vision, the progressive vision, the leftist vision, democratic vision, they spend money. They preach fiscal responsibility but driving up the debt means democrats can't ramp up entitlements right away. They have ruthlessly gamed the situation, with voter suppression, killing education which leads to greater votes for the left, and outside influence--Russia and China want conservative government because they can then do more grimmey stuff in general and to America. Recently the tech bros have bought the government that is for sale, shitting if you don't give us money.
So when people say, "I guess the emails didn't matter," referring to Hillary's emails, what they're pointing to is the lack of consistency from the conservatives based on the progressive bias, and that's just not something they're concerned about and most left criticism don't impact the psyche of conservatives, because they want what they want the way they want it, and it doesn't have to make sense to a different political perspective.
They really didn't care about national security, the alcoholic accidentally text military plans to a journalist. Not a big deal. Progressives notice they would have howled if a democrat did that.
They didn't care about law and order, that was just a tactic. They didn't really hate Russia, they're just projecting their totalitarian fantasies onto the opposition, and Russia was communist for a time, but more importantly they're totalitarian, which is fine with them, because that's what they want.
Trump has filled his cabinet with incompetent hucksters like himself, with the intention of wrecking up the place, not governing. Lefties shout, having grown up with republicans obsessed with security their whole lives, suddenly blase about the kakocracy that is acceptable because they hate government anyway. That progressives are upset is a bonus.
Things just keep getting curiouser and curiouser except the banality of evil isn't fun or interesting, it's just evil wrecking up the place. Not patriotic, and not good.
Trump's vision is that everything is for sale, and he shucks cars when the seig heiling businessman's company starts to fail because he gave him a lot of money, bought him essentially. Both drunk on power and money, with no internal integrity or virtue.
Due process is only for those who chooses, the constitution is for sale too, what do you want in it, and how much will you pay?
The grift is creating chaos, like a toddler knocking over the sand castle after adults have meticulously created it. Give me what I want or I'm going to wreck up the place. Chaos is the threat, and Trump is following through on his rage filled revenge tour, which 4 million voters withdrew their votes for a black woman instead of a white man. It's insane making to try and rhyme out the reason for such a colossal mistake. The American voters identify with the toddler more than the architects of order and justice.
The toddler anger is conservative. They hate the progressive imagination. They hate power to destroy being curbed. The toddler prevented from smashing the sand castle wriggles in anger, fights against it. There’s no adult stopping this toddler.
From the economy to history to public health to foreign relations. From science to tourism. From veterans to truth. The Kennedy Center. Maximum jerk, every nook and cranny. Due process, freedom of speech, the constitution. The richest man takes food from the mouth of the poorest and his empire crumbles, people are disgusted, stop using his businesses. His angry messages and true followers are not enough. They can’t destroy education fast enough.
No David! The pigeon can’t drive the bus. He thinks he’s Don Corleone at a wedding but he looks in the mirror and he has no clothes. It’s those two weird middle aged people holding guns awkwardly, as the mob passes them by. It’s bad plastic surgery gone wrong. It’s seeing Darth Vader’s true face.
It’s the morality police wrestling, trying to make the head covering just right, and ending with a woman naked except underwear standing in protest:
It’s Texas mortality rates moving in Afghanistan’s direction.
I think it’s tempting to blame democrats, and I've seen a lot of it. They failed to win and now we have this. The money and conservatives were behind Trump, and maybe some cheating. Four million people voted for Biden and somehow couldn't transfer that to a black woman.
I want to get out of this chaos, then steady democrats pattern, I want the democrats to shake up things from the left.
Should democrats lie? Express more hate?
People vote for democrats out of vision, kindness, a critique of capitalism, a sense of justice.
People vote for Republicans out of the hope for lower taxes (false), smaller government (false, just different) and the sense that those lies are the right vision. They are highly sensitive to Democrat lies, which as someone with a left bias, I don’t see.
Two people said to me they don’t see a difference between how Obama was enriched than the way Trump was enriched, between the grifts of Biden and the grifts of Trump. The immigrants who play soccer in the park like Trump. The AA people in one of the meetings I went to thought Trump followed through on, don’t see his promises to build a wall or lower egg prices as tricks and lies. The Polish-American mother in the park said to ignore the sieg heils. The Albanian born mother, to justify wearing no masks, said that we are allowed to have guns in America. A Ukrainian born mother says that most immigrants just don't know what's going on in America. She's not persuaded by democratic rhetoric, doesn't seem to be outraged by what's going on. Another Polish born mother canceled her trip to Poland because of the problem with air safety going on.
My Afghan born friend monitors Muslim topics, feels for the Palestinians, showed me a video about how it's just about erasing Gaza. I agreed. Israel would rather look bad to the world, than be bombed within their own country. He thinks this will last forever, but I told him things died down in Ireland. It's possible to mature past constant waring.
Most people are non-political. Most people don’t lean do more or do less, the just want what is obviously right, though articulation is wanting. A Venezuelan born mother feels they wrecked her country, but that health insurance is a basic right, and that wouldn't wreck up the country.
The will of the people is inchoate. But mistakes and problems and waste are obviously not good. Of course when you do things, there are always mistakes. A democrat accepts mistakes, and a republican says, "see, there, you shouldn't do anything." It's the classic it do something or don't do something.
The republicans are men of action, and it's weird they're so allergic to governmental action. They prefer the law of the jungle.
I don’t think Democrats should lie, because their vision is integrity and justice. Democrats should include conservatives in their administration like Lincoln had a team of rivals.
Many democrats are howling at the betrayal of the working class. It's true, I think Clinton could have been a republican, and Schumer seems to have turned to the dark side. Both New York senators voted for the corrupt slush fund, so Trump can steal more, and not be bound by past legislative mandates. AOC is the best voice, Sanders is great too, but he's old and Jewish and AOC is a hispanic woman, so neither are going to sweep the nation. Mark Kelly is heroic, white and male. There are others. This may be cynical, but I'd prefer a centrist man to a far right wing man. Vance has no popularity and Trump is a rare phenomenon, and his popularity doesn't transfer to his children or anyone else.
Criticizing democrats from the left is useless. Most political commentary is useless, except where it creates understanding, and not just wish statements. I wish all day things were different, hasn't done me much good, mostly makes me upset. I'm not going to turn off, I'm going to keep hanging in there.
My biggest question is why, since a conservative doesn't like the federal level, that they are tolerating a bully at the federal level?
It's taken me a while to figure out how Trump is conservative. Sending the autistically bold and ketamine addicted Musk to cut everything, and see what screams the most to be hired back, is a technique to see what is really important.
The judge has said all the firings were illegal. Of course the US government isn't a corporation you can just buy and then ruin the way he did Twitter or Tesla. The legislature allocates money. This current spending bill, and the traitorous voting for it of Schumer allows for things to be more of a slush fund, but previously those things were voted for, and paid for by the legislature.
The irony is the national parks make a lot of money, in business terms, they have incredible profit. To cut their budget is the height of folly, but they're just wrecking up the place, they aren't businessmen.
Trump has 6 bankruptcies. He paid $85 million to E. Jean Carroll because he couldn't stop talk shit about her, after he had to pay $5 million for talking shit about her. He is a felon, but grab him by the money, and he'll just keep talking and paying out like some amazing slot machine. He's not a good businessman.
What it does do is create doubt, and wrestles the security in the minds of people that the government is there to support citizens in our society. To try to enforce justice, and curb some of the downfalls of poverty and a million other things we're learning. The lessons learned by this destruction will depend on your political bias, and your epistemic character.
I've been thinking about the Thatcher revolution of privativing thing. Fire all the air traffic controllers and hire a subcontractor, one Musk happens to own. Reagan fired the air traffic controllers. They get too bold it seems. It's a quite stressful job. The whole operation is basic pillaging and graft. Musk bought Trump and now he gets to deliver his paybacks. Musk is the biggest welfare queen in the world and he's trying to get more, because there's never enough.
I've searched for a historical figure who might lend articulation to fascism times. I thought maybe Rafael Alberti might be able to articulate it, he had to leave Spain, and then later Argentina because of fascism. I struggle to find it articulate in his wonderful poetry, but I need to read some more. Mayakovsky was an articulate voice during the Russian revolution, that I want to learn more about. I wonder who will emerge as the articulate voice in America for this time. Paul Beatty has an amazing voice, but it doesn't actually capture this moment yet, he's better at lambasting the role of African Americans in America over the past years. Kendrick Lamar had a shot at breaking through, but most people didn't understand him. Jasmine Crockett can speak truth to power but she's a black woman, and we already voted Harris down.
There's a upending revolution attempt going on in America. Wall Street has turned against Trump and Musk, and Musk's fortune is being ruined by his insistence that Hitler didn't actually kill all those people, he's doubling down on his sieg heil gesture with more Nazism. The Polish-American woman in the park who said ignore the sieg heil part, I just can't sorry. That's sort of the Polish attitude depicted in Ida (2013) but time has a way of reflecting back on past occurrences, that mean you can't just ignore the sieg heils.
Even if you don't like some of the situations, the direction and essence, who doesn't want smaller government and less taxes? Trump and Musk are jerks enough to try and push it as far as it will go, no matter how many people die. It takes a rapist narcissist and an autistic narcissist to do this sort of thing to America. Musk's repudiation of empathy is the opposite mirror of his autistic twin Greta Thunberg, who insists on empathy and the not ignoring what is going on, in its fullness.
What is cover for what grift? The shifting sands of the gish gallop, the rope a dope, is cover for the government for sale, which goes counter the constitution and the founders intentions. The bringing it into the daylight and saying it's not bad, is quite amazing. The level of outrage they produce in reasonable aware people, outrage turns out not to change much, it's just private suffering in the end.
There's a building storm coming. The guillotine memes are prevalent. Luigi Mangione started it, who's going to keep it going? The way John Brown stood up to slavery, and the millions of people who died in the Civil War. I saw a movie about a Civil War in America last year, and it felt really far fetched, but also horrifying. That scene with Jesse Plemons and his red sunglasses.
Trump doesn't care because public opinion doesn't matter to him any more. There's no more elections. He's won his last election. He can go on his private yet government funded revenge tour, and be whatever kind of monster he wants to be.
It's up to the courts and legislature and the press to contain him, and he's not one to be contained by a no, he grabs the pussy, even if they're married. It turns out the press has shown it's true colors, and the legislature and supreme court are right wing, so the checks are really only small little rebukes so far, or not at all.
I've always seen Trump as the emperor with no clothes, he struts about thinking he's looking good when he really doesn't, he's naked and obese, revolting. There are varying degrees of approval. Wall Street has turned. That's always going to be a percentage thing, rarely is life black and white. Not sure who's voice Trump will actually listen to be a reasonable check. They want destruction and strife, and people begging to work 120 hours a week.
America has traditionally aligned along the attempts by government to fix things verses don't fix anything axis. The right has been good at cultivating resentment for taxes even among the poor, who benefit from taxation. The betrayal of the working class towards itself is a modern feat of pretzel logic. All the programs that cushion the blows of capitalism and try to right the wrongs of gross systematic inequality, not the natural inequality, and not the natural rising and lowering, which is lost in all this going on now. Doesn't seem natural to me. It's natural to curb some of the unnatural excesses of unchecked capitalism.
So many horrible things for sensitive left wing folk to see. Fire the black and woman generals in the military so it's all white men. That's not repudiating DEI with a natural meritocracy, that's white supremacy, reinstating the glass ceiling.
What little gains that have been brought to over qualified minorities are stripped again, and the fragile flowers of justice have been smashed under foot by the inchoate rage of white supremacy.
Right wing people who are tired of always being called racists, to the point of it being meaningless, hopefully can turn their awareness back on and see it now, right?
I have a hope that the Bernie Sanders of the world will rise up. He's drawing huge crowds, but more than likely there's a glass ceiling to American leftism. Bernie is too old, and Jewish, and AOC is too woman and ethnic to go very far.
People are calling for Tim Wahl and Mark Kelly. Decent white men centrists. The groundbreaking women and minority politicians are going to be right wing and centrist, not left wing. The farthest left we're going to go in this racist and misogynistic country will be with a white man. There's a real undertow towards left ideas, America would like to just get away from this far left.
Reagan was pretty far right, but Trump beats him with this term, with this budgetary violence.
Gavin Newsom ruined things by entertaining Steve Bannon. When Harris entertained Cheney, many were upset, but I think playing in the center is an important things for democrats. If Trump has taught us anything, is you have to give people a shred to believe in, if they want to go that way, even if you want to ultimately dupe them.
The woman who he promised free IVF treatments feels betrayed. I'm not into the shaddenfreud of all his voters being fired and deported, too much death and murder for me to find any solace.
The murder by "cost cutting" is highlighted by Luigi Mangione's bullets saying deny, defend, depose, and the murder by Musk and Trump and his enablers, including Schumer who's going to be hearing it on his ill planned book tour. I'm sure he's going to avoid the public and take a loss. The coward won't appear in public now even to shill his book, after his profit ruining vote. Musk's fortunes can collapse, and he's still got enough money even with all the leins on his property by baby's mommas for child support. Bill Burr pointed out if Musk came to his neighborhood in Boston, he wouldn't be so bold.
When I told a friend I was thinking of taking a spray can to the Teslas in my neighborhood owned by Jewish people, and writing "sieg heil" on them, he said make sure you wear a mask.
I can't even spit on them, I can only spit towards them. I respect property and propriety too much, but it's definitely been eroded lately.
I'm getting paranoid, I hesitate to articulate this because I feel like the forces of distraction read the opposition and utilize their insights. I can console myself with the fact that few people reads this blog.
The war is epistemology now. They can send up incomplete information on a side you agree with, and undermine your confidence in a narrative. Trump has threatened to do a lot of things and mostly he doesn't follow through, though he does follow through too. Say 3 true obvious things and then one false thing is a kind of pattern, and overwhelming are the tactics. We need to remain laser focused in this moment.
He floats the idea that he's powerful enough to rig the election, that Elon was. Creating suspicion about the American democracy. It's not untouchable, but is there any evidence?
Did he stages a weirdly bogus assassination attempt where a few people die, including the Trump supporting kid, who got cut from the shooting team because he was a bad shot, a weird way to find out there are high school shooting teams in PA. Incompetent worshipers is his pattern.
Who is this Palestinian with a green card who's been detained for expressions about Palestine in America? Mahmoud Khalil (two, wikipedia): His American wife is 8 months pregnant and he has a green card which can't be revoked without due process. He vigorously promotes Palestinian causes in America. He went to Columbia for a masters degree. I'm not sure whether he is worth defending, but on the face of it, it seems kind of spooky that he's been detained with no charges. Why would a professor who wrote 5 books do a masters degree? I know professors are always educating themselves, that's not a problem. We need freedom of expression in America. Not just right wing fascism on X and the information you like. There are limits. Harmful expressions shouldn't happen, and you can't cry fire in a crowded theater. In my opinion, far right wing expression is often harmful, lying and needs to be curbed. Musk ruined twitter, and I'm on Bluesky now, and it's pretty cool, but of this world and not perfect, and I'm drawing my ideas from there.
Are bots and trolls and half truthers cutting into Reddit and Bluesky? I've seen a huge uptick in people complaining about Reddit, swearing it off, etc. I look at the post history and they look like real people. I never really figured out why people would denounce a platform on the platform. Just walk away. Illogical doesn't mean someone is a bot.
There are narratives I can't support:
AI is somehow dangerous. It could be of course, but you have to understand science fiction, it's out to warn and it could be a problem, but we're not there yet.. AI is advanced enough to actually be useful? I like it when they underline misspelled words. I learned how to spell with that direct feedback.
The democrats could never in a million years predicted the election results and whatever nit picking you do about the democrats undermines the fact that Harris would be totally different than Trump, in a good way. The Palestinian woman who campaigned against Harris is weird to me, but just because she's against Harris isn't a problem, and Palestinian and Muslim isn't a problem to me. Of course people are not beyond criticism, but you have to examine the critiques critically. The right would really attack Harris as president, and could maybe create the idea that she's bad, like they did with Carter, but honestly. Like Biden and gas prices, that's gone away. Trump was going to lower egg prices but he hasn't, and that's only a problem on the left, the right doesn't actually care. I want boring, sane government, not wildly radical right wing experimentation, massive cuts to government, to give the rich tax breaks. You're messing with the fabric of society.
Calling Trump gay for Putin might play well in some circles, but I'm not down with calling people gay as an insult.
This Trumpcession isn't natural or growing pains, or something that will be easily reversed.
Just because Europe is taking greater ownership of defending Ukraine, doesn't mean what Trump did was right about Ukraine, and aligning with Russia is weird. I don't care if Reagan is upset in his grave, he was a monster too. The spin from the 80's isn't solid ground for me. The right wing chooses their own narratives, they don't get it from our critiques. Understand political bias.
Musk has substance abuse issues and autism. Maybe why he's so willingly able to harm people, but those conditions don't necessarily enable him, his money and our worship of money are enabling him. He has trillions to lose, he doesn't care.
Vance and Trump haven't given Ukarine anything, indeed side with Russia, so why thank him? And there are videos of him thanking America multiple times, thanking the Americans who supported the defense of democracy over oligarchy and authoritarianism.
Boycotts, ostracizing, woke and expertise are all capitalism and American. Tolerance has limits, just like free speech. Don't let the trolls get you confused.
To me the ends never justify the means, the means are the ends. How you do things is really important. Therefore I'm not for the assassination of Trump, or violent protests. Destruction of property isn't that horrible when it's Elon's products, cutting into his profits, but honestly I don't think you have the right to destroy others property. You may feel desperate, that the times justify the means, but I think that's the far right's mistake, and I don't want to repeat that.
Some hypocrisy is OK, I like to deadname twitter because Musk deadnames his own children. Anyway, it's like using the word kleenex, instead of tissue, the brand became the thing. Or xerox instead of copy. I don't capitalize because it's not a corporate logo, it's the common parlance, which is loose and not exact like print.
Not a lot of silver linings when people are dying, but clarifying one's values is a silver lining.
The first revolutionary group tends to fail and more realistic people take over.
If Trump wanted to be more successful he would phase things out, instead of creating all these obviously wrong crisis. He likes the lurid attention of being powerful enough to do obviously wrong things. He's impatient, prefers being a jerk to actually enacting policy because the policy is just to create groveling supplicants. He's clearly flagging, he looks exhausted, he knows his time is running out.
If he had a shred of virtue, and wasn't an abysmal nihilistic monster, he could also pull off what he seems to want to do, but that's not his way of being. Just do what you want to do, with a gangster whiff and a grifter touch. Grab the federal government by the pussy. Break all the norms and rules, the gish gallop of crimes there's no time to enforce. Escalating, relentless, he's intimidated most to not hold him accountable. He's surrounded by ennablers with their own twisted motives, he's a magnet for antisocial types.
People like burning it down theoretically, they're all for toddler destruction too. To me it seems like he doesn't want to succeed, he wants to be stopped. He has no core about right and wrong, he wants the world to stop him, he wants his daddy's attention, which he can't get because he's dead, so he just spreads the shit, make someone else clean it up.
He's so twisted from a life not being held accountable, he just wants to touch a core of something that is real, he can't find anything real. He doesn't like his children, he isn't loved by his wife, genital pleasure can't be more than just temporary, as much as it's been his life focus. He's getting old and limp, he's trying not to be, he's trying to show he's virile. He's trying to show America he can get it up and up and up, he's insatiable for offending everyone, and yet some still pretend to love him, the Laura Loomer types. He's hustling, he's selling, he's making his moves.
Imagine winning a Fulbright, and then Trump cutting off funds while you're over there. That's like one of a thousand douchey things he's done. They're rich because they imagine to steal and steal and steal, and say no no no. It's quite a crude existence. It's American Psycho.
There's a lot of people who think Trump is more honest than Biden. They're wrong but they exist. They think it's worth it to "cut out government waste", meaning programs that keep people alive, and thriving, they want death and suffering like they feel inside.
The people who cry to the camera, you've murdered him, you've murdered her, are seen as dramatic and lying, everyone lies, death is inevitable, turn their head, explain it away.
He's trying to make people more desperate to work. To supplicate ourselves, we think we have to many rights. He wants America to get thirsty, and they're just getting less materialistic and angry, preparing the guillotines and for the upcoming revolution.
One of the problems in America is that educational districts are political entities within themselves, and create savage inequalities. The federal education department has grants and such to try and equalize things. If your goal is to increase the class differences, you get rid of the federal government department of education. If you're against the education that usually slants people leftward, you get rid of the department of education.
Of all the dastardly things Trump is doing, this might be in the top ten, but there's lots of competition. Tanking the economy with trade wars, and mass governmental layoffs, to reduce taxes to the rich is pretty terrible. Another act that is designed to increase income disparity.
It's murderous to cut all these program to the poor and tank the economy.
Education is the hope that we have that people would avoid choosing such a person for president. He sees synergy and wants to destroy it. Disrupting, chaos, it might not all be bad, but it feels bad to me. The department that is doing many of these cuts is so inefficient, corrupt and inept that they regularly make outlandish lies.
The cultured ideals of liberalism are being demolished. The idea that we can help each other is being demolished. It's quite upsetting.
Lying is the only way any of this gets done.
A doorman who lives in my coop says he doesn't see any difference between Trump and Biden. He's the second guy to say that to me. I want to yell at him, he is the problem. But it's larger than that.
I see a huge difference.
There was a woman in the park who told me to ignore the seig heil. She feels the country is going in the right direction. She's a homeschooling catholic from Poland.
