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magxit · 5 years ago

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Taylor’s mention in the ringer article.

I have tried very hard to make my peace with “ME!,” but the “Hey kids, spelling is fun!” bridge is a slap in the face every single time. Taylor seems to be gunning for a whole new generation of teenagers, but she suddenly sounds way younger and far less worldly/savvy/poised than, say, 17-year-old Billie Eilish. And yet, this past weekend, the long-apolitical Taylor criticized Trump directly in a letter to her senator, Lamar Alexander, declaring her support for the Equality Act. (She also endorsed Tennessee Democrats Phil Bredesen and Jim Cooper in the 2018 midterm elections.)

Her public statements are growing more “purposeful,” in short, as her music gets more childlike. How do you reconcile her increased activism with the giddy regression of “ME!”? Is reconciling that even necessary? Is the key to being a pop star adult to studiously avoid singing like one?

Zoladz: I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about why “ME!” repulses me so, and I think it’s because the chorus sounds like a non-ticklish person trying to convince someone that they know how it feels to be tickled and that is deeply unsettling to me? HEE HEE HEE. HOO HOO HOO HOO OOH! Is this the scientific opposite of ASMR?

Taylor is turning 30 this year, and the sonic-fluffernutter first single off #TS7 does not exactly scream, “I am entering a new decade of maturity.” (Not to bring her new cat up again, but it feels important to note that his name is Benjamin Button.) Swift’s growth has been reflected more in her public image than her music, though, and I agree that it’s a little difficult to reconcile that chasm. I do appreciate how direct she’s been in her political targets, focusing less on empty, headline-baiting jabs at Trump (why feed the trolls?) and more on direct action at the state and local level, which is how most change is made anyway. Hey kids, civic participation is fun!

All of these once-reigning pop stars are suddenly having to contend with new peers, and you’re right to bring internet-bred next-generation upstarts like Billie Eilish and Lil Nas X into the conversation. But we also have to talk about the pop star who’s had the biggest glow-up since these three were last on the scene, Ariana Grande. I see Grande as the middle ground between these two camps: She definitely has the old-fashioned industry backing of someone like Katy or Taylor (thank u, scooter braun), but she’s also rebranded herself quite gracefully as a dominant pop star of the era of the endless scroll. Grande is popular right now because she’s very good at two crucial streaming-generation things: She’s figured out that one big album every three years is no longer a fruitful model of relevance (her more off-the-cuff 2019 release thank u, next came out just six months after her Proper Release Sweetener, and it’s been even more commercially successful.) But she’s also made the boundary between her music and her public persona incredibly porous. “Thank U, Next” was such a smash because of how directly it dealt with what we already knew about her personal life. We’re a long way from Carly Simon’s “You’re So Vain”—Ariana was out here naming names. Even her nod to the “7 Rings” royalties controversy in her one-off single “Monopoly” feels incredibly savvy, proof that she (or at least the people around her) has one eye on the memes. Do you think Katy, Taylor, and Miley could stand to learn something else from their insurgent contemporaries?

Harvilla: Taylor is definitely our reigning champion at Naming Names—“Dear John” remains undefeated—but I agree that Grande has devised a more fluid, nimble, modern, and above all human approach to calling out crap dudes in transcendent pop songs. The #TS7 rollout has only just begun and already feels endless: The pastel Instagram makeover, the endless Easter eggs, her sweaty attempt to glom on to various pop-culture phenomena from Fleabag to Game of Thrones … it all feels so slow, so traditional, so antiquated. And yes, as you say, a 2013 approach counts as antiquated. It’s too perfect that a song as Maximum Internet as “Old Town Road” has already stolen so much of her thunder, to say nothing of everyone else’s.

The problem is that the very thought of Taylor trying to be hip and revolutionary and internet-savvy leaves me exhausted. Moreover, what most people seem to want from her in 2019 is, for her, the ultimate regression: a country album. And a surprise drop of #TS7 would feel like she was ripping off Beyoncé yet again. She’s too big to fail but also too entrenched to innovate; she can’t break the music-industry wheel because she is the wheel. She’s a throwback and a bit of a relic in her very hugeness.

As a near-30-year-old with 10-plus years of fame to her credit, Taylor is also far too young to go the Pink or Kelly Clarkson route and age gracefully into brassy empowerment anthems that all sound like pleasant Ellen episodes unto themselves. But she’s far too old to compete with—or sing like, or convincingly pander to—actual teenagers. (Carly Rae Jepsen, whose new album Dedicated is a very enjoyable slight letdown, is likewise struggling with this what’s-my-age-again dilemma, though she’s already more of a critical enterprise than a commercial one.) Taylor has tons of precedents and tons of disciples, but aspects of her conundrum—how “mature” she can act and how “disruptive” she can really get—still feel unique to her.

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aalapdavjekar · 3 years ago

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On Identity

First published in October, 2020.

At the age of fourteen, I found myself in my first online chatroom. "Asl," they asked — early Internet slang for age, sex, location. It was never self identifying information. No one was interested in names. No one cared about what you looked like. You were free to be anonymous as long as you provided a small token of details from which the rest could be inferred. Your interests were apparent from the room you were in and your avatar dropped other crumbs of personality. The concept of anonymity was still years from making sense to me yet the obliviousness to physical identity was real. The idea of a fourteen year-old from India soon became dull. So, I decided to get creative.

Some days I would be a 75 year-old living in rural Mongolia who had just purchased his first computer after selling 25 of his favourite sheep. On another, a divorced mother of three, fresh out of prison, looking for advice on everything from makeup to homeschooling. Each day was a blank slate, a new role to fill, a fresh start. Identity on the web is as literal as fiction. It could be as entertaining as you wanted it to be.

Regardless of how you chose to portray yourself, your personality was a central component to how each story was laid down. Regardless of how out there you wanted to go, to an extent, most would assume you were giving out correct information. In theory, you could be the Pope pretending to be the Queen. Not many would care but most would find it funny.

No one can judge the unknown. On forums such as Reddit, getting a new identity is as easy as coming up with a new username. There’s no one to question your motives, judge you by the colour of your skin, or ban you for being too young.

You have no age on the Internet, no gender and you have no country. Your username might change, your writing will mature over time, new subreddits will be found, some will disappear.

Yet, like real life, people can and do judge you based on certain criteria. Online, credibility is based on reputation — call it Internet points, karma, the number of followers, likes, etc. To some online services, these signify your commitment to your role. Like seniority in a real life occupation, Internet points signify how long a profile has been around. The Reddit karma system which was primarily developed as a reward mechanism also serves as an easy way to distinguish between credible profiles and inflammatory and digressive posters — trolls. If you post worthwhile content, you get upvotes — points! On the other hand, if people don’t like what they see, you get negative points. Unlike the virtual world, physical age plays a very important role in real life in determining your credibility. It gives people an easy excuse to ignore your opinions depending on how old you are while giving way to cultural cliches such as respect your elders or tradition is sacred. One of the harshest — kids are stupid might almost seem like a mathematical axiom but ignores certain aspects of the child that are seldom found in adults such as the ability to quickly master languages or adopt new skills.

ASL in the offline world is very much like the Internet. The major difference is that it’s much easier to catch someone lying. As an Indian teenager, I could never pretend to be a 75-year old Mongolian even with the best makeup advice. Yet, there were other ways to pretend. At the time, I thought of myself as shy but I could still stir up some confidence when I had to talk to strangers. I only had to pretend to be charming, smart, and interesting. Society even had my back. “You can be anything you want to be when you grow up,” they told me at school. “Always dream big,” they proudly added. Years later, I realized all these statements only translated into, “get a bigger salary.” So, yeah, they were pretending too. Eventually I came to the conclusion that everyone was pretending. Everyone I interacted with had a story to tell. They all had a big bag of words that they used to confidently describe themselves. Most interesting of all, they all took the story they told themselves and others very, very seriously and would happily clock you in the mouth if you merely hinted at anything otherwise. Like calling someone out in the chatroom for their alleged fakery, painting someone as a liar in real life was akin to assault. But my conclusions weren’t based on some impulsive thought. They were carefully considered observations. The wall of pretense we erect is not even a conscious decision. Almost always, it is based on years of cultural indoctrination.

Who are we?

Culture is a weird one. The typical North American and South Asian of the 1950s could be considered living centuries apart from each other. The Indian, most likely an illiterate farmer barely making ends meet, could not dream of life in the American Golden Age — minimum wage that could pay for two cars and a mortgage. He could not conceptualise the existence of luxuries such as refrigerators, ovens, swimming pools and shopping malls, hospitals and discotheques, or the ability to travel the world on tips earned while bartending. The average Indian farmer desired healthier bulls, better harvests, regular rainfall, obedient wives for his sons. But then, as much as now, drastically different cultures still overlap in certain ways. The Indian farmer, much like his American counterpart, looked to his neighbour to understand himself. If the Jones next door bought a fancy new car, everyone living in the neighbourhood wanted something better. If the Kumars next door threw a huge wedding for their son, inviting everyone from the closest twenty villages, the Chopras dreamt only of throwing a larger party next year. The collective psyche of each culture is only a reflection of the desires of each individual. But cultures, homogeneous or otherwise, are an echo chamber. They consciously or subconsciously produce edicts, rules and regulations that individuals integrate and pass on. Whether it’s capitalism good, communism bad in the American psyche, or India good, Pakistan bad in the Indian, from economic policy-making and government initiatives to television programming and pop art, everything must adhere to cultural norms and traditions. Unless it fits the identity of the collective and follows a cultural narrative, it will be discarded.

Take the never ending list of Indian god-men and celebrities who are routinely treated as infallible figures worthy of worship. Devotees are often so unflinching in their faith that they are willing to overlook overwhelming evidence of rape, murder, exploitation and extortion. This is not unique to India. Charismatic personalities have sway over swaths of people all across the world. Whether it’s Trump, Duterte, Bolsonaro or Modi, the ability to pander to the masses and speak to the cultural norm is more important than competence at one’s job. Trump gave voice to a collective that was scared of immigrants taking over their jobs. Years later, his ineptitude would lead to one of the worst administrative failings in American history and the death of over 400,000 people in the course of the pandemic. The actions of the Indian government during the second wave need no mentioning.

In many countries, questioning one’s cultural norms is akin to treason. Similar to questioning a person’s opinions, questioning the integrity of a political ideology often leads to terrifying consequences. The BJP’s rise to power in India has been followed by the arrests of intellectuals, academics, students, poets, and doctors for voicing opinions against the party. This is quite the routine for authoritarian governments. In the 1950’s, Mao Zedong’s government in China persecuted and killed half a million of its educated populace before launching the Great Leap Forward, a project that aimed at transforming China from an agrarian economy into an industrial power. While it looked great on paper, it led to the greatest famine in history and resulted in the deaths of at least 20 million people. This failure politically weakened Mao. In response, he launched another program to weed out and eliminate dissidents, killing another million in the process while leading to the destruction of thousands of Chinese historical and cultural artifacts. What was the outcome of this violence? It only strengthened Mao’s hold over the masses. His personality was now a cult.

To call humans sheep would be unfair because sheep are never pushed off a cliff by their masters. Human societies, on the other hand, are rife with power struggles, deep hierarchies, discrimination, and violence. Yet, each of us identifies as a good person. We can rationalize why we are good, therefore we must be good. No country in the world would ever think about labeling itself as a force of terror, cruelty, and animosity, but we can easily call “the other” any number of names. We look to our family, friends, and society to support and reinforce these views — call them nationalism, patriotism, freedom, equality — regardless of how accurate or even relevant these views might actually be.

Oscar Wilde said, “Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else’s opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.”

Our identity does not quite work in favour of our individual or collective happiness. We associate a feeling of national pride towards statistics, numbers, and symbols. Rising GDP is popularly correlated with the “wealth” of a country, but many forget that this number just smashes together a country’s total economic output over a period of time without distinguishing between “good” and “bad” economic activity. Even the man who came up with the concept, Simon Kuznets, was of the opinion that the number had nothing to do with individual well-being.

We look to our history to understand where we came from without realizing we have many incomplete pieces to an enormous puzzle. Many contemporary Indians would associate themselves with the iconic Indus Valley civilization and think of the core of their cultural and religious identities as unchanged for thousands of years. However, the morals and the values carried by the average Indian today — monogamy, marriage, vegetarianism, holidays and celebrations, rites and rituals — all stem from thousands of years of mingling with the outside world. What we define as violent invaders and conquerors today have played an important role in shaping our culture into its current form. Not only did the Mughals contribute to our aesthetics and our lexicon but they also brought with them mathematics, science and philosophy. Global trade helped carry the Indo-Arabic number system (the numerals 0 to 9) to Africa, Europe, and eventually to the rest of the world. The British brought their own legal and judicial systems, passed down from the Romans, the railway infrastructure, and a bizarre penal code which sought to divide the subcontinent culturally, morally, and geographically according to their own prudish Victorian attitudes.

Hinduism, a major global religion today, has its roots in the Vedas, a collection of manuscripts believed to have been written by ancient sages at least a thousand years before the birth of Christ. The Vedas described the lives and spiritual pursuits of the priestly class, the Brahmins of ancient India. Before being written down, they were orally passed on from teacher to pupil. The Vedas described the lives of gods, rites and rituals, spells and incantations, all of which have their roots in even earlier animistic traditions, or the worship of animals, plants and nature — a theme common to the birth of nearly all religions. These texts were central to the agrarian communities that inhabited the Indus Valley. However, one might be hard pressed to call this Hinduism. These ancient traditions later branched out into numerous schools of thought such as Samkhya, Nyaya, Vaisheshika, Yoga, Mimamsa, and Vedanta, each with their own unique set of philosophies.

Due to the geographical scale of the Indian subcontinent, the diversity in language, culture, and race, the ideological descendants of Vedic traditions were in the hundreds, if not thousands, and were regarded as a way of life by those who practiced them. The word ‘Hindu’ was simply used to describe people living near the Sindh, a river that flows through the northwestern part of the subcontinent. The word had nothing to do with the individual beliefs of these people. The modern form of Hinduism developed in the 18th century through reformist movements started by Ram Mohan Roy who wished to rid Hindu traditions of superstition and promote rational and ethical ideas about the religion. Thinkers such as Dayananda Sarasvati, Paramahamsa Ramakrishna, and Swami Vivekanada, would develop the idea of a unified Indian continent and seed missionary movements that brought Hinduism to the shores of Europe and later, the United States. Savarkar, who used the term hindutva to describe ‘the quality of being Hindu’, brought on a politically-charged connotation to Hinduism. This was further fueled by the Indian Independence movement that promoted the idea of ‘India as a Hindu nation’ before the eventual partitioning of the subcontinent along religious lines.

It is a topic of much debate whether an organized and unified Hindu nationalist identity that brought the sheer variety of the subcontinent under one banner to overthrow colonialism would have naturally evolved without the presence of the British Raj. More importantly, the idea of a ‘Hindu nation’ starkly contrasts the cultural openness of the early inhabitants of the subcontinent, and their acceptance of hundreds of cultures and different belief systems, which is ironic considering the foundation of Hindutva is based on the myth that India has always been a country for Hindus.

What are we?

Does my cat know he’s a cat? Do animals know of themselves? What about viruses and bacteria? You might say no to all of these questions and state that the ability to know oneself is unique to homo sapiens. The correct answer is debatable but not really the point I am trying to make. What if I asked you what you made you believe you were human, or conscious, or even real? There is good reason for you to believe in all of those things because you might think it’s ridiculous to believe we are just deterministic machines running on genetic code. Surely, we must have free will. Surely, we must be the most intelligent byproduct of evolutionary pressures. Surely, we must be the only creatures capable of stewarding the Earth. Surely, we must be correct about the things we know and accept as fact.

How comfortable would you be if none of these were true? I won’t attempt to answer these questions here because these are an entirely separate discussion but my point is that we believe we are a number of things only because we have identified with these beliefs for a good portion of our lives. Like the Ptolemaists who believed the Earth was the center of the Universe, or Creationists who believe ‘the Earth is 6000 years old and dinosaur bones exist only to test our faith in god’, there may still be numerous misconceptions of reality that we accept as common fact. Regardless of what these beliefs are, it’s critical to understand that our beliefs are our identity. Through many years of indoctrination, people on opposite sides of the Korean Demilitarized Zone still identify as human beings, but their world views are starkly different. One might defend the ideals of capitalist society while the other might think his leader is god and gladly give his life to protect this belief.

There is no distinguishing between one’s beliefs and oneself. Our beliefs form our habits, which in turn form our personalities. We live our lives from the point of view of our beliefs; a home forged from our own subjective interpretations of the world. We hold ourselves accountable to our identity; define ourselves with tokens of adjectives, layers of tradition and symbolism, while in the meantime, we fight to preserve every shred of it, and live the rest of our lives in a struggle to cultivate it. We try to keep it sacred, unique, and immutable. Otherwise, we ask ourselves, what is the point? We work tirelessly to make sure we’re not just another cardboard cutout while raking in trophies, certificates, photographs, children, exclusive club memberships, Internet points — anything to expand our fairytale legacy; anything to suppress our natural mortality and increasing vulnerability. We judge ourselves not through the motivations, beliefs or struggles of others; we judge others based on ourselves. Identity is a relational web. It is a comparison sheet we use to analyse our place in the world. It helps us weave a meaningful story to answer difficult questions such as: What am I? When did I begin? What will happen to me when I die?

No one is born religious. No one is born to identify with a particular piece of land. No one is born to identify with a particular political party. No one is born as a specific identity. We are all simply products of indoctrination. Every single day, from the moment we are born, our education begins — not towards an ideal of truth but towards survival. The agenda of the education system is only a reflection of the cultural landscape it inhabits. Perhaps only science can claim the ability to course-correct and steer its way towards better models of the universe. Humans, meanwhile, are not so flexible. Between years three and four, most children start forming opinions about the world and themselves. I am this. I like that. This young identity is shaped through an education system whose primary objective is passing exams, failing which the child is immediately labelled as stupid. The child is routinely compared with their classmates, labelled any number of things — shy, honest, hardworking, problematic, unmotivated. Their place in the world begins to solidify. The child, in most cases, assimilates these assessments as accurate characteristics about themselves, never questioning their validity.

Over the course of a lifetime, many layers of identity are crafted and worn, each accentuating every other. Our identity has an appetite. It must consume knowledge and meaning or risk starvation. Some may be consumed by this hunger, turning into narcissists and megalomaniacs. Others might see through the illusion. Yet, most people never manage to leave their opinions behind, not enough to provoke a different perspective because the need never makes itself apparent. Most people internalise their self-beliefs themselves to the point where they are defined by them. People tend to stick with people who think like they do. They fall into a loop of self-compliant views and confirmation biases. Eventually, this simplistic view of the world and the self becomes hardwired and impossible to outgrow. Anything that challenges these hardwired beliefs is first ignored as fake news, but eventually, it brings forth an increasingly agitated response. The stronger the hold of identity, the greater is its tendency to fight back against change. People might call themselves vegan, neo-marxist, jazz aficionados, liberal, Muslim, pan-romantics, Indian first, Maharashtrian second, [enter artist’s name]’s biggest fan. They might have good reason to suspect these words as truth. Regardless of their accuracy, these are just layers of identity, to be worn as per the demands of the situation, like seasonal clothing.

When people communicate, it is a specific identity that does the talking. When I am speaking to my boss, I wear the mask of a loyal employee; when I am speaking to my son, I wear the mask of a loving father; with a stranger, all the politeness I can muster; with a foe, skepticism, mistrust, anger. We carry countless and distinct identities, only to utilize a specific ASL — a condensed and limited disclosure of the ego based on the situation and circumstance. These are like webpages which hide the underlying HTML, CSS, and JavaScript code while only showing you what you wanted to see — a funny cat video. The individual’s relational web grows with every new encounter, every new discovery about the world. It begs to answer only one question — Where is my place in the world? The relational web offers a map to reality; a model that seeks to understand and tailor itself based on experience. This is an intrinsic biological mechanism without which the ego cannot survive.

Our identity is life itself. It is the very antithesis to death. These are polar opposites: creation and destruction. Identity forges meaning while death snatches it away in an instant. While the pursuit of meaning is a lifelong endeavour, ageing is a paradox. Ageing in the modern world is the contradiction between wanting a longer life as well as infinite youth. A trillion-dollar anti-aging industry that only seeks to postpone the inevitable, is testament to this fact. In the meantime, all we are left with is the pursuit of polishing our individual story. Some might cherish the annual event that signifies the day they were born while others might hate it, resenting the lives and achievements of others associated with a smaller number while casting everyone else into a basket of irrelevance. Perhaps this is why the shadow of anonymity offered by the Internet is such a comforting place to live. But whether offline or online, my ASL is whatever I want it to be as long as it gives me the joy that I seek and the comfort I need to go on.

There is no point in living in a cage of dubious and limiting self-beliefs. I am not suggesting you could fly simply by identifying as a bird. I am merely suggesting identity is an emergent phenomenon. It is a continuous carving and remodeling of the ego. It evolves in response to experience of an immediate environment because it is essentially a tool evolved for survival. With that knowledge, at the very least, it might bring you a step closer to staying open to new ideas and possibilities. Just don’t take yourself too seriously.

#identity #psychology #humancondition #internet #reddit #hinduism #hindutva #politics

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politicrap-blog · 8 years ago

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Politics

Someone on Facebook asked me if I’m one of the “we are mad trump won team.” Let me tell you that yes, I am. I very much am. If you aren't a multimillionaire, you should be, too, because he's already screwing you over. He's looking to take away either all of your healthcare or make what you do have more expensive so his rich cronies can get richer. He cut mortgage aid on the FIRST day in office to make housing and other real estate more expensive. He's a real estate mogul, and stands to directly profit from screwing the little guy. He's willing to cost you money both directly and indirectly via his pipe-dream wall. Both taxes and the cost of goods from Mexico go up, and it won't keep anyone out anyway. We'd have to arm the whole border, which would push us right into going to war against not only Mexico, but probably everyone else who would stand to lose from such an agreement, like China, Russia, and most of the UN. Every single decree we've seen from him, and are going to see from him, are about dollars going right into his pocketbook. Let's talk about the Muslim Ban for a second. Which countries are on the list? Libya, Sudan, Somalia, Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Yemen. How many refugees have caused death on American soil from these countries? 0. Not a single one. In fact, the last time refugees suggested a real threat to the American way of life, the Cherokee side of my family were being slaughtered and enslaved by them. So why the ban? There are a few reasons, but none of them are good. Using panic and fear to increase personal power. Using economic pressure to coerce poor countries into accepting skewed deals. Just plain hatred of brown people. Who knows? Well, now that we're depressed, let's talk about the ACA, or "Obamacare." Millions of people are going to lose their healthcare if the ACA is repealed. If people lose their only access to healthcare, they die. Period, there's no way around it. How high could the death toll be from repealing the ACA? Well, before the ACA was enacted, Somewhere between 40 and 65 THOUSAND Americans died every year due to inadequate health coverage. Afterward, the number dropped sharply, but it's still too early to get a reliable estimate. The number is anywhere between 12 and 36 thousand. That said, any number greater than zero means that the Republican party is literally more dangerous to the American populace than Muslim refugees. They will have murdered, without hyperbole murdered, thousands of innocent Americans, and people are cheering for that because they don't understand the ramifications of what they're doing. They're just bucking the rules of the last president because he was liberal or he was brown skinned or he had a foreign sounding name or whatever. I'd much rather we spend the money that we're currently spending on a pipe dream on infrastructure, education, and yes, healthcare. I didn't support Hillary Clinton, I supported Bernie Sanders, because I believe that all people need to stand together. I believe that everyone should be treated equally, rich and poor, white and black and hispanic and asian and other, straight and gay and trans and asexual and apache helicopter and whatever else people are calling themselves nowadays. The law should be written so that the variables that make us individual people do not matter beyond the social scope. Rich people should not get lighter sentences than poor people, and the same goes for respectively white and black, but that's exactly what happens, no matter what you think of the now polarized word "privilege" (frankly, I hate it, because it boils down a complex set of socioeconomic interactions to "if you're a white male people treat you better," which is just not always true.) Society doesn't need to change much to make the lives of everyone better. We live in the information age, and could be on the cusp of true greatness via the elimination of poverty through education and the free exchange of information. I believe that the floor of poverty should be lifted so that the lives of everyone gets better, not the ceiling raised so that the top becomes further unattainable to more people. I believe that food, water, shelter, education, and the ability to stay alive if you get sick should be rights unalienable to all people, no matter how much it costs multi-billion dollar corporations or the billionaire elite, or even the regular joes and janes. Life is by far more important money, and if the taxes on my already impoverished wages need to go up, then so be it, but the rich need to pay their share as well instead of hoarding the money in the sick zero sum game of keep away that we're already playing. Adjusted for inflation and cost of living increases, we the actual working people are already earning less than half of the buying power that the minimum wage was worth 50 years ago. We're literally being driven backward economically because of the insane wealth disparity in this country. On top of that, we already have a huge number of democratic socialist/outright socialist programs in place in the United States. Everyone knows about Medicaid, Medicare, SNAP (food stamps,) and WIC as socialist policies, but the roads you drive on, the schools your kids go to, the free parks, libraries, and hell, even the infrastructure that companies profit from, like power lines and water and sewer pipes are paid for via tax money. On top of that on top of that again, a seemingly endless stream of economists have stated that the move to single payer universal health care saves the average American over $1,000 a year. I'd be okay with over $1k in my pocket, and the savings to each and every one of us, as well as the Federal government, could be seriously monumental if we took the further step of regulating the price gouging pharmaceutical companies to keep costs in check and reforming hospitals to keep prices down. The savings to the Federal government after five years are in the high double digit to low triple digit millions of dollars a year. That said, the current administration wants to fleece us for what little we've got while they sail away on a solid gold boat, to hell with making everyone's lives better and actually improving the overall economy by giving the lowest economic class the ability to put money back into it. So am I mad that Trump won? Hell yes, I'm mad. I'm mad that an utterly abysmal businessman (the guy doesn't pay taxes because he lost almost a BILLION dollars in a single year. Somehow that makes him smart. He has dozens of failed businesses in his wake and settled a fraud lawsuit for $25 Million. The guy couldn't even sell steak,) appealed to the worst in people. I'm mad that the new president of my country, MY figurehead, went on air about how he would walk in on underage teenage girls changing, on purpose, and his staff would force them to dote on him in various states of undress. I'm mad that he openly states that he respects no one. I'm mad that he treats people like property, stating that because he is rich, he could do whatever he wanted to whoever he wanted with no consequences. I'm mad because he's a horrifically bigoted person, and always has been. It's not just calling out Mexico. It's stating that he doesn't want "blacks" handling his money, that he'd rather give it to the jews. I'm mad that he tried to impress Billy Bush with "locker room talk." Even if he were in a locker room, that speech wouldn't be acceptable. In every locker room I've ever been in (and having been a martial artist for a very long time, that's quite a few,) if a guy, ANY guy, bragged about sexually violating a woman without her consent, they'd have their throat punched in before they could say another word. Thing about that is, he wasn't even in a locker room. He was at a TV taping where he knew he was being heard by microphones and didn't CARE who heard him. He is nothing more than a pandering demagogue who appealed to the scared old WASP crowd who believes that they're being oppressed now that the playing field is finally starting to level a little bit. Why am I mad? He spouted nothing but bullshit, and it worked. I've never had much faith in humanity, but I've never been quite this sickened by the American people, or been quite so ready to tear down the establishment and start over, either. Why am I mad? We had legitimate candidates that could make the country better, even if you or I didn't like them, but the vast majority of the states decided to elect a man who has one redeeming quality: money that he was born into and has lost most of. Good luck with your reality star. He's going down hard if he makes it to four years without getting himself removed from office.

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humongoutroll · 6 years ago

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MAGA MEET AMERICAS’S GREATEST ASSHOLES AND OTHER DUMB-ASSES ( 1 ) The dubious honor of being the first person or persons to be trolled on this blog goes to both Kanye West and his wife Kim West. ( it should have been asshole number eight )Kanye you are nothing but an ass licking house ni###r. There is reason to your madness. You just want money from Trump.Evidence? You had no shame of publicly begging for a handout from Mark Zuckerberg.Kim half of your brains are in your TWAT and the other half in your overrated derriere for “being in love “with this black douche bag.Fact is we know you are in it for the fame and money .FACT! Your big FAT butt has more claim to fame than you as a person.For being a douche bag Kanye your picture shouldn't have appeared here. Instead the honor should have gone to your wife’s big butt. (2 ) David Clarke For being a Trump supporting asshole and bad sheriff. ( 3 ) Tiger WoodsAnother one of those self hating Trump loving uncle tom’s who said he is CASBLASIAN ( Hello your late father was a 100% asshole negro) to pander to his white fan base.A reprobate marital cheater. Another dumb athlete whose brains are in his dickOnly equaled by his big mouthed deceased father ( word is Woods got his sex addiction from him).His loud mouthed father had the audacity to compare and rate his second rate son above THE GREATEST ( MUHAMMAD ALI )Would have been fun to see Ali giving him a piece of his mind in the ring and asking him “What’s my name uncle tom what’s my name” (4) Michael JordanBeing a great basketball player does not mean you are a great person. You are a grade A asshole for the simple reason that over the years you have been very reluctant to weigh in on important political and social issues.STUPID PRICK By the way Lebron James is the G.O.A.T both as a person, activist and as an athlete. ( 5 ) Jim BrownAn old football fart and washed up actor trying to gain relevance today by jumping on the Trump gravy train. ( 6 ) Ben CarsonUnlike Kanye West and the above listed vocal uncle toms this one is an uppity silent uncle tom. Sorry you got gifted hands but shitty views and stands. My onl;y words of praise and commendation for him ? A HIGHLY LEARNED BLACK DICKHEAD. ( 7 ) Manigault Newman OmarosaSorry were not dumb. Some of us unlike the majority of Americans do not have a short attention and memory span.Your book “ Unhinged “ changed nothing about my perception of you ! You are nothing but a dumb black scumbag for supporting Trump all that time until Kelly kicked you out on your big black fat ass. ( 8 ) Donald Trump SnrYou should have been the first on this list but I will overlook that since you dear sir have the honor of being the first p.o.t.u.s ( piece of totally useless shit )to become THE P.OT.U.S ( PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES ). Of all the shit he carries around two things stand out in my mind about this white racist bunghole of a president. America has never been so politically desecrated as a nation. I note only two things here.One.It’s a hundred percent true. NOT FAKE NEWS. You did make fun of Serge KovaleskiTwo.Did you pay off Katie Johnson to drop her lawsuit that you raped her when she was 13 years old or did you send her one of your goons to threaten her into silence like you allegedly did with Stormy? Which logically brings me to asshole number 9 ( 9 ) Donald Trump JnrYou are an asshole imitating THE ASSHOLE your father. I mean your twitter habit of trolling other people.Hey by the way you were quick to rightly challenge (first thing you done right in your life) Peter Fonda the old man for grossly saying that your innocent young brother Barron should be put in a cage with pedophiles.Question is ? Why are you not so quick to accept Michael Avennatis challenge ? ( 10 ) Peter FondaYou are and were a great actor and person .But you are a real asshole for dragging Barron Trump a young innocent boy into your fight with his father’s policies.I do appreciate your anger over the separation of immigrant children from their families.Sorry but you reacted like a stupid prick. ( 11 ) Queen Elizabeth Alexandra Mary the Second. Queen of Saint Kitts and Nevis Your Royal Highness God forbid that I should call you an asshole.But I really do think you are a selfish old TWAT ! Please quickly abdicate the throne in favor of……..Prince Charles? ………………….Nah too old !Prince William?................. Nah lacks charisma!Prince Harry ?.....................Nah not fit for the job !Prince George ?......... YES ! YES ! YES .He is charming ,adorable and charismatic also meeting Obama in his pajamas was a big political coup as well as a plus( never mind the rocking horse).So long live King George with his father and uncle as regents. at October 12, 2018 Email ThisBlogThis!Share to TwitterShare to FacebookShare to Pinterest

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melindarowens · 7 years ago

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Pinkerton: The Plutocrats vs. the People: Trump’s Climate Decision Exposes the Latest Battle in the Class War

First of Two Parts…

1. The Latest Battle in the Class War, Blue Dots vs. Red Heartland

On Thursday, President Trump announced that the U.S. would be withdrawing from the United Nations Framework on Climate Change. Speaking of the deal, which had been signed by President Obama in 2015 but never submitted to the Senate for ratification, Trump said:

The Paris Climate Accord is simply the latest example of Washington entering into an agreement that disadvantages the United States to the exclusive benefit of other countries, leaving American workers . . . and taxpayers to absorb the cost in terms of lost jobs, lower wages, shuttered factories, and vastly diminished economic production.

At the White House, the audience applauded, and it’s a cinch that across the country, folks in the red states of Trump Nation, too, were pleased.

However, elsewhere, especially in the culture-crafting blue cities along the two coasts, opposition to Trump’s decision flowed, fast and furious.

Indeed, the reaction was so strong, and so deeply comprehensive—cutting across so many sectors of society and the economy—that one is left to wonder whether or not Trump’s decision will have the stimulative effect in the Heartland that he was hoping for—and that Heartlanders deserve.

That is, it’s possible that blue-state opposition will thwart red-state efforts to make more use of—or even to continue to use—fossil fuels. We will consider this point more closely later, in Part Two.

Yet in the meantime, we can marvel over the totality of anti-Trump hostility: Just about every headline and press report in the Main Stream Media has been critical, with some going out of their way to neon-sign their negativity. For instance, a writer in Politico declared that Trump’s decision “was about extending a middle finger to the world.”

In a similar vein, there was this headline in The New York Daily News: “Trump to World: Drop Dead.” Here, some of us old-timers might pause to recall that the Daily News was once the regular read of New York City’s working class, which was always interested in the lunch-bucket questions of jobs and growth. But now that the paper is owned by a post-industrial billionaire, its editorial stance has changed dramatically; it no longer reflects Queens and Canarsie, but rather Manhattan and the Hamptons—and that might help account for its vanishing circulation.

As for other elite outposts, the reaction was just as fierce. “Hollywood suffers meltdown over Paris Climate Accord” was the headline for a “greatest hits” roundup on Foxnews.com.

Meanwhile, the left end of the political system, too, is reacting fiercely. Indeed, the left is reacting with such ferocity that it threatens to jolt our constitutional system. Hence this headline from Roll Call: “New York, California, Washington Form Climate Alliance in Wake of Paris Accord Withdrawal.” An “alliance,” really? How many more states will join? And how far will this alliance go?

In addition, the anti-Trump forces have injected yet another disruptive element into our constitutional equation—the idea of dealing directly with foreign powers to undercut U.S. policy. Here’s a New York Times header: “Bucking Trump, These Cities, States and Companies Commit to Paris Accord.” The story outlines the efforts of non-federal activists to create their own foreign policy; they seek to do so by submitting a climate plan of their own, directly to the United Nations, pledging to meet the requirements of the Paris agreement. According to the Times, the as-yet unnamed group includes 30 mayors, three governors, more than 80 university presidents, and more than 100 businesses.

Moreover, Bloomberg Philanthropies, the charity of former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg, has committed $14 million to help fund the effort. Once again, this is strange legal territory; the Logan Act, a federal statute since 1799, would seem to specifically forbid this sort of ex parte diplomacy.

So why all this fervor for U.S. participation in the Paris agreement? After all, according to the UN’s own figures, if the U.S. doesn’t participate in the Paris deal, the atmospheric temperature will rise by a mere 0.3 celsius in the next century (that is, if one trusts these sorts of projections).

Many will ask: Is it really worth ripping up the political fabric of the U.S. for such a tiny goal? Yet the answer that’s coming back, of course, is an emphatic “Yes!”

Thus we come to see that the climate change issue is perhaps better to be regarded as a matter of morality or even theology, as opposed to money, or science.

Indeed, maybe it’s akin to a religious revival—that is, a revival for the mostly non-religious. And so The New York Times’ David Brooks probably spoke for many in his social class when he entitled his June 2 column, “Donald Trump Poisons the World.”

In that piece, Brooks outlined the ultimate rationale for many Trump opponents who have picked up a green hammer (among other kinds of hammers) to wield against the dreaded 45th president: “People yearn for righteousness. They want to feel meaning and purpose in their lives, that their lives are oriented toward the good.” Such emotions can be viewed as either righteous or self-righteous, but either way, they are powerful.

By this reckoning, the sacred guideposts of this new worldview include not only the United Nations, but also the European Union. And so it should come as little surprise that American elites openly side with the UN and the EU; that is, they prefer to associate themselves with, say, Angela Merkel of Germany, and never you-know-who. Indeed, in this new world order, Merkel is now routinely considered to be the world’s most moral political leader.

2. China Plays the Green Card

In their untiring enthusiasm to hammer Trump with everything available, the elites have made some curious choices. Here’s a revealing headline from the MSM’s marquee name, the Times: “Trump Hands the Chinese a Gift: The Chance for Global Leadership.”

Let’s try to get this straight: China as the global leader, because of climate change? To many, that will seem like quite a stretch, since, under the terms of the Paris agreement, China must make precisely zero cuts in carbon emissions before “around 2030.” In the meantime, China is emitting more carbon dioxide than any other country; indeed, even now it emits twice as much as the US.

Yet for their part, the Chinese, who seem relentlessly conscious of the strategic goal of de-industrializing the West, even as they themselves continue to industrialize, seem happy to play along with politically correct green thinking.

On June 1, China’s Premier Li Keqiang stood alongside EU leaders, intoning about the “global consensus” on climate change, and declaring the “international responsibility” to do something about it. Given such high-minded words, nobody seemed to notice that China won’t start doing anything about carbon for another 13 years—maybe.

Why the maybe? Let’s remember that this is the same People’s Republic of China that is flagrantly defying adjudicated international law on the high seas in order to protect its strategic interests. Can that same regime really to be trusted to give up its economic interests?

To be sure, some American leaders outside of the Trump administration are courageous enough to call out this bizarre process. One such is Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, who last month laid out the stakes to Breitbart News’ Matthew Boyle:

About eight billion tons of coal is burned per year in the world. The United States of America burns less than one billion tons of coal a year, so we’re less than one eighth of the world’s consumption. That tells you seven-eighths of all the coal in the world is being burnt somewhere else. Four billion tons is being burned in just China alone. [emphasis added]

In other words, the Chinese burn four times as much coal as we do, and yet we’re judged to be the bad guys. Sad!

3. The Coming Battle: Plutocrats vs. People

We shouldn’t kid ourselves: The actions of the Trump administration notwithstanding, it’s still possible that green activists—greatly bolstered, as we have seen, by overall anti-Trump enthusiasm—will succeed in stopping fossil fuels in their tracks. Indeed, if we go to the web page of the same Bloomberg Philanthropies, we see that already, Bloomberg and his allies have succeeded in shutting down 251 coal plants. So we can ask: Did anything Trump decided on Thursday make it more likely that any one of those plants will re-open?

In the meantime, we can be sure that all the actors, activists, litigators, and regulators will keep right on going, true to their self-appointed righteous mission of domestic energy shutdowns, freelance international diplomacy—and anything else they can think of. Indeed, from their point of view, if bashing coal and fossil fuels means bashing Trump as well—all the better. And of course, such Trump-bashing also has a way of becoming Trump-supporter-bashing.

For instance, Frank Rich, the longtime New York Times theater critic and columnist now writing for the similarly-minded New York magazine, looks askance at any possible effort, post-2016 election, to understand the motivations of Trump supporters. Rich derides such efforts as “Hillbilly Chic,” adding:

For those of us who want to bring down the curtain on the Trump era as quickly as possible, this pandering to his voters raises a more immediate and practical concern: Is it a worthwhile political tactic that will actually help reverse Republican rule? Or is it another counterproductive detour?

In other words, no sympathy for the hillbilly from that New Yorker—nor from many others.

Of course, the idea that city dwellers look down their noses at the “rubes” in the rest of America is nothing new; in fact, Manhattanites have been known to proudly proclaim their arrogance.

Moreover, it’s no shock that most Democrats—Manchin is just about by himself in his party on climate change—are inclined to oppose just about anything that a conservative or a Republican might wish to do. That is, after all, what partisan politics is often about.

However, what might be surprising is the degree to which the very wealthy have turned against one of the historic engines of economic growth, namely, fossil fuels.

In fact, we can look back at the last three centuries and see that energy consumption has soared a thousand-fold since George Washington’s time. It’s that growth in energy consumption that has fueled, literally, the standard of living that we enjoy today. And, of course, nobody enjoys it more than the very wealthy.

In fact, the environment is, according crucial metrics, vastly better than it was in the old days, when people hunched over unventilated wood- or-peat burning hearths for cooking and for warmth, or else hunted down whales, nearly to extinction, for their blubber, which provided scanty amounts of fuel and tallow.

Yet today we find that many of the wealthiest families are now distancing themselves from economic growth. Or, as they might prefer to say it, they are demanding that we “evolve” beyond fossil fuels. Of course, it’s never clear whether or not the world is ready to make such an economic leap of faith.

Indeed the reader might ask himself or herself: Is it wise to trust our “betters” when they tell us that the affluent-favored renewables—solar, wind, biomass, and geothermal energy��can be expanded rapidly enough to protect the well-being of the average American?

In fact, according to the National Academy of Sciences, in 2015 those four renewables made up less than eight percent of total U.S. energy consumption. So realistically, what are the chances that they could be expanded sufficiently to take the place of the energy sources (fossil fuels, nuclear, hydropower) that are now out of fashion in high circles?

Or, is it wiser for the ordinary Joe and Jane to conclude that the Al Gore class simply doesn’t care what happens to them? After all, the last few decades of environmental politicking, which have undercut so many Heartland industries and jobs, would seem to point to that bleak conclusion.

Indeed, speaking of haute, perhaps the most astonishing bit of plutocratic guilt-tripping can be seen in the choices made by the Rockefeller Family Fund, which announced in 2016 that, having deemed ExxonMobil to be “morally reprehensible,” because of its ongoing energy production, it was therefore choosing to divest itself of its stock in the company.

This is a remarkable turn of events, since ExxonMobil is descended from John D. Rockefeller’s Standard Oil. In other words, the fortune that the Rockefellers enjoy to this day comes from fossil fuels.

We might note that “divestment” is not the same as “giving the money away.” That is, the Rockefellers, this branch of the family at least, are simply transferring their wealth from one stock to another. Meanwhile, the rest of us might observe: If gains are judged to be ill-gotten, they should be renounced, not simply shuffled.

Yet in the meantime, these Rockefellers will now be free to join the swelling blue chorus that regards climate change as a greater threat than all the other threats, including—but certainly not limited to—terrorism, North Korea, and the Zika virus.

Yes, these are curious choices that some, especially in the toniest zip codes, are making. But as we have seen and will see, they aren’t just making these choices for themselves; instead, they seek to make choices for the rest of us.

So that’s why should all be paying attention, and seeking appropriate strategies in response.

Next in Part Two: Fighting for the Many: The consequences of economic growth, slow or fast, for America.

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source http://capitalisthq.com/pinkerton-the-plutocrats-vs-the-people-trumps-climate-decision-exposes-the-latest-battle-in-the-class-war/ from CapitalistHQ http://capitalisthq.blogspot.com/2017/06/pinkerton-plutocrats-vs-people-trumps.html

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everettwilkinson · 7 years ago

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Pinkerton: The Plutocrats vs. the People: Trump’s Climate Decision Exposes the Latest Battle in the Class War

First of Two Parts…

1. The Latest Battle in the Class War, Blue Dots vs. Red Heartland

At the White House, the audience applauded, and it’s a cinch that across the country, folks in the red states of Trump Nation, too, were pleased.

However, elsewhere, especially in the culture-crafting blue cities along the two coasts, opposition to Trump’s decision flowed, fast and furious.

As for other elite outposts, the reaction was just as fierce. “Hollywood suffers meltdown over Paris Climate Accord” was the headline for a “greatest hits” roundup on Foxnews.com.

Many will ask: Is it really worth ripping up the political fabric of the U.S. for such a tiny goal? Yet the answer that’s coming back, of course, is an emphatic “Yes!”

Thus we come to see that the climate change issue is perhaps better to be regarded as a matter of morality or even theology, as opposed to money, or science.

2. China Plays the Green Card

In other words, the Chinese burn four times as much coal as we do, and yet we’re judged to be the bad guys. Sad!

3. The Coming Battle: Plutocrats vs. People

In other words, no sympathy for the hillbilly from that New Yorker—nor from many others.

Of course, the idea that city dwellers look down their noses at the “rubes” in the rest of America is nothing new; in fact, Manhattanites have been known to proudly proclaim their arrogance.

However, what might be surprising is the degree to which the very wealthy have turned against one of the historic engines of economic growth, namely, fossil fuels.

Indeed the reader might ask himself or herself: Is it wise to trust our “betters” when they tell us that the affluent-favored renewables—solar, wind, biomass, and geothermal energy—can be expanded rapidly enough to protect the well-being of the average American?

So that’s why should all be paying attention, and seeking appropriate strategies in response.

Next in Part Two: Fighting for the Many: The consequences of economic growth, slow or fast, for America.

Source link

from CapitalistHQ.com http://capitalisthq.com/pinkerton-the-plutocrats-vs-the-people-trumps-climate-decision-exposes-the-latest-battle-in-the-class-war/

#TrumpNews #CapitalistHQ.com

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newagesispage · 8 years ago

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MARCH 2017

PAGE RIB

*****Beyonce and Amal are both pregnant with twins.

*****The Trump international hotel and tower opened in Vancouver B.C. with Tiffany and the sons amidst hundreds of protesters and a boycott from the mayor.

*****So, did anybody see Seth Mcfarlane in Real time with Bill Maher? He seemed to just sit and pout. He sat there sying nothing and suddenly blurted out “I’ve got water.” It seems that perhaps an earlier guest got his Jack D. and he got water. It just seemed to me that he wasn’t going to add much to the conversation if he did not have his drink. Such a diva!

*****Kevin Smith and comic book men are back and looking good!!

*****TLC is back with the fabulous ‘Who do you think you are?’ The season begins with Courtney Cox and her relatives who killed the King of England.

*****Leann Rimes seems to have added a few pounds and looking healthy and well too!!

*****Have John Stewart and Ricky Gervais lost it?

*****The number 1 item requested in homeless shelters is socks. Bombas (latin word for bees) socks is giving away 60 thousand pairs in one day.

*****American rehab: Detroit on DIY told a great story of a couple bringing an old house which had been part of the family back to life for a new era.

*****Nick Cannon is out at America’s got talent.

*****Louie Anderson is just knocking it out of the park on Baskets.

*****David Cassidy went public with dementia diagnosis.

*****Who knew that Hillary Farr, the’ love it or list it ‘chick was Betty Monroe on The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

*****Roger Waters is heading out on the Us and Them tour and will the poke the snake called Trump.

*****Dale Earnhardt Jr. was on Watch what happens live and seems to like Vanderpump rules. Too bad about the crash at Daytona Jr. Hooray for Michael Waltrip and his 8th place. We do not want to see U go.

*****Stay away from the Remington 700. It shoots without pulling the trigger. Of course the company does not want to admit that.

*****Tried to watch the new sitcom Powerless. I want DC to succeed in their endeavor but hmmm..??

*****CBS Doubt looked like it had a great cast so gave it a try. The stories were of the same old kind but love the supporting cast and a nice twist. It had a little Spader/Shatner thing going on.

*****The Pats won that super bowl but it didn’t start out that way. Super bowl 51 was so up and so down. Their wide receiver, Malcolm Mitchell was asked by a woman at Barnes and Noble one day to join her book club. He joined, in part, because he couldn’t read very well. He is still with the club and it has inspired him to write a children’s book and begin a literary campaign. For the halftime entertainment at 51, Lady Gaga gave us a statement of equality that said it all.

*****Days alert: Ok.. Is Days going to be cancelled for Megyn Kelly? Say it ain’t so.. Word is coming that there will be no Days in 2018!! Oh NBC, it is about the only thing you have left that I want to watch. Get the picket signs ready. We can’t lose Days. I am still hurting from losing One Life to Live. Jen and Eric have seen each other again and he is saving a picture of her. Let’s fix his hair and get these two together. The last days of February and finally some progress on that front. We need that Tom and Alice couple that we can rely on and stick together no matter what. She already has the house and they have the good foundation and they have come back from the brink. **And.. is Drake feeling better yet? Bring back John Black!

*****Twitter donated a mil to the ACLU.

*****I want to be in the middle of those great scenes with Tim Omundson and Deidrich Bader on American Housewife.

*****The house votes to roll back the background checks for gun owners .This includes those mentally incapable of managing their own affairs.

*****Are we all really supposed to pray for Schwarzenegger? Weren’t the ratings of that awful show low anyway?

*****A friend told me that 80% of immigrants are on welfare. Depending on where you look, it is really 40-51%. Do your research people!

*****SNL is back with new shows starting with Octavia Spencer and Scarlett Johansson.

*****The continuing madness of King Trump includes him waiting a week into the Presidency before handing the reigns of biz to his son’s. It wasn’t until he was called out by reporters that he finally did it. His supporters do not even seem to care. The sons have secret service all over the world looking after them with our tax dollars as they go about the Trump business. *** Steve Bannon openly admitted that they put people in place to deconstruct the administration.

*****Some republicans are now asking for an independent prosecutor to investigate the Russian contact and interference. Jeff Sessions should recuse himself.

*****Our state reps are chickening out with tele town halls. They feel they don’t have to face the people who elected them and can therefor go full speed ahead with their own agendas. They use the excuse that too many people are turning up so they have to take questions by phone. Funny how the softball questions from people who mostly agree with them get through. Quit being cowards and do your jobs or get out of the way.

*****Tom Perez is now DNC chair, the moderates win. I don’t agree with scary clown 45 that it was rigged but a little shake up may have been in order. Personally I love Donna Brazile. Is it time for a new party ,the resistance party? Some will never trust the Dems. Some will never trust Republicans. A new hard left party may be in order. It will struggle but eventually take hold. We need to start with brains and artisans.

*****The President will not come to the White House correspondence dinner on April 29. He says he was elected to get work done and to focus on the country, like getting busy on that wall. Pendejo! Oh please!

*****Pandering to Wall Street, the house is working on ridding us of Dodd Frank that was put in place to help the financial crisis. Do we really want to relax those rules? They are going for a 75% reduction in regulations for companies to add more pollution, to not look out for the customers best interest etc. Shouldn’t we be worrying more about production? Will they do the right thing as they see how the rest of us live or will they continue to ignore the problems?

*****Scary clown 45 claims he did not know what he was signing when he put Bannon on the National Security council. Huh?

*****Elizabeth Warren was stopped from reading pertinent information from Coretta Scott King on the senate floor.

*****Charlie Rose underwent heart surgery and will be back in March. He has been spotted and is doing fine.

*****Looks like a new show Trial and Error is coming. The ads look ok but they are advertising the hell out of it. Wasn’t there a movie with the same name?

*****Carol Merna, executive director for the center for prevention of abuse, wrote an open letter to Illinois governor Rauner. She asked him to put partisan politics aside and get a budget for the state. Some neglect cases have had to be dropped due to lack of funds.

*****CNN is doing the history of comedy.

*****Bill Nye saves the World is coming April 21 to Netflix.

*****Chris Kennedy, 8th child of Bobby and Ethel that was born July 4th 1963, is running for Governor of Illinois.

*****Blondie brings us the ne “FUN”. They are touring with Garbage this summer.

*****Zach Braff and Carol Burnett are both returning to tv.

*****Burger King is buying Popeye’s, lord help us.

*****Iran has cancelled visas for wrestlers that were to compete in a world competition. The Muslim ban has upset so many apple carts. Church missionaries and Doctors have to rethink leaving the country to help others because they may not get back in. We are not all as stupid as they think and should respect us enough to at least quit saying this is about our safety. Why are Christians prioritized? This new administration does not agree with Obama on much so why keep talking about the 7 countries he specified? He did no bans for these countries. Hundreds of companies have coordinated to file a lawsuit against this.

*****If we don’t live globally, things will be a lot more expensive.

*****Isis is on a drone buying frenzy. They are buying drones off the shelf and doing much damage. Our commander in chief needs to get in front of this.

*****New Power Rangers coming out this month.

*****Mar-a Lago, the former home of Emily Post and E.F. Hutton was donated to the government but Nixon did not really want it. After scary clown 45 bought the Palm Beach estate there was much ado about his flag pole. He also wanted the flight patterns changed so as not to disturb his guests. With the racist white house raging on, it is hard to believe that he was once more welcoming. The old guard of Palm Beach was not too crazy at who he was bringing to Mar-a-Lago. The resort would welcome anyone who could pay the fee. Initially it was 100 thou but as soon as he became President it was doubled, being President pays. Oh yea, and the flight pattern has now been changed. ** Scary clown 45 seems to think he is under some sort of cloak of invisibility when he is there. Hillary’s e mails were a problem but he can discuss anything classified on his own cell?? Are you fucking kidding me?**And speaking of Palm Beach, the President is spending a lot of time there. Before the election he claimed he would have no time for golf and relaxing. He has spent about as much of our money on secret service and his travels in a month as Obama spent in a year. This does not even include Melania and the NY digs and the sons who travel the world for the Trump business all the time. Of course, the business is benefitting from this.

*****Kevin Brady and Orrin Hatch can make The IRS show us the Presidents taxes.

*****Nordstrum’s dropped Ivanka’s line. Marshall’s, TJ Maxx, Sears and Kmart are in agreement.

*****If you give up freedom to get security, you get neither. –Ben Franklin

*****Why are the Sunday morning political shows just repeating the same mainstream stuff all the time? Let’s follow Bill Maher and John Oliver who at least talk more about our rights that keep getting stripped away. John Oliver is putting ads on the shows that scary clown 45 watches so he can at least get some real information. Marijuana laws, transgender rights, voting rights are all under attack. The pot industry is booming, why does this administration want to start taking away U.S. jobs? The department of agriculture has removed regs about the treatment of animals. The will no longer make lab inspection results and violations publicly available. Now, you must file a request to the freedom of information act if you want to know.** John Kasich is still making sense, why couldn’t the republicans have went with a sane person? He met with the President on health care. He feels the ACA needs reform but that you can’t just pull the rug out from 20 million people. Kasich tries to do things in a calm and reasonable manner much like the left. Is it worth trying? The administration says that the opposition is acting like 5th graders. How many times do we reach out and try to do things reasonable only to be shut down?

*****Thank you J Lo for reminding us of Toni Morrison’s words about how important artists are in times like these.

*****Thank you A tribe called Quest for yelling “Resist” and telling us to break through the wall.

*****Seattle severed ties with Wells Fargo in protest of the DAPL. ** A federal judge denied the Sioux tribes request for a halt to the pipeline. And while the CPAC was in full bloom, the protesters were dragged away. Some moved across the river and some moved on.

*****Good news for Kim Cade: Camping can help you to sleep better by shifting internal clocks to align with daylight hours.

*****Jimmy Carter put in enough solar panels to power half of Plains. Go Jimmy Go!!!!

*****North Korea launched a ballistic missile.

***** It was something to see when Paul Ryan was asked over and over again about Flynn and the Russian situation. He was annoyed right away. Really? How does it feel? And Hillary held up for 11 hours. Who can take it and wo can’t? Pussies!

*****FLEXIT: After many denials, Mike Flynn , the man who started the ‘lock her up’ chant, was finally ousted. When will they find proof that they all knew about this? They are not even good spin kings but how do they live with themselves? And Pence calls himself a good Christian? Did he know?** Did they make a good choice with H R Mcmaster? Of course, he is active duty so he could hardly say no. He is getting a lot of support because he wrote against Johnson and the handling of Vietnam and Bush with Iraq.

*****White house flunkie Steven Miller was getting invited everywhere after he told George Stephanopoulos he would go on any show, anywhere. Colbert and the View were waiting but he never showed. LIES,LIES,LIES: GET OUT!!!!

***** Streisand men ,past and present, seem to be showing up at CBS. James Brolin has been there for a couple of seasons and Elliot Gould is on the new Doubt.

*****Catch Trevor Noah on Afraid of the Dark.

*****Glad that Nightcap is back for season 2.

*****Scary Clown 45 gave his presidential address on the last day of February. He started the day by letting us all know that the protests and problems were Obamas fault. He started to adlib about 8 pages in. A lot of attention was paid to Karen Owens, the widow of navy seal Ryan who was killed in Yemen. The VP insists that the reports of nothing being gained from the raid are false. Trump pulled back on the immigration agenda that he earlier seemed to soften on. He did mention black history month which never happens. He is still talking about repeal and replace with the ACA. He did not shut it down first day like he said on the campaign trail. He said the same stuff in this address that he has been saying, just with a slightly different tone. He sure changed his tune about the Jewish hate crimes. Former Kentucky governor Steve Beshear gave the democratic response. What?? Why the fuck did they pick a FORMER Gov.? It was a pretty middle of the road response. He gave Trump polite hell for his lashing out at military, media and the intelligent agencies. He scolded that just because they disagree does not make them their enemies. Agreed but Yawn!! The best part of the night was afterward on MSNBC. Kathy Griffin, Michael Moore and Rob Reiner put a wonderful cap on the evening. Thank you for some sanity.

*****Better Call Saul is starting to run ads for their April 10th premiere. So fucking excited!!

*****Comedy Central is bringing ‘Colossal Clusterfest” to San Francisco on June 2nd. The fest will include stand up and sketch comedy, podcasts and music. The lineup includes Jerry Seinfeld, Kevin Hart, Sarah Silverman, Hannibal Buress, Bob Odenkirk, Fred Armisen, Tig Nataro, Ice Cube, Tegan and Sara, Reggie Watts and Princess and interactive offerings with South Park, Seinfeld and It’s always Sunny in Philadelphia.

*****Finn Whitrock, Sally Field and Joe Mantello appear in Broadway’s The Glass Menagerie.

*****The Grammy awards which I have never really understood came and went again. Some of the audience looked a bit perplexed when James Corden purposely flubbed the opening. They rarely honor anyone I really respect. But Adele’s George Michael tribute , once on track was amazing. Chance the Rapper won best new artist and claimed his victory in the name of the lord. Lady Gaga sounded great with Metallica. Again there were sound issues that you would think the Grammys of all places would have worked out but… Best dressed were Lady Gaga and Audra Day. The worst was Taraji P. Henson.

*****HBO is making a documentary about Andre the Giant.

*****The Independent spirit awards were on Feb. 25th and made some great choices. Molly Shannon won best supporting female for Other People. Moonlight won best picture, best director for Barry Jenkins and the Robert Altman award. Casey Affleck (best actor) and Jenkins took their best shots at Trump.

*****Bison have been reintroduced to Canada’s first national park after 140 years.

*****The Oscars were the next day, Feb. 26th and oh what a finale they had. Most everybody knows by now that the wrong film was announced, but that was not the entire show. It was only the second time an envelope mishap happened. Sammy Davis Jr. opened the wrong envelope last time. I always wished that they would show the honorary awards as well, they look like fun. Jimmy Kimmel seemed casual about his hosting gig and never stuck the knife in too deep. The Matt Damon stuff never really gets old. Tourists were brought in and Gary from Chicago is already getting offers from just being there. He had just gotten out of prison 3 days before after a 20 year sentence. Wal Mart is giving he and his fiancé wedding gifts. ** During rehearsal a big part of the set fell down.**The Salesman from Iran won and a statement was read about the Muslim ban. A lot of people were wearing ACLU ribbons to show solidarity. The best dressed were Emma Roberts, Haylee Steinfeld, Ava Duvernay, Laura Dern, Janelle Monae, Taraji P. Henson, Mahershala Ali, Naomie Harris, the dancer with Timberlake wearing the red and black dress, Luciana Barroso, Nicole Kidman, Ryan Gosling and Meryl Streep. Honorable mention goes to Halle Barry, Viola Davis, Michelle Williams, Karlie Klass and Emma Stone. Worst dressed were Leslie Mann, Dakota Johnson, Octavia spencer, Trudie Styler and Felicity Jones and some chick in the audience with a bold blue and white striped lace fiasco. There was a story about Karl Lagerfeld saying that Meryl Streep wanting to be paid to wear a dress but nobody believes it. In the fallout after the best picture controversy, Les Moonves said he’d fire his accountant if this happened. Matt Damon said he was not at all surprised and that is what you get when you let Jimmy host.

*****You can now get Dateline’s Keith Morrison on your GPS.

*****Michael Moore has put out a 10 point plan to get rid of Trump. Most of it is common sense but good o remember:

1. Call your senators and reps: 202-225-3121 or 202-224-3121. A call a day keeps the Trump away

2. Visit your members of congress and both senators once a month.

3. Create your own personal rapid response team, form a group to be ready to leap into action.

4. Join national groups like Planned Parenthood or the ACLU.

5. Remember the women’s march. Join in.

6. Join the democratic party.

7. Form ‘regions of resistance’. Pass state laws.

8. Run for office. Everyone can run for precinct delegate.

9. Become the media. Report the truth.

10. Join the army of comedy. Spread the words of great comedy about scary clown 45.

*****Elvis Costello and the Imposters are touring in June.

*****George W. Bush is making the rounds with his new book, Portraits of courage. He pays tribute to the wounded warriors and at the same time raises money for vets. He also probably feels that it is safe since he is small potatoes compared to the new Prez. We can’t forget the havoc that he and Cheney brought upon us today is today.

*****Lisa Marie Presley is in the middle of a nasty custody battel. Priscilla has her twin grandchildren living with her.

*****The Prez has already cut domestic spending so he can pour millions into the military budget. We spend as much on the military as the next 7 largest military spending countries combined.

*****Spain is going to appoint a sex czar.

*****Another Sandusky, the son Jeff was arrested for sex offenses against minors.

*****Scary Clown 45 made his

*****RIP William H. Busch, Richard Hatch, Al Jarreau, Erwin Corey, George the Animal Steele, Ward Chamberlin, Clyde Stubblefield, Bill Paxton, Judge Wopner and Neil Fingleton.

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mavwrekmarketing · 8 years ago

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WASHINGTON The election and now, inauguration, of Donald Trump has shaken American progressives to their core, inspiring myriad diagnoses of what went wrong and how best to move forward.

On Friday night, an all-star lineup of radical thinkers presented their vision for the Trump era to an 800-plus audience of mostly millennial activists in the capitals Lincoln Theatre. They advised them to embrace with renewed vigor the movements for social democracy, peace and sustainability that existed long before Trump took power.

Its not enough to simply say No to these attacks, best-selling author Naomi Klein told the crowd, referring to Trumps hard-line policies. Its not enough because we know that where we are now, before the attacks come, is entirely unacceptable. The levels of inequality, the levels of racism and the planet chaos that we have unleashed. We need radical system change.

The events sponsors Jacobin magazine, Haymarket Books and Verso Books branded the event the Anti-Inauguration. In both substance and style, it stood in stark contrast to recent Democratic Party vehicles for self-assessment.

The Democratic Party needs to either be decisively wrestled from pro-corporate neoliberals or it needs to be abandoned. Naomi Klein

The attendees, many of whom were in town to protest the inauguration, were in a raucous mood, applauding zingers, booing the names of Trump Cabinet members and calling out reactions to injustices, free-association style. It had the vibe of a call-and-response church revival or a sold-out rock concert, rather than a political theory lecture.

Jeremy Scahill, founding editor of The Intercept, began his remarks with a stand-up-comedy-style anecdote about a chance encounter with conservative actor Jon Voightthat slayed with the crowd.

Noting that Trumps election is part of a wave of far-right populism sweeping the developed world, British activist and author Owen Jones nailed a joke about Nigel Farage, the Brexit exponent, who is reportedly planning a move to the U.S.

I must apologize for the first major British export of the Trump era: Nigel Farage, he deadpanned, drawing laughs and jeers.

By contrast, a Wednesday night debate among contenders to chair the Democratic National Committee was a milquetoast affairin which hard truths took a backseat to platitudes and party-insider pandering. At a meeting of Democratic power-brokersin Aventura, Florida, the most contentious arguments were between those who think the party did nothing wrong in 2016 and those who think its crime was embracing populism.

Those at the Anti-Inauguration more than made up for the lack of self-criticism at the Democratic-centered events this week. They were unsparing in their indictment of Democrats, with whom they have only ever fitfully gotten along to begin with.

Trump won within a very rigged system. And even within that very rigged system, he didnt actually win it, Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party lost it,Klein said.

Members of the radical left enter the post-election debate in a position of strategic superiority. Their favored candidate, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) lost in the primary to the more pro-business Hillary Clinton. That Clinton weighed down by focus-tested policy positions and deep ties to Wall Street went on to lose to the most openly sexist and racist presidential candidate in recent U.S.history has only vindicated their conviction that Democrats should be taking cues from them, not the other way around.

Spurn hard-core progressives again and youll lose them for good, Klein warned.

The Democratic Party needs to either be decisively wrestled from pro-corporate neoliberals or it needs to be abandoned, she said, drawing sustained cheers and applause.

Mark Blinch / Reuters

“We need radical system change,” author Naomi Klein said on Friday.

But the evenings speakers went beyond the Bernie would have won arguments raging on social media.

They made clear that they were not interested in staying within the bounds of the debate, as Sanders or any other figure in the two-party system defined them.

In fact, author Anand Gopal and Scahill used their respective speaking slots to critique the United States foreign interventionism and civil liberties policies in terms that made Sanders sound downright hawkish by comparison.

And while Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, an assistant professor of African-American studies at Princeton, praised Sanders for a campaign that asked for more, she argued that the Vermont senators commitment to remaining in the Democratic Party … threatens to neuter his political revolution. Taylor called for the creation of multiracial, democratic political organizations outside the two-party system.

Scahill suggested that antiwar protesters incessant disruption of President Lyndon B. Johnsons public appearances, which many credit for his decision not to run for re-election, are an appropriate model for Trump-era resistance.

Mainstream liberals uncomfortable with the ideas discussed at the Anti-Inauguration event might have appreciated the blunt humor and communal joy in the room that night.

Some of their Jacobin-reading peers statements may have even resonated with them, including a rejection of the idea that fighting for racial justice and economic equality are somehow at odds with one another.

Klein made clear that there is no time for those internecine disputes.

Our task is to find the common thread that connects our movements. That means, first and foremost, dropping this nonsense of pitting class against so-called identity politics and economic justice or other progressive priorities, Klein said.

This my issue trumps your issue helps one thing and that is Trump, she concluded.