“The choice facing the nation this November is much older and deeper than Trump. A determined minority has been trying to shape the foundations of American governance for their own benefit since the inception of the republic. ... In 2024, the country is once again immersed in a pivotal battle over whom the political system should serve and represent.”
I think that Biden has an even bigger problem than the fact that he keeps giving taxpayer-funded weapons to Israel to kill Palestinian kids: it's the recognition by many people that the reason for doing so is to appease the #oligarchy actually in charge of our country. That #billionaires , not city leadership, are directing police to suppress free speech. That's not #democracy. #Gaza
Talking of Chameleons, I am always impressed by the way Apple have managed to maintain much of their ‘outside, liberal’ image - even when they dominate mobile markets. Jobs was a shite, indifferent to others in his company, family and community. The organisation maintains that process - with a ‘friendly face’.
I do use their hardware/software but am under no illusions about the company.
For centuries, oligarchs were viewed as empowered by wealth, an idea muddled by elite theory early in the twentieth century. The common thread for oligarchs across history is that wealth defines them, empowers them and inherently exposes them to threats. The existential motive of all oligarchs is wealth defense.
Turns out not a lot has changed in real economics for about, oh, 3000 years or so since ancient Sumer and Babylon. Debt destroys the economy.
The oligarchy takes over, and the only real way to un-entrench them is to declare a Jubilee. Naturally, the oligarchy itself is never going to propose this. It has to come from a ruler that is willing to take on the oligarchy.
Good luck with that today. They ARE the oligarchy.
We must remove the wealthy from controlling elections, appointing judges & enacting legislation that benefits themselves at everyone else's expense. Literally.
"Every economy...has a market. But the economists say, no, the only market is where there’s no govt intervention, no govt oversight of weights and measures, no govt prevention of monopoly, no govt concern for the common idea. Well, this is a rightwing philosophy and quite frankly, it’s neofascist - that’s called neoliberalism today..."
Is America a Democracy or an Oligarchy? Edited by Eamon Doyle
The viewpoints in this volume examine the development of the country from political, social, and economic perspectives to determine whether the country can still be considered a democracy.
@seachanger I think we backslid a lot in terms of intellectual capacity. For one, the ability to anticipate right wing tactics just isn't there. Second, our journey from Twitter days to now has taken us from narrating around terms like #toobigtofail, #oligarchy & #rashism to a more coarse old-left vocabulary focused on "capitalism" which is all over my fedi TL. Old Twitter consciousness recognized that capitalism was dead, so I'm at a loss as to why the fedi intelligentsia does not.
The well-off and financially secure easily get into this pipe-dream that if we just decentralise and free everything, democracy just happens like magic.
But democracy doesn’t actually happen, oligarchy happens. Freedom from central control means those resources are fought over by the most powerful, not shared like in a democracy.
Competition is healthy, as long as there is competition. But what we increasingly have also in the #west is #monopolistic#oligarchy.
If ALL countries tax the rich, they'll have nowhere to go to avoid taxes! (Though I wouldn't put it past Elmo to try and move to the Moon or Mars to avoid paying taxes).
"I do not believe in seizure. There are better alternatives, including regulation, taxation, and competition."
In principle, I agree. However, since last year, I did not believe that this is possible anymore in the US. It truly is a #plutocracy (I've written several threads on this during the past year. A tipping point was #CitizensUnitedVsFEC.*)
Elmo has become the most powerful fascist in history.
E.g. just #Starlink:
"The world’s richest and most powerful oligarchs are depending on America’s Republican Party to make the world safe for their 21st century form of autocratic kleptocracy. And Donald Trump, who’s been owned by the KGB/GRU since the 1980s, is their man who’s leading the charge."
The world’s richest & most powerful oligarchs are depending on the GOP Party to make the world safe for their 21C form of autocratic kleptocracy. #TFG (owned by the KGB/GRU) is their man.
The oldest form of govt in the world (at one time or another ruled every “civilized” nation on Earth) is oligarchy.
Comcrap, a.k.a. #Xfinity is a real PITA for their customers, who they screw regularly. All #CableCompanies suck, but Xfinity is in a category of their own.