https://twitter.com/lanadelraytheon/status/924830890747764736
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From an essay by Corey Robin:
As far back as the 19th century, capitalism assumed a militaristic guise, with references to captains of industry, industrial titans, and the like. It seems natural, then, that given the chance to play an actual commander in chief, the businessman would continue to speak the language of his milieu. “Dealmaker-in-Chief” is Trump’s preferred term. But there’s a more recent reason for Trump’s slippage, which is that politics has assumed an economistic guise. As Wendy Brown has argued, neoliberalism is, among other things, the conquest of political argument by economic reason. The dominant rationale for public policy is not drawn from political philosophy but economics: choice, efficiency, competition, exchange. In 1975, Jimmy Carter helped launch the neoliberal turn in American politics by campaigning on the claim, “I ran the Georgia government as well as almost any corporate structure in this country is run.” Four decades later, managing a firm no longer provides a standard of leadership. It is the substance of leadership.
I can’t locate the Wendy Brown reference: it may be
Neoliberalism and the end of liberal democracy though Robin would have to have paraphrased her quip.
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“Columbus didn’t set off with this big old plan to create in the 21st century the industrialized world that we see before us today, of course he didn’t,” Akala says.
“He wasn’t that clever a man. He set off, he murdered a whole bunch of people, committed genocide, and out of a whole series of historical circumstances, and accidents, and some planning, this world system of European-based capitalism evolved – along with white supremacy.”
Fundamental in all of this was the kidnapping and enslavement of Africans, Akala says: “There was an interesting program on the BBC of all places a few weeks ago, called ‘Britain’s Forgotten Slave Owners,’ by David Olusoga, which outlined something historians used to consider controversial. Eric Williams wrote a book in the 1940s called ‘Capitalism and Slavery’ and he put forward the thesis that Transatlantic slavery was really the foundational moment in the formation of European capitalism.”
The BBC’s program effectively confirmed Williams’ thesis, drawing on extensive research by banker-turned-historian Nick Draper.
But, as Akala puts it, “It’s not rocket science. Imagine if Apple Macintosh didn’t pay a single one of its employees. It’s already the richest company in the entire world.
“Imagine it only paid the most senior management and it didn’t pay anyone else – no-one who worked in the stores, none of the people who made the products – no-one, only Steve Jobs and his cohorts. It would be an infinitely richer company than it is today. Now imagine a whole nation of companies that applied that principle. So it’s not difficult to see how Europe became so wealthy.”
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It’s hard to believe that videos like this aren’t intended as sneaky pro-revolutionary propaganda.
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At this point, what’s wrong with a revolution? Trying to change things through voting doesn’t seem to be working so maybe it’s time for other means.
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No complaints here…
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Do you want to understand why the wealthy have no fear?
Because unions, when working toward common goals, sound like lame-ass social media campaigns and never come off.
Because campaigns against the stupid shit rich people: (airstrikes) in Ethiopia, Somalia, Yemen, Syria, etc., never signify.
And we act like it’s normal and we don’t keep our own rich in check.
Let’s put the rich in check.
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Are you okay, Andy?
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I get where you’re coming from, but you know my preferred tactics:
And they are tactics.
I argue for non-violent resistance because I think that this is the method most likely to succeed, given the existing balance of forces. If I thought that the world could be fixed with a handful of bombs and bullets, I’d have already done it.
But it can’t be fixed that way; the world is not that simple. The problem is much more difficult than that.
It’s systemic, not individual; shoot one rich bastard and another rises in his place.
I believe that they can be beaten. But the power is in the people; that’s where change comes from.
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This is not bad. The question is about whether the banker position should move one to the left while the former banker goes directly to Jail.
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