#politics moribund institute

[language400]

Exploring the Neologism "Polymachia": Its Meaning, Etymology, and Potential Uses

Etymology:

"Polymachia" is a neologism that is derived from the Greek words "poly," meaning "many" and "machia," meaning "fight" or "battle." The term literally means "many fights" or "many battles."

Comparison to "Monomachia":

"Monomachia" is a term that is also derived from Greek and it means "single combat" or "single fight." It is often used to refer to a one-on-one battle between two individuals, as opposed to a larger, more general conflict. In contrast, "polymachia" could refer to multiple one-on-one battles or many fights happening simultaneously in a larger conflict. It can also refer to a fight involving many people or all the people in a given area, such as a bar fight or a riot. A good example of this is the "Ip Man vs. 10 Black Belts Scene" in the movie "Ip Man" (2008) where Ip Man (played by Donnie Yen) demands to fight ten Japanese martial artists The term can be used to describe a chaotic and widespread fight or battle, where multiple people are involved in different individual combats or actions that are part of the same event. It is a more general term that can encompass different forms of conflicts, whether it's one-on-one or many people fighting at the same time.

Potential Uses:

In biology, "polymachia" could refer to a hypothetical situation where multiple species are in conflict with one another.

In sociology, "polymachia" could describe a scenario where different groups or communities are in a state of conflict with one another.

In political science, "polymachia" could refer to a situation where multiple states or nations are in a state of war with one another.

In religious studies, "polymachia" could describe a hypothetical scenario where all or multiple religions are in conflict with one another.

In science fiction, "polymachia" could describe a hypothetical scenario where multiple alien species, nations, etc. are in a state of war with one another.

In literature, "polymachia" could refer to a story or poem that depicts multiple heroic figures engaging in battles or combats.

In history, "polymachia" could be used to describe a period of time where multiple wars or conflicts were happening at the same time.

In philosophy, "polymachia" could be used to express the idea of multiple fights to defend a certain ideal or cause.

Coinage by Murdoch Maxwell:

As the term 'polymachia' is a newly coined word, there is no established historical usage of it. While Murdoch Maxwell claims to have originated the term, its authenticity has yet to be confirmed.

Conclusion:

In summary, "polymachia" is a newly coined term that refers to multiple one-on-one battles or many fights happening simultaneously in a larger conflict. It can be used in a variety of contexts, such as literature, history, philosophy, and even hypothetical scenarios in fields like biology, sociology, political science, religious studies, and science fiction. It is important to note that as a neologism, "polymachia" is not a well-established term and its meaning may vary depending on the context in which it is used.

In a broader sense, "polymachia" could also be used to describe a situation where multiple groups or entities are in conflict with one another, such as different species, communities, states, or religions. This highlights the idea that "polymachia" is a term that can be used to describe a wide range of situations, from real-world conflicts to hypothetical scenarios.

[morlibertarianism]

"Optimizing Governance through Psychographic Diversity: A Manifesto for The Forkers"

The Forkers is a cross-ideological political movement dedicated to defending individuals' right to fork governance projects. We believe that individuals should have the freedom to take a copy of a constitution, bill of rights, or other governance project, and secede from their current government to start an independent development process. This allows for the creation of distinct and separate governments, fostering competition and innovation in the realm of governance.

We recognize that different psychographic profiles may be drawn to different governance systems, and that the diversity of governance systems allows for individuals to choose the one that best fits their values and needs. The right to fork enables individuals to self-determine their governance and creates a more diverse and vibrant democracy.

We stand for the protection of individual rights, transparency in government, and the power of the people to shape their own destiny. We seek to promote a world where individuals have the freedom to govern themselves and to choose the governance systems that best meet their needs.

Join us in the fight for the right to fork and the creation of a more open and democratic world.

[bitterkarella]

Midnight Pals: The First Omen

Arkasha Stevenson: submitted for the approval of the midnight society, i call this the tale of the first omen Stevenson: things about to get real catholic here William Peter Blatty: yes.. ha ha YES!! Stevenson: and even more italian Lovecraft: Lovecraft: oh uh i don't like that

Stevenson: it's about a moribund religious institution forcing a woman to carry a baby against her will set against the political violence of the years of lead Alex Garland: why you hafta get all political Garland: why can't people just make nice films anymore

Stevenson: see the thing about my film is Stevenson: it engages with the moment Garland: oh but i prefer a film that doesn't engage with the moment Garland: hey has anyone here seen adam sandler's you don't mess with the zohan? what a tour de force!! [chef's kiss]

Stevenson: so this american woman goes to rome to become a nun Stevenson: but what she doesn't realize Stevenson: is how incredibly italian everything will be Stevenson: and also its the 70s, which is statistically speaking, the MOST italian time period

Stevenson: like things are SO italian Lovecraft: [sweats] they can't be THAT italian, right? i mean, it's just Lovecraft: just a little bit italian right?? Lovecraft: right???  Stevenson: it's smoking nuns level italian Lovecraft: [sweating intensifies]

Stevenson: but even better, so catholic William Peter Blatty: yes, yes, i like it! Stevenson: there's gonna be this one irish priest- Blatty: that's me Blatty: that guy is me Stevenson: and his accent is SO thick Blatty: that's my OC now

Stevenson: you know what the omen really needed, though? Stevenson: hot hot devil sex Barker: that is true Barker: the omen DID have a severe lack of devil sex Barker: i noticed that when i watched it, kind of a glaring oversight actually

Stevenson: well, don't worry Stevenson: we rectify that in this version Stevenson: we're gonna flash the devil's dick Blatty: whoa you can't flash the devil's dick! Barker: yeah, that's right, you really need to linger Barker: we all want a good look at that

Barker: like, how are we supposed to see anything when you flash it so fast? Frank Belknap Long: oh it's nothing special, it's just a bad dragon model 57a Willowtongue ® the Ent, 2017 Alt-Porn award winner Barker:

Stevenson: now we are retconning a few things about the omen Stevenson: for example, this time damien has a mom Stevenson: instead of being birthed by a dog Barker: oh but that was dean's favorite part Dean Koontz: i wish my mom was a dog :( Barker: kid just really loves dogs

[sasquapossum]

On my mind: why has there been such an increase in adulation and loyalty toward obviously defective people like Trump and Musk? Have people become more gullible than they were when I was younger? Seems unlikely. We internalized all sorts of stupid shit too, but it wasn't so focused on personalities. Then it struck me: the problem is that we've lost faith in institutions and personalities are what's left. Consider...

Politicians: believe it or not, we used to trust that they were at least sane and working generally for some vision of public good, even when we disagreed. Not since Nixon, Reagan, Dubya, etc.

Journalists: we used to trust them to report the facts in a reasonably objective way, even when that isn't necessarily what they were doing. Then came Fox and that all went out the window.

TV/radio media became all about engagement, a form of entertainment, not actual reporting. Now it's all podcasts and TikTok or YouTube, but basically same. There are some who believe one particular favorite speaks the truth, but few who would say these folks in general are trustworthy.

Print media failed in a different way, partly by being partisans for the establishment (e.g. NYT and the Iraq war) but mostly by totally missing the boat on going online. They could have agreed on a single shared subscription or micropayment system, but they each had to be greedy with their own paywalls etc. So their lunch got eaten by social media (who bear their own share of blame for eroding trust), and the press got even more unhinged about it.

Science, engineering, academe: we used to believe promises about new miracle materials, chemicals, drugs, etc. Even before anti-vaccine lunacy became a thing, a long string of disasters - microplastics, DDT, thalidomide - changed that.

Unions: they've experienced a resurgence very recently, but that's almost a "dead cat bounce" after being moribund for decades. Some people would blame Reagan and PATCO. I think the collapse of major union-heavy industries - auto, steel, mining - had more to do with it, but the result was the same.

I could go on - there's a whole other post I could write about the mixed role of churches in this context - but you get the idea. The fact that in many cases there were good reasons to withdraw our trust doesn't change the fact that such a general withdrawal creates a vacuum which we've filled with hero worship instead. That's where people like Musk and Trump come from.

Here's the kicker: it's not an accident. Undermining trust in institutions has been part of the authoritarian playbook since forever. Julius Caesar is the earliest example that most people would be familiar with, hence the silly illustration, but the phenomenon goes back much further than that. Creating that vacuum is central to authoritarian strategy. Remember Reagan's "nine most terrifying words"? Some people think of that as a libertarian statement but, with the so-called Moral Majority and various militia groups (then as now galvanized by immigration) behind him, that misses the mark. It was part of an authoritarian strategy, demeaning the administrative state and permanent civil service (i.e. institutions) in favor of raw executive power (i.e. personalities).

I'm all for unions, co-ops, mutual aid, etc. but they can't stand alone. Never have. Without a government enforcing rules (including against itself), anarchy will always evolve toward autocracy. If you think the role of government should be minimized, then congratulations, you're part of the Reagan Left ... or worse. A red hat with a hammer and sickle on it is still a red hat. You are effectively supporting authoritarianism whether you mean to or not. Also, since there's no significant left-authoritarian element in US politics - no Stalin or Mao and thank FSM for that - that means you're supporting right-authoritarians. You should stop, especially if you're a member of a group that would suffer most under such a regime.

[loving-n0t-heyting]

There is a good question why i get all heated about the relative democratic legitimacy of hamas and fatah (beyond purely meta cynical explanation like the relative lack of saturation of this niche in the Discourse Market). The plc is a moribund institution, you can argue about whose fault this is but thats not going to resuscitate it and given that it is functionally dead why care about who would win in hypothetical elections? Its like asking if caesar would win against macarthur, its spec fic shit

Ig my fear is that the current war might end with the farce to answer oslos tragedy. That hamas will be successfully uprooted and an unreformed pa under the rule of the plo under the rule of fatah under the rule of abbas will be given the reins over gaza on the pretext of some toothless lopsided "path to peace" learning nothing from the failure of the last. Now without even last times modest optimism and public buy in from either side. And i worry that, even among western observers canny enough not to see this as an act of beneficience and political emancipation for the ppl of gaza, it will be seen as no more than a recolouring of a pre existing illegitimate dictatorship in the strip, rather than as a terrible defeat for the palestinian ppl worthy of protest and indignation. This is the way these abstract concerns about democratic legitimacy "cash out" fir this blogs little readership

The way in which hamas image has been successfully reduced in the west to the most criminal and inexcusable aspects of the offensive on oct 7 will not help dissuade the american public from this view of things, if it comes to pass. Which tbc it probably wont, this bad ending is still among the best possible outcomes to the conflict and the (short term at least) pessimists have so far been raking in the bayes points at every turn. But it still feels worth discussing

[mariacallous]

Turkish politics is interesting again. For years, Turkey’s opposition was moribund. Under the leadership of Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) had trouble attracting more than 25 percent to 30 percent of voters.

Then suddenly, last weekend, the opposition broke through. It’s not just that the CHP held on to mayoralties in big cities such as Ankara, Izmir, and Istanbul, where the sitting mayor, Ekrem Imamoglu, has established himself as the most dynamic Turkish politician since President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was himself mayor in the mid-1990s. Making matters worse for the Turkish leader, the CHP and other parties soundly defeated mayors from the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) in 15 other municipalities.

Just five years ago, the AKP’s orange almost entirely covered Turkey’s local electoral map across a wide belt from east to west and in a mostly uninterrupted swath from north to south in the middle of Anatolia. Now the party controls barely contiguous blots of orange from 15 provinces stretching from the northeast to the central part of the country where it hits a thick wall of CHP red. And despite Erdogan’s best efforts to undermine Kurdish politicians, the purple of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM) dominates the southeastern quadrant of Anatolia. The royal blue of the fascist-adjacent Nationalist Movement Party appears as eight disparate splotches across the landscape. Although pictures allegedly tell a thousand words, the Turkish electoral map needs just one: drubbing.

Yet the results of Sunday’s vote were unexpected. Not because the AKP is strong. It is, in fact, a shell of the dynamic party with a compelling vision of Turkey’s future that it once was. That AKP is long gone. Rather, Erdogan and his party have been able to prevail over the last dozen or so years because he has become a practiced and shrewd authoritarian who leveraged the press, the courts, and parliamentary procedure to make it more difficult for the opposition to compete. He also employed a fair amount of intimidation and violence against opponents.

It is a testament to the political fortitude of Turks and the continuing strength of Turkey’s democratic practices—without the country actually qualifying as a democracy—that people still came out in droves last weekend to register their disapproval of Erdogan and the AKP. At least for the moment, Turkish voters have tempered the idea that the current age is one of illiberalism in which non-democratic leaders can leverage seemingly democratic institutions to advance anti-democratic agendas and consolidate their power. Erdogan was at the leading edge of this phenomenon (even before Hungary’s Viktor Orban became the poster boy for electoral authoritarianism) but now confronts the most serious rebuke of his political career. For the first time in many years, without stretching credulity analysts can imagine what a post-AKP Turkey might look like.

It is actually worse for Erdogan than one thinks. While there are plenty of losers in Sunday’s election, there is really only one clear winner: Imamoglu. Imamoglu scored a thumping 51 percent victory against the AKP’s Murat Kurum, who received 39 percent. This result was not, in fact, a race between Imamoglu and Kurum; it was a contest between Imamoglu and Erdogan. In his effort to support Kurum, Erdogan employed every strategy, including sending 17 cabinet ministers to campaign in the city, as well as making numerous appearances himself. The pro-Erdogan media did their best not to provide coverage of Imamoglu out on the hustings. None of this prevented him gaining one out of two votes in a race where more than 8 million citizens voted, however. The mayor’s reelection represents his third consecutive victory (twice in 2019) in contests with Erdogan’s hand-picked candidates and, for the AKP, the most worrying.

Imamoglu is the political rival the Turkish president fears most, and he is the most likely to challenge Erdogan for the presidency, currently scheduled for 2028. His 51 percent result far exceeds the national support for the CHP. It is hard not to wonder, had Imamoglu been at the top of the opposition’s ticket during the May 2023 presidential election instead of the hapless Kilicdaroglu, how different Turkey might look today. It is plausible that last Sunday, President Imamoglu would have congratulated the opposition on a strong showing. Imamoglu’s victory over Kurum was about the same percentage difference (~10 percent) that Imamoglu was projected to win the presidency had he been the nominee to challenge Erdogan.

Whether Imamoglu will be in a position to face off against Erdogan remains an open question, though. Imamoglu could be banned from holding political office if a frivolous lawsuit that a prosecutor filed against him in 2019 is upheld by an appeals court. If the court upholds the lower court’s decision, it will prevent Imamoglu from running against Erdogan or remaining mayor of Istanbul.

Given the vehemence with which Erdogan had vowed to retake Istanbul and Ankara ever since those cities were lost to the opposition, it is shocking that Erdogan failed. But it is not necessarily surprising. The AKP fielded terrible mayoral candidates who lacked charisma and were perceived to be out of touch with voter sentiment. To compensate for the AKP’s C-team lineup, Erdogan assumed a role of campaigner-in-chief and attempted to be the candidate behind the candidate in many mayoral races. Powerful may be Erdogan’s rhetorical skills, but they could not make up for the crushing economic conditions felt by citizens, notably consumer inflation over 120 percent.

Behind the tough economic times, it seems that after almost 22 years, Erdogan and the AKP have worn out their welcome. Long gone on the stump is Erdogan’s positive vision of Turkey’s future. In its place are a bevy of threats bellowing to crowds that if they did not vote for the AKP, then he would suspend local government services. The bad candidates, the terrible economy, and Erdogan’s bellicosity all came crashing down on Sunday. Not only did Imamoglu romp in Istanbul, but the CHP incumbent in Ankara, Mansur Yavas, crushed his AKP opponent by almost 30 points, and the opposition turned over what were thought to be AKP strongholds throughout the country.

Can Erdogan do anything to turn this grim picture around? It seems unlikely. A man who has always rebounded from political downturns, like the coup attempt (2016) and the Gezi Park protests (2013), appears to be politically weakened beyond repair. In the early hours of April Fools’ Day, Erdogan delivered a concession speech in Ankara, which many TV channels switched away from, as Imamoglu began his victory speech in Istanbul at the same time. While Erdogan looked deflated and worn, Imamoglu was full of energy, addressing a jubilant sea of voters. Yet Erdogan was not prepared to take the defeat lying down. Just hours after the election,  sought to block the winner in the city of Van’s mayoral race==from the Kurdish-based DEM Party—in favor of the AKP candidate who lost badly.  Violence broke out until  the High Election Board demonstrated atypical spine in the face of Erdogan’s pressure and recognized the rightful winner.

Going forward, there are not many good options for Erdogan. If he taps the court to ban Imamoglu, this could result in a massive public backlash, well beyond the boundaries of Istanbul. Similarly, removing Imamoglu does not alter the CHP-dominated electoral map of Turkey that has appeared. True, these were local elections and not necessarily determinative of a national race, but Erdogan would not risk an early presidential race now. Attempting to reset the AKP to its factory settings and returning to 2002 will not work. The entire AKP brand is tarnished by corruption, arrogance, and Erdogan’s authoritarianism. Never count Erdogan out, but it does seem that Turkey is on the cusp of a new era. Erdogan will cling to office, but it seems clear that the future now lies with Imamoglu.

[metamatar]

https://www.roundtableindia.co.in/bahujans-and-progressive-brahmins-adversaries-not-allies/

I assume you're the same anon going around trying to be inflammatory lol.

But here is the good faith response you don't deserve. Yes, most of the indian left continues to have a horrific blindspot on caste. The anger is understandable. Privilege discourse about identity politics in rarefied institutions obscures historical class-caste antagonism by focusing on individuals. This piece also pretends an antagonism between Ambedkar and Socialism that doesn't exist? See Teltumbe linked below, he was deeply influenced by Fabian Socialism, the disagreement was with Marxist conceptions of history and the necessity of revolution. It is not clear from the piece if its endorsing Deweyan liberalism as Ambedkar did by the end, bc that is not a panacea that is immune to elite capture. I wish the piece addressed the ongoing project of Brahmanisation by the BJP and its success at defanging caste politics, the renewed popularity of 'Dalit Capitalism' but I get the focus. India's parliamentary left tends to be a moribund zombie.

Unfortunately I continue to be a communist, and I do not think any serious historical materialist or even like, intellectually honest liberal historian would attribute the failure of the USSR down to it refusing to addressing "social" antagonisms because of some vulgar economist interpretation of reality. Like, yes a lot of the left has been bad at race, gender, caste and the not traditionally economically understood axes of oppression. But at this point, social reproduction theory is several decades old.

[studentprotests]

The strange death and rebirth of the Liberal Party under Trudeau..

Ten years ago, Justin Trudeau inherited a moribund political institution.

[xtruss]

Joe Biden, The Ultimate American Snake-oil Salesman — Scott Ritter

© AFP 2023/Nicholas Kamm

The second Summit for Democracy kicks off in Washington, DC today, with President Joe Biden gathering representatives from around 120 countries vision of in hopes of breathing life into his vision “restoring” American leadership on the world stage after four years of Donald Trump

According to the US State Department, Biden’s American vision seeks to “prove democracy still works and can improve people’s lives in tangible ways,” adding that “democracies have to come together—to rejuvenate and improve our open, rights-respecting societies from within; to stand together in defending against threats from autocracies; and to show we can address the most pressing crises of our time.”

It is notable that two NATO allies—Turkey and Hungary—are absent from the list of invited nations.

The Summit for Democracy is, in fact, anything but. Genuine democracy is a by product of the domestic political realities of a sovereign state, where its constituent population builds institutions and values derived from their own collective experiences.

The American vision of “democracy” being promulgated by the Biden administration, however, ignores this reality. What the Biden administration is seeking to do is to further the span of control of what it calls the “rules based international order”, an unwritten “standard” imposed by the United States in the aftermath of the Second World War which, at one time, was seen as the necessary mechanism for which to oversee global post-conflict reconstruction efforts, but which eventually was used a the means for sustaining American economic, political, and military hegemony over the world.

Devastating Quakes? Don’t Care Must Rob: US Continues Oil Looting of Quake-Hit Syria! Syrian UN representative Bassam Sabbagh blasted Washington’s effort to politicize the humanitarian response in Syria in the wake of last month’s devastating earthquakes, pointing out that the US’s “illegitimate dominance on oil and gas wells in the northeastern part of Syria and the smuggling of petroleum outside the country” constitute a special form of cruelty which “deprived Syrians from these materials and billions of dollars in estimated income.”

Like any “system”, the rules based international order requires an antagonist from which it can generate the fear necessary to compel people and nations to rally to its cause. In the aftermath of the Second World War, this antagonist was the forces of international communism embodied in the form of the Soviet Union and Communist China. When the Cold War ended, rather than adapt the rules based international order to meet the needs of the newly-emerging multi-polar world, the US opted instead to use the cause of “democracy” as a means of imposing its will not only on its former ideological opponents, but also to compel conformity among those nations of the world who had espoused non-aligned points of view.

The American definition of “democracy” had more to do with imposed subservience, and less with genuine empowerment of sovereign goals and aspirations.

In the decades that have passed since the end of the Cold War, however, the reality of imposed “American” democracy has been exposed as a false promise, buried in the ashes of Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Yemen, and, most recently, Ukraine. The inconsistencies of a US foreign policy built on the premise of “human rights” which are selectively embraced depending on the needs of American national security, combined with the glaring inadequacies of the American democratic model as practiced at home, have removed the rose-colored lens behind which America had shielded its vision of “democracy” from the rest of the world, leaving the moribund reality of the American enterprise laid bare for all to see.

Joe Biden’s “Summit for Democracy” is little more than a modern-day manifestation of the American snake-oil salesman of old, a seedy profiteer trying to exploit an unsuspecting public by selling it quack remedies. In this case, however, it isn’t just the cure that is fake, but also the underlying ailment for which the cure is offered. To make the cure-all of the American democratic model more palatable, the Biden administration has had to resurrect the demons of old—Russia and China—portraying them as the forces of “autocracy” (i.e., the new communism) for which the only cure is American-directed “democracy”—the ultimate snake oil.

China Urges US to Stop Interfering in Other Countries' Affairs Under Pretext of Democracy. Chinese Foreign Ministry, Mao Ning, said! "What our world needs today is not to interfere in other countries’ internal affairs under the guise of democracy, but to advocate genuine democracy, reject pseudo-democracy and jointly promote greater democracy in international relations," the diplomat said. (March 28, 2023)

"We have stated our position on the so-called 'Summit for Democracy' on multiple occasions. Despite the many problems at home, the US is hosting another 'Summit for Democracy' in the name of promoting democracy, an event that blatantly draws an ideological line between countries and creates division in the world. The act violates the spirit of democracy and further reveals the US’ pursuit of primacy behind the façade of democracy," Mao added. (March 28, 2023)

One of the problems facing Joe Biden and the coterie of erstwhile “democracy” proponents with which he has populated his foreign and national security team is that not only does the United States not have a cure (“democracy”) for a non-existent disease (“autocracy”), but Biden, by overplaying his hand through publicity stunts such as the “Summit for Democracy” has inadvertently opened up American-style democracy for diagnosis by the other nations of the world who, while finding no cure, have actually classified the American snake-oil as a disease, the cure for which is the very force the US is seeking to isolate and weaken through its actions—Russian and Chinese “autocracy.”

While the Biden administration can bully, cajole, intimidate, and bribe nations to attend his Summit for Democracy road show, at the end of the day nations vote with their feet, and it is to institutions like the Shanghai Security Organization (SCO) and BRICS that the global collective is gravitating to in increasing numbers, rejecting the failed policies and false promises of the core institutions that comprise the so-called rules based international order that serves as the key ingredient of the snake-oil cure being offered by Joe Biden.

Increasingly the IMF and World Bank are being viewed by the developing world as the extensions of the foreign and national security arms of the US, the EU, NATO, and the G7—the so-called “collective West” that have so openly aligned themselves against both Russia and China. By joining the SCO and BRICS, many nations have made it clear they want no further part with a “rules based international order” which can, on a whim, violate or make moot the very rules it advocates for by illegally seizing foreign assets, sanctioning nations in violation of international law, and controlling through economic manipulation.

One only need look to the example of Saudi Arabia, a long-time stalwart American ally, which has openly divorced itself from the rules-based international order it had served for many decades, aligning instead with Russia and China. More and more nations are positioning themselves to follow in the footsteps of Saudi Arabia, opting to become part of a global multi-polarity which is successfully challenging the antiquated and decrepit system built around the flawed premise of American singularity.

Joe Biden’s Summit for Democracy is simply the modern version of the scam perpetrated by the ultimate personification of the American snake-oil salesman, Clark Stanley, who plied his trade at the turn of the 19th century.

Like Stanley’s customers of old, who had been misled into buying a cure that contained none of the ingredients he claimed it did, and as such cured nothing, the world is seeing through the overhyped claims regarding the benefits of American “democracy”, exposing it as little more than false promises and outright lies which, if embraced, leads to only suffering, death, and destruction. The real threat to the world, it seems, isn’t the forces of “autocracy” for which American “democracy” is intended as a cure, but America itself, especially in the form of politicians such as Joe Biden who seek to continue the scam for as long as possible, regardless of the consequences for both the salesman and the customer.

— Wednesday 29 March, 2023

[annarellix]

Black Wolf by Kathleen Kent

Minsk, 1990. The Soviet Union is crumbling. The scavengers and predators are gathering, eager to pick the meat off the bones of a dying empire.

THE SPY: Melvina Donleavy is part of a US trade delegation... and on her first undercover mission with the CIA. Mel has a secret skill: she is a 'super recognizer', someone who never forgets a face. She is the CIA's early warning system, on watch for hostile agents trying to extract fissionable materials from the moribund USSR.

THE SERIAL KILLER: On the streets of Minsk, women are being strangled. Many more have disappeared. The Soviet Union is not a gentle place for women and too many men are capable of such violence, but the truth is worse: just one man is responsible. Worse still, the authorities will never admit to his existence - serial killers, after all, are a symptom of capitalist decadence. And now he has a new target...

THE SPY HUNTER: Chairman of the BSSR's KGB, recipient of the Hero of the Soviet Union medal, the Order of Lenin, the Medal for Valour, the Order of the Patriotic War and the Order of the Red Star. They say you never hear his footsteps until he's carrying your coffin. And now he has a new target...

The Cold War may be coming to a close, but Mel is in danger of being obliterated by its fallout. Whichever way she turns, the wolves are gathering.

Pre-order link: Amazon: https://amzn.to/3lhJiiZ

My Review: It's a book that talks about the last days of the Cold War but the places and the people are so current that it could have been set in these days. The Glasnost happened long time ago, Gorbachev died last year and the geography and the political situations is very different but there's something timeless in this type of story and these types of characters. This is a gripping and twisty story that mixes spy story and thriller. CIA, KGB, Russian mafia and serial killers. I thoroughly enjoyed this complex story as I loved Melvina, a clever and brave woman. This is the first book i read by this author and I appreciated the storytelling, the attention to the details, and the complex plot that always kept my attention alive and made me feel a constant sense of dread. An intriguing story that I strongly recommend. Many thanks to Aria & Aries for this arc, all opinions are mine

The Author: Kathleen Kent’s debut novel, The Heretic's Daughter--about the author's 9X great-grandmother who was hanged as a witch in Salem in 1692-- made the New York Times' Bestseller List the first week of publication. It has since been published in 17 countries, and was followed by two more bestselling historical novels, The Traitor's Wife and The Outcasts. Her 7th novel BLACK WOLF, a Russian spy novel, will be released 2/14/23. She was Edgar Nominated for her contemporary crime trilogy: The Dime, The Burn and The Pledge. The Washington Post writes, “Raymond Chandler praised Dashiell Hammett for taking crime fiction out of the drawing room and into the streets. With Betty Rhyzyk, Kathleen Kent brings those mean streets to life as excitingly as anybody has in years.” She has written short stories and essays for D Magazine, Texas Monthly and LitHub, and has been published in the crime/horror anthology Dallas Noir. In March 2020 she was inducted into the Texas Institute of Letters for her contribution to Texas literature.

Follow Kathleen Kent Twitter: @kathleenkent214 Instagram: @kathleenkentbooks Website: kathleenkent.com

Follow Aries Twitter: @AriesFiction Facebook: Aries Fiction Website: http://www.headofzeus.com

[politicsmoribund]

Atlanticism [アトランティシスム] - (politics) A philosophy of cooperation among Western European and North American nations. 

[memecucker]

something interesting about the decline of the Manchu language is the Qing dynasty was aware of it and actually actively tried to combat it by translating Chinese literature into Manchu (funfact European scholars preferred Manchu translations of Chinese texts as it was considered easier to learn and translate since Manchu also uses an an alphabet) and offering classes in Manchu and granting rewards and preferential treatment to anyone who passed Manchu exams but it still declined despite high level institutional support and by the end the only original Manchu texts were well-wishings to the emperor (the imperial family was always fluent in Manchu)

I think that’s interesting bc like, you have the language of the imperial family and what was initially the language of the officially politically dominant group also getting large amounts of institutional support and incentives to learn the language (and maybe even add the fact that it was easier for communication with certain places) but it still ended up severely declining to the point of moribund status even during the Qing dynasty

[gothhabiba]

[P]art of the great interest of autoeroticism for lesbian and gay thought is that it is a long-execrated form of sexuality, intimately and invaluably entangled with the physical, emotional, and intellectual adventures of many, many people, that today completelyfails to constitute anything remotely like a minority identity. The history of masturbation phobia-the astonishing range of legitimate institutions that so recently surveilled, punished, jawboned, imprisoned, terrorized, shackled, diagnosed, purged, and physically mutilated so many people, to prevent a behavior that those same institutions now consider innocuity itself-has complex messages for sexual activism today. It seems to provide the most compelling possible exposure of the fraudulence of the scientistic claims of any discourse, including medicine, to say, in relation to human behavior, what constitutes disease. "The mass of 'self-defilement' literature," as Vernon A. Rosario II rather mildly points out, can "be read as a gross travesty of public health education." [8] And queer people have recently needed every available tool of critical leverage, including travesty, against the crushing mass of legitimated discourses showing us to be moribund, mutant, pathetic, virulent, or impossible. Even as it demonstrates the absolutely discrediting inability of the "human sciences" to offer any effectual resistance to the most grossly punitive, moralistic hijacking, however, the same history of masturbation phobia can also seem to offer the heartening spectacle of a terrible oppression based on "fear" and "ignorance" that, ultimately, withered away from sheer transparent absurdity. The danger of this view is that the encouragement it offers--an encouragement we can hardly forego, so much need do we have of courage--depends on an Enlightenment narrative that can only relegitimate the same institutions of knowledge by which the crime was in the first place done.

Today there is no corpus of law or of medicine about masturbation; it sways no electoral politics; institutional violence and street violence do not surround it, nor does an epistemology of accusation; people who have masturbated who may contract illnesses are treated as people who are sick with specific disease organisms, rather than as revelatory embodiments of sexual fatality. Yet when so many confident jeremiads are spontaneously launched at the explicit invocation of the masturbator, it seems that her power to guarantee a Truth from which she is herself excluded has not lessened in two centuries. To have so powerful a form of sexuality run so fully athwart the precious and embattled sexual identities whose meaning and outlines we always insist on thinking we know, is only part of the revelatory power of the Muse of masturbation.

--Eve Sosofsky Sedgwick, “Jane Austen and the Masturbating Girl.” Critical Inquiry, Vol. 17, No. 4 (Summer, 1991), pp. 818-837.

8. Vernon A. Rosario II, "The Nineteenth-Century Medical Politics of Self-Defilement and Seminal Economy" (Paper delivered at the Nationalisms and Sexualities Conference, Center for Literary and Cultural Studies, Harvard University, June 1989), p. 18.

[mariacallous]

Talk of a right-wing wave breaking over Europe has become a commonplace of political punditry, but the reality is more nuanced.

Is a right-wing, even a far-right wing, wave crashing over Europe? A lot of pundits would have it so. A recent article in Politico, with the trenchant title “Springtime for Europe’s Fascists”, ran through the usual suspects, with a special focus on the rise and rise of the far-right Alternative for Germany, AfD.

There’s no doubting the right’s momentum in large parts of Europe. Far-right parties are either in governments, or are propping up governments, in “normally” social democratic Finland and Sweden. The AfD, as the Politico article noted, is scoring 20 per cent in the polls in once staid and centrist Germany – above the 18 per cent support for Chancellor Scholz’s governing Social Democrats. “Never in the history of post-war Germany has a chancellor’s party had such low approval ratings,” as Germany’s Deutsche Welle, DW, remarked.

Conservatives romped home in this year’s elections in Greece – which not that long ago, under Alexis Tsipras, was the flag carrier of the European left. A new far-right constellation, Confederation, is polling strongly in already right-wing-governed Poland. Georgia Meloni’s right-wing “Brothers of Italy” are presiding over Italy. In Austria, the far-right Freedom Party, FPO, is tipped to come first in next year’s elections. It’s a long list, and not a compete one. Who knows what elections in a jittery Netherlands, due in November, will yield?

However, even if the right, in various guises, is on a roll in Europe, talk of a fascist takeover remains wide of the mark, not least because right and far right are ideologically loose terms – umbrella words for a range of insurgent forces with a grab-bag of often conflicting agendas and few commonalities, beyond often vaguely expressed identitarian politics, opposition to large-scale immigration and much talk about helping “the family”.

Some, like Hungary’s and Poland’s rulers, are welfarist, some are not. The AfD and the FPO and Hungary’s ruling Fidesz are pro-Russian but Meloni’s Brothers of Italy don’t fit that description. Nor do rightists in Poland. Some echo US Republicans in their obsession with limiting or even outlawing abortion, but not all of them do. Some flirt with anti-EU-ism, others don’t – and dream of taking over European institutions and reshaping them, rather than getting rid of them.

Some, like Viktor Orban’s Hungary – echoing Putin’s Russia – trumpet a noisy if flakey “traditional” Christianity, which usually involves ignoring the modern variety of the faith as espoused by the current Pope. Others can’t be bothered with that, seeing no votes in a moribund Church, posing instead as defenders of the Enlightenment and of a Western secularism they see as threatened by Muslim immigration.

Moreover, in another complication, the victorious Greek conservatives are more of a classic old-style pro-European centre-right party. That suggests the doom supposedly hanging over the European centre right, and its imminent annihilation by the far right, is not a foregone conclusion.

Then there’s Spain. Right up to polling day in the Spanish elections in July, those predicting a far-right tsunami in Europe were practically salivating over the expected outcome – a victory of the conservative right, which would be propelled into office on the back of a strong vote for the far-right Vox party.

It didn’t happen. Instead, the conservatives and the left polled similar amounts of votes and the Vox vote slumped, leaving the Spanish Socialists within reach of staggering on in alliance with, or supported by, Catalan and Basque nationalists. That wasn’t on the playbook.

The Spanish vote either points to Iberian exceptionalism [with the left also in power in Portugal], or to a possible alternative explanation for what’s going on in Europe, or parts of it – which isn’t necessarily a growing tilt to the right but a growing polarisation, with right and left-wing voting blocs crystallising and entrenching their positions.

Polarisation, of course, is not necessarily a much better outcome than a simple right-wing surge. The last time voters in Spain locked themselves into fiercely opposing left-right options, in the mid-1930s, the result was a civil war.

Either way, the immediate future looks bleak for Europe’s once formidable social democrats. They remain in the saddle in Germany, may cling on in Spain – and will likely take power in Britain next year – but both those latter two countries are literally on the margins of Europe; neither sets the European weather.

Next year’s European elections will formalise the way the political wind is blowing. But for now, the only question is whether the most gains are made by the centrist conservatives of the European Peoples Party, EPP, or by the more right-wing Conservatives and Reformists. Divided and baffled, the left seems out of puff.

[penzanews]

Cuba can overcome internal problems without external intervention

PenzaNews. The Cuban government allowed the inhabitants of the island to open small and medium-sized private business with up to 100 employees. This happened in the wake of the massive protests which took place in July in Havana and a number of major cities due to the deterioration of living conditions, including in connection with the COVID-19 pandemic.

“The State Council has approved a decree-law on micro, small and medium-sized enterprises, which facilitates their coherent insertion in the legal system as an actor that affects the productive transformation of the country,” says a note on the website of the National Assembly of People’s Power of Cuba.

Meanwhile, President President Miguel Diaz-Canel said Cuba was taking firm steps to update its economic model.

Earlier, travellers were allowed arriving in the country to bring in food, medicine and other essentials without paying import duties.

According to official information, many government supporters who took to the streets during the days of the protests to prevent provocations were injured in clashes with protesters. The Cuban authorities blamed the United States for organizing the riots.

Analyzing the situation in the country, David Jessop, the director and founder of the Cuba Initiative, Non-Executive Director of the Caribbean Council and Cuba Briefing Editor, said the protests were largely spontaneous.

“The unrest, news of which was widely spread on social media within Cuba, was a response to growing concerns about food shortages, severe power outages, the growing incidence of COVID 19, and the deteriorating ability of Cuba’s health care system to cope with rising infection rates in some provinces, all of which to a significant extent have been exacerbated by the tightening of the US embargo. These then morphed in some locations to protests against the government,” the expert reminded.

In his opinion, the Government response was initially confrontational possibly because some in the Communist Party feared that a US soft war that the leadership says it has been facing was becoming among some a US inspired direct challenge to its power.

“Cuba’s President subsequently sought to lower the tension by recognising the legitimacy of many of the concerns expressed including by ‘revolutionary people’. Since then he has moved to indicate to others in the leadership that it will be necessary to increase the space for debate in Cuban society, and to address issues with a wider group of participants,” David Jessop said.

From his point of view, this reflects in part the danger the early confrontations on the street posed to the Cuban military concept of a ‘war of all the people’ as this doctrine is felt to be the only way to repulse the US attempt at an invasion if it happens.

“Government has been undergoing generational change and implementing major economic reforms that decentralise and theoretically de-bureaucratise state decision making and encourage non-state economic development. There are divisions between conservatives and liberal reformers about the pace of and nature of such change. In my view the current tension s surrounding economic delivery and future growth and the concerns of many Cubans could be overcome if it were to liberalise and create a social market economy that emulated many of the reforms undertaken in Vietnam,” the expert said.

At the same time, according to him, only the Cuban people can decide on their own future.

“It is not up to The US, the EU Russia or anyone else to determine. The US Embargo has failed but has become a function of US domestic politics, making it harder to unravel and in the process harming the ability of the Cuban people to have a better life,” David Jessop added.

Laurence Whitehead, Senior Research Fellow at Nuffield College, Oxford, believes that the unrest in Cuba was “spontaneous, and a non-violent expression of social despair.”

“But there is also a broader setting. The ‘revolutionary regime’ leadership is trying to pass power to a next generation, but this rising cohort lacks the self-confidence and prestige of the founders. Hopes for a more inclusive future were stirred by Barack Obama, and by the spread of the internet, and some mild economic relaxations, then dashed by Donald Trump, COVID-19, and the collapse of tourism. The long overdue currency unification was launched under duress on Jan 1st – the worst possible timing – and has only produced inflation and empty shelves so far. Fundamentally the regime failed to promote food self-security and now lacks the means to import basic food supplies either,” Laurence Whitehead noted.

In his opinion, the US sanctions and international solidarity, including from Russia, help governmental cohesion.

“The immediate crisis seems to have passed without spinning out of control, and to my mind the authorities have exercised suitable restraint - but this is controversial with the western press screaming ‘repression.’ […] On the issue of economic scarcity it is bending to some obvious and easy but necessary and overdue concessions. But that does not restore the prestige of the regime, or compensate for the damage done. Major further reforms are essential, but extremely difficult without splitting the elite. So the danger persists of renewed and perhaps more confrontational outbursts. It remains to be seen how Havana is processing all this,” the expert said.

Commenting on inadmissibility of the intervention of external forces in solving problems in Cuba, he stressed that the question of how it is governed must be decided by the islanders.

“[…] The question at issue in Cuba is whether the US government has the right to asymmetrical intervention that it has repeatedly exercised since the invasion of 1898. The UN votes every year by about 191 to 2 (US and Israel) that such ‘plattism’ is not permissible. […] Biden knows it is not, and that there is no prospect of containing the damage if they invade again like in Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.,” Laurence Whitehead explained.

“The question of how Cuba is governed must be decided basically by the islanders. My observation in 2019 is that the referendum on the current constitution did have substantial (if grudging) support. It would have to be the basis for further political innovations that are going to be essential in coming years. The protesters want ‘Patria y Vida’ rather than ‘Patria o Muerte.’ That is a powerful, but essentially reformist and national platform. Fulminating against supposed ‘totalitarianism’ is no help to the Cuban people. They need international solidarity to guide the country out of its current impasse,” he added.

In turn, Mark Jones, Professor of Political Science at Rice University, expert in Latin American Studies, shared the opinion that the situation in Cuba is increasingly problematic for the Cuban government.

“The economic downturn associated with the COVID-19 pandemic combined with the reduction in low-cost/free oil shipments from Venezuela have added almost unbearable stress to an economic system that was already broken and in dire straits,” the expert said.

“Cuban citizens have finally reacted to the Communist government’s myriad failures: a moribund economy that cannot provide for Cubans’ basic needs, a health care system that cannot protect them from COVID-19, and a repressive police state that denies Cubans even the most basic civil liberties,” he said.

Meanwhile, in his opinion, the Cuban government should be able to effectively repress these protests.

“First, as an island, it is easier for the government to prevent both access to the broader world. Second, the Cuban security apparatus is formidable and also realizes quite clearly, that if the current government falls, they and their families will lose all of their economic and social privileges and quite possibly be jailed for human rights violations,” Mark Jones explained.

Analyzing the likelihood of outside interference, he suggested that the Joe Biden administration will not go the next step of trying to overthrow the Cuban government, beyond the punitive measures such as the embargo that are already in effect.

“There are multiple reasons for this. First, intervention into another country’s internal affairs is opposed by most Democrats and many Republicans. Second, within the progressive wing of the Democratic Party there are many Democratic elites who are historic supporters of the Cuban Revolution and Cuban government, and any intervention would alienate them. Third, the last thing the Biden Administration wants is a breakdown of the current Cuban Government and the country descending into anarchy, which would possibly result in a million or more Cuban refugees arriving in Florida,” Mark Jones said.

Emily Morris, Research Fellow at University College London’s Institute of the Americas (UCLIA), drew attention to the fact that even before COVID-19 the country was suffering from the tightening of US sanctions during the presidency of Donald Trump.

“When the pandemic began, multilateral official financing institutions, led by the IMF, moved quickly to provide emergency financing facilities for countries that needed foreign exchange and fiscal support to enable them to respond to the health emergency. They knew that if they did not, there would be huge suffering and likely political upheaval. But because of US sanctions, Cuba […] has had no access to official international emergency financing. Moreover, just before leaving office in January 2021, the Trump administration introduced their most devastating measure in terms of its effect on the Cuban economy: by re-listing Cuba on the US Treasury department’s list of ‘state sponsors of terrorism’ without any plausible justification. […] This makes it extremely difficult for any Cuban entities to simply process payments for international trade, as well as finance. So Cuba not only had no access to official external financial support, but faced the pandemic amidst a sharp reduction in access to any form of international finance. No other country has experienced this,” the expert said.

“On top of all this, the Cuban government introduced a major economic reform in January 2021: currency unification. This is an important and necessary reform, but it was inevitably going to cause some economic disruption – with businesses earning foreign exchange becoming more profitable, while those with high import components becoming uneconomic – and inflation. In the context of shortages resulting from COVID-19 and US sanctions, inflation has been stronger than it would otherwise has been, creating considerable alarm among Cubans,” Emily Morris added.

According to her, the protests were certainly encouraged by the efforts of US-based organisations to stir unrest, but they also reflected real frustrations of the citizens.

“The government’s attempts to cap prices and ration distribution of increasingly scarce basic goods stimulated growing black markets and queues. With foreign exchange limited, many goods disappeared from shelves […] and were only available in hard currency stores. So politically, there was a general atmosphere of rising frustration,” the expert noted.

In her opinion, the current Cuban government is committed to economic reform, and has been moving towards greater openness and inclusion.

“It has also been remarkably competent in terms of ensuring that basic health and nutrition needs of the most vulnerable are met during this severe economic crisis, and very willing to respond to complaints and difficulties. But the reforms have been a slow process, and the messaging has been clumsy, especially in terms of reaching the young and unengaged population. President Diaz-Canel’s insistence on ‘continuity’ works for the older generation and loyal followers, and indeed may be necessary for ensuring that planned reforms have their consent, but is unattractive to this new generation. AS well as being frustrated by the loss of opportunities and dismal economic situation, they are bored with hearing the government blame problems on the ‘US blockade’ – even though US sanctions are more to blame than before – and fed up with the bureaucracy and controls,” Emily Morris said.

From her point of view, intervention, directly or indirectly, can only make the situation worse.

“The situation should be resolved in Cuba and by its people only. Indirect intervention, whether the radio or TV broadcasts, propaganda disseminated through internet, or covert support for dissidents, is entirely counter-productive in terms of its effect on the internal debate. There is a vibrant exchange of opinions within Cuba, which has the capacity to bring new thinking and concrete reforms, and a process of reform towards a more open society and economy is under way. In the short period of the Obama opening, discussion opened up; but in the context of growing US hostility, the Cuban authorities, as always – and as any government would, in the face of a perceived external threat – reacted against outside intervention by closing ranks,” the expert stressed.

“Direct intervention would be a disaster, with the resultant chaos and destruction causing suffering in Cuba and difficulties for the US. Whether or not it succeeded in its stated intention of ‘regime change’, it would be resisted by a large proportion of Cubans, and the resultant conflict would be costly in human terms,” Emily Morris concluded.

Source: https://penzanews.ru/en/analysis/67212-2021

[zvaigzdelasas]

Also while I'm at it Gavin Newsom should be Parody Redacted on a spit (in Minecraft) for reopening California when he did just to kneel to small business tyrants.

This crisis is 10000% damning evidence of the vacuousness of our political institutions on every level, and anyone who focuses on trying to blame other individuals bc they made a choice that should not have been available to be made in the first place is helping to redirect blame away from these moribund Capitalist institutions