Socindy has not been moving quickly, but I have been working on the larger plan.

We are going to replace the entire online network of liberal and democratic party sites with an alternative network, not merely add a site here or there. The left - or whatever it is - online is dominated by a very narrow demographic, and it is hopeless wrestling with them.

Labor activism, poverty activism, and socialism are the three legs we are going to stand on, and we are going to build a network of interlocking and mutually supporting sites and resources. Discussing this with people online leads to a never-ending stream of what can't be done, why it won't work, how fucked up and wrong everyone is (except the person saying that, of course) etc. etc. yet every single other interest area - knitting for example - is effectively using the web - except the political left. WTF is up with that? I will tell you what - it is being suppressed and people are rolling over for it. That is osmething that can be fought and overcome. I am certain of that.

Everyone is working class, everyone is in poverty or near it (except for the fortunate 10% - all of fucking whom are posting on DU or one of the other liberal sites, I think - and everyone is a potential socialist. THAT is reality, not whatever all of the assholes are telling me is the "reality" that I "must accept."

Socindy has not been moving quickly, but I have been working on the larger plan.

We are going to replace the entire online network of liberal and democratic party sites with an alternative network, not merely add a site here or there. The left - or whatever it is - online is dominated by a very narrow demographic, and it is hopeless wrestling with them.

Labor activism, poverty activism, and socialism are the three legs we are going to stand on, and we are going to build a network of interlocking and mutually supporting sites and resources. Discussing this with people online leads to a never-ending stream of what can't be done, why it won't work, how fucked up and wrong everyone is (except the person saying that, of course) etc. etc. yet every single other interest area - knitting for example - is effectively using the web - except the political left. WTF is up with that? I will tell you what - it is being suppressed and people are rolling over for it. That is osmething that can be fought and overcome. I am certain of that.

Everyone is working class, everyone is in poverty or near it (except for the fortunate 10% - all of fucking whom are posting on DU or one of the other liberal sites, I think - and everyone is a potential socialist. THAT is reality, not whatever all of the assholes are telling me is the "reality" that I "must accept."

Sounds great, keep me informed, please, my winter break is over :cry: hope to still be a help somehow!

Socindy has not been moving quickly, but I have been working on the larger plan.

We are going to replace the entire online network of liberal and democratic party sites with an alternative network, not merely add a site here or there. The left - or whatever it is - online is dominated by a very narrow demographic, and it is hopeless wrestling with them.

Labor activism, poverty activism, and socialism are the three legs we are going to stand on, and we are going to build a network of interlocking and mutually supporting sites and resources. Discussing this with people online leads to a never-ending stream of what can't be done, why it won't work, how fucked up and wrong everyone is (except the person saying that, of course) etc. etc. yet every single other interest area - knitting for example - is effectively using the web - except the political left. WTF is up with that? I will tell you what - it is being suppressed and people are rolling over for it. That is osmething that can be fought and overcome. I am certain of that.

Everyone is working class, everyone is in poverty or near it (except for the fortunate 10% - all of fucking whom are posting on DU or one of the other liberal sites, I think - and everyone is a potential socialist. THAT is reality, not whatever all of the assholes are telling me is the "reality" that I "must accept."

Sounds good to me.

Your words on my computer screen are inspiring and believable. Very little can elicit that reaction in me. I don't know what it is.

So keep talking, and tell me what, if anything, I can do.

Wolf and anax and chlamor I know I can absolutely count on to keep doing what they are doing. Blindpig knows a little about the project, because he has been approached by another one of the people involved.

Every time you try to put ideas out in public and reach consensus or plan, it gets sabotaged, and it is always the same shit. There is a small army of gatekeepers, holding the entire left hostage, extorting people, suppressing communications. For whatever else happens, whatever else we do, we can smash that monopoly. I am certain that we can. The only price to pay is to endure the squealing of the offended ones, and to be willing to say fuck it to all of the excuses and reasons for why we can't do anything.

Wolf and anax and chlamor I know I can absolutely count on to keep doing what they are doing. Blindpig knows a little about the project, because he has been approached by another one of the people involved.

Every time you try to put ideas out in public and reach consensus or plan, it gets sabotaged, and it is always the same shit. There is a small army of gatekeepers, holding the entire left hostage, extorting people, suppressing communications. For whatever else happens, whatever else we do, we can smash that monopoly. I am certain that we can. The only price to pay is to endure the squealing of the offended ones, and to b willing to say fuck it to all of the excuses and reasons for why we can't do anything.

Yes Mike. It's all very easy in fact not the Sisyphean task that is imagined by those who will defensively cry: "Idealist" or any number of such dodges.

As a professional loudmouth my experience is that many, many folks are already there and ready to go.

The suppression that you speak of is due to the fact that those who are in control of these "progressive" outlets identify with the status quo for the most part. The beauty of all of this is that they and those who participate/perpetuate such ideologies that are regurgitated in these forums are miniscule in numbers.

Levi Locke is just sittin' there waitin';

and that thing that you call "price to pay" is a pleasure.


We are going to replace the entire online network of liberal and democratic party sites with an alternative network

What's Step One?

and that thing that you call "price to pay" is a pleasure.


You are an evil fookin' clown.

http://www.feebleminds-gifs.com/evil-clown.jpg

What's Step One?

I am going to fire up the SocIndy server tomorrow.

I think we have to ignore the entire liberal establishment, and in so many ways they demand attention, and obstruct, and confuse, and divert.

It is like a cartel - "offend us and you never work in politics again." The illusion is that there is some way to compromise or cooperate. One homeless person took them all on and whupped their asses, and I could see it all as plain as day. There are no barriers - it is all smoke.

There are no friends to make, no comrades to be found, no feelings deserving of respect in liberal land, and nothing to lose by opposing them thoroughly and aggressively.

Sehr gut, bin wondering. I'm ready as I'll ever be.

Let's rumble.

I wondered what the "hook" was for me, and wrestling with things alone this morning I realized what it is.

People say they are going to help. "Help" is a word that has been hijacked to represent some modern liberal concept. It means "control, delay, obfuscate, block, confuse, dominate."

How do we get people to "look"? Spam? How do ya do that, anyway? "Product placement", ie, inserting links in posts at liberal sites? Word of mouth only might take a while.

Should I start looking for that mimeograph machine?

How do we get people to "look"? Spam? How do ya do that, anyway? "Product placement", ie, inserting links in posts at liberal sites? Word of mouth only might take a while.

Should I start looking for that mimeograph machine?

That won't be a problem.

I wondered what the "hook" was for me, and wrestling with things alone this morning I realized what it is.

People say they are going to help. "Help" is a word that has been hijacked to represent some modern liberal concept. It means "control, delay, obfuscate, block, confuse, dominate."

Hope it wasn't my offering "help" above that did it, and that it was taken with the original meaning ("Sounds great, keep me informed, please, my winter break is over Crying or Very sad hope to still be a help somehow!") but if it was my offer and it gets things moving!!! then so be it!! get this ball rolling if over me for helping or with or without me, but you go Mike!!! And if I can use whats at soc indy to move some "liberal" teachers!! to do their true duties...It'll be something! rock and roll.

I am going to fire up the SocIndy server tomorrow.

Please let me know about bloggishness as you do this, Mike. I am quite busy with a new jawb, but still have intention to post a rather lengthy Pisarev essay. To that end, I have so far managed to -finally- get *us* log in credentials for MovableType as well as acquiring and loading up OCR software for use in converting scanned images of the essay.

I'm happy to post that at the new URL although I dunno nuttin' about the mechanics of doing so.

I am glad to know you are forging ahead even as I (all-too-slowly) work within current confines.

Cheers

I am going to fire up the SocIndy server tomorrow.

Please let me know about bloggishness as you do this, Mike. I am quite busy with a new jawb, but still have intention to post a rather lengthy Pisarev essay. To that end, I have so far managed to -finally- get *us* log in credentials for MovableType as well as acquiring and loading up OCR software for use in converting scanned images of the essay.

I'm happy to post that at the new URL although I dunno nuttin' about the mechanics of doing so.

I am glad to know you are forging ahead even as I (all-too-slowly) work within current confines.

Cheers

I am going to post a couple of articles here that describe what I am seeing from the tech standpoint. It may or may not mean anything to people.

If there is a need for backup of the database or anything like that I still have a fast connection and my external drive.

I won't offer to 'help' or anything but if you care to give me assignments I do follow directions pretty well ;)

And I've got nothing but time on my hands most evenings and weekends.

Nothing wrong with helping people, Mary and Megan. I am talking about when it is used as cover for another agenda - which it is more often then not by liberals.

Re-posting this here...

But in any case, the approach we take to discussion and to building organizations is deeply flawed and can never work. This is the only place where I see glimmers of people breaking out of the pattern. Once the pattern is successfully broken anywhere, it will spread and be broken everywhere. Still, that is at risk of being thrown aside here, in the same way that all attempts at this are thrown aside everywhere.

Since the approach we take is flawed and certain to fail, I am very much open to considering Wolf's model, which dates back to a time when people were able to discuss things and were able to build organizations. I also see value in chlamor's "smash it up" approach since it is something of a hypnotic coma that people are in - but certainly not Wolf.

I am resigned to be an organization of one, if that is what it takes. It is impossible to be a leader, except and unless one is willing to strictly follow the modern corporate CEO model of leadership. I am going to go the opposite direction, whatever it takes, working alone and perhaps some will follow eventually. If not, I can blaze the trail for future leaders when people are ready once again to approach politics and life with some measure of sanity.

One must be in loco parentis to be accepted as a leader, and deal with endless squabbling by the children. There is overwhelming pressure on any one trying to lead. If one refuses to be in loco prentis, one is sen as a bad parent - the children are confused and resentful. This is why we have only moral cowards for leaders whose main skill is at telling people comfortable things they want to hear, or tyrannical assholes. I have ben trying to get at that on a thread over at DU - "Why Did Gore Concede?"

You can't even talk about direction and purpose and organizational issues or lead people because if you stop for a moment to explain to people they will overwhelm you with considerations and hesitations and other distractions, until and unless you start acting like Donald Trump. Then everyone falls in line. People are actually angry with me because I won't act like Donald Trump, yet they keep gravitating to me as a leader - they are confused and offended and hurt and what not. So it is me and my lonesome and so be it.

I fully expect all of my efforts to blow up, and to then be seen as no longer a dog whose ass needs to be sniffed. No way around that.

Timetables, schedules, roles, assignments, mission statements, organizational structure, benchmarks, funding, goals....

Fuck all of that.

Homelessness and poverty and oppression and tyranny are like a mine cave in, writ large.

There was a cave in. Miners are trapped. The goal is to save them. You dig until you succeed. You dig even if you are the only one digging.

The first model is the corporate model, and we sit around sipping coffee and covering our asses and being a team player. The second model is what you do when you are in an emergency situation and the onlookers are paralyzed by fear and denial so that their brains have seized up and they have become non-functioning.

While it is seductive and tempting to entertain people's offers of help - after all, with a hundred people digging we would in theory be more likely to save the miners - it is a trap. The problem is that endless time is spent debating with the "helpers" only to find out that the helpers don't believe that miners are trapped, or deny it, or think that trapped miners is inevitable so "we do what we can do," do not want to face the fact that digging is required and on and on. And then people are offended that you are suggesting that they are not the type of person who cares about trapped miners. Others say the problem is over-rated. Others say that it is inevitable - human nature that we can never change. Others say that the experts are working on mine safety, know better than we do how to "solution the problem," and that those raising alarm bells about the trapped miners are in the way and have no business talking about it.

So I am digging. The task is self-evident. If I am the only one digging, so be it. I will dig until the job is done or I die. If others helped it would go faster, but it is a waste of time trying to organize or motivate people.

People cannot be led, they refuse to be led. They bog you down in endless debates that only serve the purpose of preventing anything from happening.

What people really want to know is will you flatter them, or will you coerce them. They refuse to commit, and stay safely at a distance. They will bail the moment that any slight little annoyance or inconvenience arises. They prefer a dictatorship, providing they know the parameters of it, to true leadership.

Timetables, schedules, roles, assignments, mission statements, organizational structure, benchmarks, funding, goals....

Fuck all of that.

Homelessness and poverty and oppression and tyranny are like a mine cave in, writ large.

There was a cave in. Miners are trapped. The goal is to save them. You dig until you succeed. You dig even if you are the only one digging.

The first model is the corporate model, and we sit around sipping coffee and covering our asses and being a team player. The second model is what you do when you are in an emergency situation and the onlookers are paralyzed by fear and denial so that their brains have seized up and they have become non-functioning.

While it is seductive and tempting to entertain people's offers of help - after all, with a hundred people digging we would in theory be more likely to save the miners - it is a trap. The problem is that endless time is spent debating with the "helpers" only to find out that the helpers don't believe that miners are trapped, or deny it, or think that trapped miners is inevitable so "we do what we can do," do not want to face the fact that digging is required and on and on. And then people are offended that you are suggesting that they are not the type of person who cares about trapped miners. Others say the problem is over-rated. Others say that it is inevitable - human nature that we can never change. Others say that the experts are working on mine safety, know better than we do how to "solution the problem," and that those raising alarm bells about the trapped miners are in the way and have no business talking about it.

So I am digging. The task is self-evident. If I am the only one digging, so be it. I will dig until the job is done or I die. If others helped it would go faster, but it is a waste of time trying to organize or motivate people.

People cannot be led, they refuse to be led. They bog you down in endless debates that only serve the purpose of preventing anything from happening.

What people really want to know is will you flatter them, or will you coerce them. They refuse to commit, and stay safely at a distance. They will bail the moment that any slight little annoyance or inconvenience arises. They prefer a dictatorship, providing they know the parameters of it, to true leadership.

But there are some of us who don't know the way to dig, or where to dig, or who don't have the physique to dig efficiently...how can we find out?? If not leaders, then teachers, mentors, or guides if you will? Maybe just a pointing finger?? Last summer I was at an extended family gathering and was talking at great length about the dire need for true action, my brother in law's brother in law, said "lead Mary, we'll follow..." We all need the first step and don't know where to put our foot...

But there are some of us who don't know the way to dig, or where to dig, or who don't have the physique to dig efficiently...how can we find out?? If not leaders, then teachers, mentors, or guides if you will? Maybe just a pointing finger?? Last summer I was at an extended family gathering and was talking at great length about the dire need for true action, my brother in law's brother in law, said "lead Mary, we'll follow..." We all need the first step and don't know where to put our foot...

OK, how? Serious question. I am intensely interested in this issue. What if you say again and again to people - intelligent people - "right there. Grab this shovel" and they still claim to not get it?

But there are some of us who don't know the way to dig, or where to dig, or who don't have the physique to dig efficiently...how can we find out?? If not leaders, then teachers, mentors, or guides if you will? Maybe just a pointing finger?? Last summer I was at an extended family gathering and was talking at great length about the dire need for true action, my brother in law's brother in law, said "lead Mary, we'll follow..." We all need the first step and don't know where to put our foot...

OK, how? Serious question. I am intensely interested in this issue. What if you say again and again to people - intelligent people - "right there. Grab this shovel" and they still claim to not get it?

Change tack? When I'm teaching a kid how to "see" and draw objectively, sometimes I have to go at it from 5 different directions, I use all kinds of devices, sometimes I get a piece of tracing paper and draw right over the kids drawing, then quite literally go and draw the shape I just drew on the paper with my finger on the object; I'm a yeller and I let the kids yell at me a lot (not always). When they have that moment of comprehension of truly seeing, its fantastic for both the kid and the teacher. (Doors of Perception, great book)

Maybe its just a big block, inverted tunnel vision? And sometimes it has to be literally spelled out, literally not figuratively. I talk, and write, and spiel, and post, and discuss with others elsewhere, am I "digging"?

Intelligent people are not necessarily wise, or clear, or understanding at all times? some are more perceptive and concrete, less conceptual, and abstract. Some have serious processing disabilities. Some are very intelligent in some ways, very dense in others. Change tack? maybe?

Change tack? When I'm teaching a kid how to "see" and draw objectively, sometimes I have to go at it from 5 different directions, I use all kinds of devices, sometimes I get a piece of tracing paper and draw right over the kids drawing, then quite literally go and draw the shape I just drew on the paper with my finger on the object; I'm a yeller and I let the kids yell at me a lot (not always). When they have that moment of comprehension of truly seeing, its fantastic for both the kid and the teacher. (Doors of Perception, great book)

Maybe its just a big block, inverted tunnel vision? And sometimes it has to be literally spelled out, literally not figuratively. I talk, and write, and spiel, and post, and discuss with others elsewhere, am I "digging"?

Intelligent people are not necessarily wise, or clear, or understanding at all times? some are more perceptive and concrete, less conceptual, and abstract. Some have serious processing disabilities. Some are very intelligent in some ways, very dense in others. Change tack? maybe?

Every possible change of tack has been tried, were it truly a matter of people needing to be educated. Something else is going on. What if the kids refused to touch pencils because they were evil, and even speaking the word caused a huge uproar in the classroom that you spent the rest of the day handling, and then led to weeks of controversy in the community and threatened to cause the school to be shut down? What method of teaching them to draw would overcome that?

Change tack? When I'm teaching a kid how to "see" and draw objectively, sometimes I have to go at it from 5 different directions, I use all kinds of devices, sometimes I get a piece of tracing paper and draw right over the kids drawing, then quite literally go and draw the shape I just drew on the paper with my finger on the object; I'm a yeller and I let the kids yell at me a lot (not always). When they have that moment of comprehension of truly seeing, its fantastic for both the kid and the teacher. (Doors of Perception, great book)

Maybe its just a big block, inverted tunnel vision? And sometimes it has to be literally spelled out, literally not figuratively. I talk, and write, and spiel, and post, and discuss with others elsewhere, am I "digging"?

Intelligent people are not necessarily wise, or clear, or understanding at all times? some are more perceptive and concrete, less conceptual, and abstract. Some have serious processing disabilities. Some are very intelligent in some ways, very dense in others. Change tack? maybe?

Every possible change of tack has been tried, were it truly a matter of people needing to be educated. Something else is going on. What if the kids refused to touch pencils because they were evil, and even speaking the word caused a huge uproar in the classroom that you spent the rest of the day handling, and then led to weeks of controversy in the community and threatened to cause the school to be shut down? What method of teaching them to draw would overcome that?

I think my brain just exploded...I'm out of thoughts...

I think my brain just exploded...I'm out of thoughts...

Oh no! Didn't mean to do that.

Change tack? When I'm teaching a kid how to "see" and draw objectively, sometimes I have to go at it from 5 different directions, I use all kinds of devices, sometimes I get a piece of tracing paper and draw right over the kids drawing, then quite literally go and draw the shape I just drew on the paper with my finger on the object; I'm a yeller and I let the kids yell at me a lot (not always). When they have that moment of comprehension of truly seeing, its fantastic for both the kid and the teacher. (Doors of Perception, great book)

Maybe its just a big block, inverted tunnel vision? And sometimes it has to be literally spelled out, literally not figuratively. I talk, and write, and spiel, and post, and discuss with others elsewhere, am I "digging"?

Intelligent people are not necessarily wise, or clear, or understanding at all times? some are more perceptive and concrete, less conceptual, and abstract. Some have serious processing disabilities. Some are very intelligent in some ways, very dense in others. Change tack? maybe?

Every possible change of tack has been tried, were it truly a matter of people needing to be educated. Something else is going on. What if the kids refused to touch pencils because they were evil, and even speaking the word caused a huge uproar in the classroom that you spent the rest of the day handling, and then led to weeks of controversy in the community and threatened to cause the school to be shut down? What method of teaching them to draw would overcome that?

It might be that appeals to the rational are beside the point, they will not overcome the conditioning . Anax and Fidel have recently talked of ideas, but if ideas are precluded by the self evident testimony of your eyes, your optically oriented monkey brain might prefer the information recieved from the visual stimuli. Not wanting to go off on a tangent but we really oughta blow up the TVs.

More and more, I suspect that a significant portion of the resistance is due to misplaced percieved self interest.Some might be described as poverty stakeholders.

Change tack? When I'm teaching a kid how to "see" and draw objectively, sometimes I have to go at it from 5 different directions, I use all kinds of devices, sometimes I get a piece of tracing paper and draw right over the kids drawing, then quite literally go and draw the shape I just drew on the paper with my finger on the object; I'm a yeller and I let the kids yell at me a lot (not always). When they have that moment of comprehension of truly seeing, its fantastic for both the kid and the teacher. (Doors of Perception, great book)

Maybe its just a big block, inverted tunnel vision? And sometimes it has to be literally spelled out, literally not figuratively. I talk, and write, and spiel, and post, and discuss with others elsewhere, am I "digging"?

Intelligent people are not necessarily wise, or clear, or understanding at all times? some are more perceptive and concrete, less conceptual, and abstract. Some have serious processing disabilities. Some are very intelligent in some ways, very dense in others. Change tack? maybe?

Every possible change of tack has been tried, were it truly a matter of people needing to be educated. Something else is going on. What if the kids refused to touch pencils because they were evil, and even speaking the word caused a huge uproar in the classroom that you spent the rest of the day handling, and then led to weeks of controversy in the community and threatened to cause the school to be shut down? What method of teaching them to draw would overcome that?

It might be that appeals to the rational are beside the point, they will not overcome the conditioning . Anax and Fidel have recently talked of ideas, but if ideas are precluded by the self evident testimony of your eyes, your optically oriented monkey brain might prefer the information recieved from the visual stimuli. Not wanting to go off on a tangent but we really oughta blow up the TVs.

More and more, I suspect that a significant portion of the resistance is due to misplaced percieved self interest.Some might be described as poverty stakeholders.

Thank god I gave up on tv, occasional movie, very occasional network news on a poor reception tv (I watched Nader on MTP). Your point about the visual hits so close to home for me! Thats part of the reason I teach art, I try to give some kids visual literacy so they can "read" some of the spew from the world and discern when the words and images are skew, not real sure how successful I am, but its better than nothing. Way too much sensual overload going on, and I do think the brains are getting circuited differently.

I read an article about 5 years ago about how the subtle perceptual skills are being lost due to this bombardment. Someone my age, 51, and within a generation could discern 27,000 different music tones, supposedly, someone 25 years younger, 15,000. I think the loss of percepts, knowledge gained through the senses, may have something to do with the loss of sympathy or compassion? nothing I've read, just my wonderings; I have known some kids who were denied as much tv/computer access, and they do seem maybe more "in tune", but that could be my imaginings. Anyway the speed and noise and constant overall loudness may be making some truly numb. Can you even go to a mall for any length of time? I haven't been for a couple years, just can't deal with it.

Another crazy thought (they came back, Mike!), is the number of microwaves in the air. Not the comspiracy idea that we are purposely being subjected to them, but just the number that are actually in the air may affect the brain? They are at least warning about cell phones and babies. Aren't we electro-chemical beings? all this electricity, maybe its just physiological the lack of receptivity to the message, maybe we need to talk to folks on cell phones, or text them.

It might be that appeals to the rational are beside the point, they will not overcome the conditioning . Anax and Fidel have recently talked of ideas, but if ideas are precluded by the self evident testimony of your eyes, your optically oriented monkey brain might prefer the information recieved from the visual stimuli. Not wanting to go off on a tangent but we really oughta blow up the TVs.

I think there is something to that. The arguments with people are so bizarre and it is so difficult to reach any understanding that there must be something very powerful at work. For example, on that Google thread it is not so much that people are disagreeing as it is they are living in alternative and contradictory realities.

Imagine if we could know the TV habits of all of the people on that Google thread. It would not surprise me if those arguing on the one side watch a lot of TV, and those on the other little or none. That would be something, wouldn't it? I know as fact that several of us on the one side of the debate don't own or don't watch TV. It could well be that when the others consider our arguments, they are consulting the picture of reality they have in their minds and that picture is straight of of television. That would explain the enormous amount of angst they seem to be suffering when they consider our arguments, and their quick retreat into simplistic (and patently false) good guy versus bad guy scenarios, which is what is happening on TV all the time.

Once at DU I made the mildest imaginable criticism of TV and people just went ballistic - defending TV watching and accusing me of insulting them, offending them, being self-righteous, of being a horrible, ugly, hateful person - in fact the exact same objections we are getting on that Google thread, come to think of it.


More and more, I suspect that a significant portion of the resistance is due to misplaced percieved self interest.Some might be described as poverty stakeholders.

Yes. Of course. "Poor people belong to US - the expert anti-poverty people, and we need them to make ourselves feel good and justify our own existence, and how DARE you try to take our pets away from us or encourage them in their bad behavior??"

Anyone here hear about the Back to Nature movement? A movement to get kids playing in the park or the back yard and get over the xenophobia involved?? I'm sure it will be co-opted somehow, but sounds interesting to me. We may just have lost a generation in the interim.

Edit: this is a post script to the post above Mike's, I'd sent it empty and then wrote on edit there.

It might be that appeals to the rational are beside the point, they will not overcome the conditioning . Anax and Fidel have recently talked of ideas, but if ideas are precluded by the self evident testimony of your eyes, your optically oriented monkey brain might prefer the information recieved from the visual stimuli. Not wanting to go off on a tangent but we really oughta blow up the TVs.

I think there is something to that. The arguments with people are so bizarre and it is so difficult to reach any understanding that there must be something very powerful at work. For example, on that Google thread it is not so much that people are disagreeing as it is they are living in alternative and contradictory realities.

Imagine if we could know the TV habits of all of the people on that Google thread. It would not surprise me if those arguing on the one side watch a lot of TV, and those on the other little or none. That would be something, wouldn't it? I know as fact that several of us on the one side of the debate don't own or don't watch TV. It could well be that when the others consider our arguments, they are consulting the picture of reality they have in their minds and that picture is straight of of television. That would explain the enormous amount of angst they seem to be suffering when they consider our arguments, and their quick retreat into simplistic (and patently false) good guy versus bad guy scenarios, which is what is happening on TV all the time.

Once at DU I made the mildest imaginable criticism of TV and people just went ballistic - defending TV watching and accusing me of insulting them, offending them, being self-righteous, of being a horrible, ugly, hateful person - in fact the exact same objections we are getting on that Google thread, come to think of it.


More and more, I suspect that a significant portion of the resistance is due to misplaced percieved self interest.Some might be described as poverty stakeholders.

Yes. Of course. "Poor people belong to US - the expert anti-poverty people, and we need them to make ourselves feel good and justify our own existence, and how DARE you try to take our pets away from us or encourage them in their bad behavior??"

On your final point, it is exactly the same with the environmental movement. And this is not to trash the thousands of field workers who are doing excellent work which is rendered irrelevant by the self sastified classism and and political cowardice of the wasteful multitude of 'causes'.

It might be that appeals to the rational are beside the point, they will not overcome the conditioning . Anax and Fidel have recently talked of ideas, but if ideas are precluded by the self evident testimony of your eyes, your optically oriented monkey brain might prefer the information recieved from the visual stimuli. Not wanting to go off on a tangent but we really oughta blow up the TVs.

I think there is something to that. The arguments with people are so bizarre and it is so difficult to reach any understanding that there must be something very powerful at work. For example, on that Google thread it is not so much that people are disagreeing as it is they are living in alternative and contradictory realities.

Imagine if we could know the TV habits of all of the people on that Google thread. It would not surprise me if those arguing on the one side watch a lot of TV, and those on the other little or none. That would be something, wouldn't it? I know as fact that several of us on the one side of the debate don't own or don't watch TV. It could well be that when the others consider our arguments, they are consulting the picture of reality they have in their minds and that picture is straight of of television. That would explain the enormous amount of angst they seem to be suffering when they consider our arguments, and their quick retreat into simplistic (and patently false) good guy versus bad guy scenarios, which is what is happening on TV all the time.

Once at DU I made the mildest imaginable criticism of TV and people just went ballistic - defending TV watching and accusing me of insulting them, offending them, being self-righteous, of being a horrible, ugly, hateful person - in fact the exact same objections we are getting on that Google thread, come to think of it.


More and more, I suspect that a significant portion of the resistance is due to misplaced percieved self interest.Some might be described as poverty stakeholders.

Yes. Of course. "Poor people belong to US - the expert anti-poverty people, and we need them to make ourselves feel good and justify our own existence, and how DARE you try to take our pets away from us or encourage them in their bad behavior??"

Aside: I do find it interesting the parallels that occur when people are writing at the same time, which seemed to have happened to some degree when you were writing this and I was writing the post above it.

Anyway, there is a book on the effects of tv on the brain and social conditioning so many reasons why ...you should kill your tv, or something like that, I'll find out tomorrow and post it here. I've not read it, seen parts, but it does talk about the "programming" that goes on. I can testify how much more accepting of true reality I've become in the three years I've been living without it. I'm almost a different person I feel at times, some in my family are a little worried about my ideas. Its like a strange addiction too. I tried to wean, it wasn't until I moved to this house with no cable or antenna that I was able to make the clean break.

It might be that appeals to the rational are beside the point, they will not overcome the conditioning . Anax and Fidel have recently talked of ideas, but if ideas are precluded by the self evident testimony of your eyes, your optically oriented monkey brain might prefer the information recieved from the visual stimuli. Not wanting to go off on a tangent but we really oughta blow up the TVs.

I think there is something to that. The arguments with people are so bizarre and it is so difficult to reach any understanding that there must be something very powerful at work. For example, on that Google thread it is not so much that people are disagreeing as it is they are living in alternative and contradictory realities.

Imagine if we could know the TV habits of all of the people on that Google thread. It would not surprise me if those arguing on the one side watch a lot of TV, and those on the other little or none. That would be something, wouldn't it? I know as fact that several of us on the one side of the debate don't own or don't watch TV. It could well be that when the others consider our arguments, they are consulting the picture of reality they have in their minds and that picture is straight of of television. That would explain the enormous amount of angst they seem to be suffering when they consider our arguments, and their quick retreat into simplistic (and patently false) good guy versus bad guy scenarios, which is what is happening on TV all the time.

Once at DU I made the mildest imaginable criticism of TV and people just went ballistic - defending TV watching and accusing me of insulting them, offending them, being self-righteous, of being a horrible, ugly, hateful person - in fact the exact same objections we are getting on that Google thread, come to think of it.


More and more, I suspect that a significant portion of the resistance is due to misplaced percieved self interest.Some might be described as poverty stakeholders.

Yes. Of course. "Poor people belong to US - the expert anti-poverty people, and we need them to make ourselves feel good and justify our own existence, and how DARE you try to take our pets away from us or encourage them in their bad behavior??"

Aside: I do find it interesting the parallels that occur when people are writing at the same time, which seemed to have happened to some degree when you were writing this and I was writing the post above it.

Anyway, there is a book on the effects of tv on the brain and social conditioning so many reasons why ...you should kill your tv, or something like that, I'll find out tomorrow and post it here. I've not read it, seen parts, but it does talk about the "programming" that goes on. I can testify how much more accepting of true reality I've become in the three years I've been living without it. I'm almost a different person I feel at times, some in my family are a little worried about my ideas. Its like a strange addiction too. I tried to wean, it wasn't until I moved to this house with no cable or antenna that I was able to make the clean break.

I think that's 'Four Arguments For The Elinmination Of Television", by Jerry Mander. finally read it recently, though I've been familiar with some of the arguments for quite some time. It's weird here, my sweetie watches at least 4 hrs per night, me none, is it a surprise that we don't see eye to eye on a lot of shit?

Curious as to whether or not we can reach consensus on a few things....

- The political battle is one of ideas, not "to dos."

- Whatever "to dos" that do exist, they are for the purpose of winning the battle of ideas

- There is a relatively small number of intellectuals controlling that battle of ideas, and one of the things they do is to deny those first two statements

- That same group works tirelessly to make sure that we don't talk to the activist community, and also that we can't reach the general public

- The prime method for the suppression and censorship is in the promotion of certain ideas that sabotage discussion and create plausible excuses for banishing or destroying people

- The Internet is curiously poorly utilized by the left, although it represents the easiest, most efficient and readably available way to reach the public

I was about to chime in and say I don't watch very much TV but then a parallel occured to me: researchers say that everyone categorizes their own masturbation frequency as "normal" and use that as a basis for comparison. I never thought I was normal in that regard, but its probably the same idea for TV.

And incidentally, my frequency stays pretty much the same even during "dry spells"

In the "more facts you didn't care to know" colum, I knew some guys in college who'd never done it although mostly only by reputation -- once a girl finds out, half the campus is gonna hear about it. One of them actually had to go to a urologist because of it (y'gotta exercise ol' buford now and again for sanitary reasons).

Oh the stories I could tell on this topic..but then 'tis the season for self-restraint..

PS Has anybody ever seen The Red Green Show?

Quando Omni Flunkus Moritati (you guys are all brains, you should get it :))

Another problem - work here is in various ways at odds with the rest of your life. If it paid that would go along way to resolving the conflict, not just from the survival standpoint, but from the standpoint of people around you respecting the work.

In fact, I think this is an enormous problem, and one that no one addresses.

Money - thoughts on that?

Has anybody ever seen The Red Green Show?


I had a bass player working with me at one time years ago, and he had tapes of Red Green so I am familiar with it. Pretty hilarious shit, especially for those of us who grew up close to Canada and spent a lot of time there.

Another problem - work here is in various ways at odds with the rest of your life. If it paid that would go along way to resolving the conflict, not just from the survival standpoint, but from the standpoint of people around you respecting the work.

In fact, I think this is an enormous problem, and one that no one addresses.

Money - thoughts on that?

Oh God lets not talk about money. A money discussion is like fetishization squared. I know this isn't what you're getting at, but I've been thinking recently that our Gesell discussion from months ago with that troll from RI was really just a precursor to a much longer discussion needing to be had.

Can you imagine trying to talk about money with people at DU??..and on that topic I'd say they're about representative of the average American.

A thought I read a few days ago is that money is more like a divider than a positive possession as in those who don't have money are excluded and barred from participation -- not just in politics but in everything..as Wolf and others have pointed out this extends even to excluding people from surviving quite quickly.

Mike wrote:


...it is not so much that people are disagreeing as it is they are living in alternative and contradictory realities.

I believe this is an incisive summation of the underlying mechanism of Moron Nation.

Moron Nation’s core belief is the spurious notion that individual consciousness is the whole of reality -- that nothing exists outside of individual consciousness, and the “collective reality” is therefore by definition nothing more than an illusion -- at best a momentary convergence of individuals who have agreed, for example, to “visualize peace.”

The derivative doctrine that governs Moron Nation politics is the equally spurious belief that riches are ultimately the result of one's success at "visualizing prosperity," while poverty is the result of what might be termed (with apologies to George Orwell) "badthink."

Not coincidentally, this formulation reduces class-struggle to a meaningless phrase. It not only divorces poverty from socioeconomic conditions, but redefines poverty as a purely personal pathology: symptomatic proof of stupidity, psychoses or simultaneous affliction by both.

The conceptual result -- verbalization of which is taboo -- is a two-caste hierarchy of the healthy (the affluent ubermenschen) versus the sick (the impoverished untermenschen), with additional variations in each caste (for example, the extremely affluent versus the hopelessly poor). In effect, affluence thus becomes synonymous with normal good health while poverty becomes synonymous with disease.

Which then perverts a basic human survival instinct -- fear of infection -- into a psychodynamic force for individual isolation. The capability for empathy is thus redefined as vulnerability to contagion (by poverty) and is therefore suppressed by the need for health (affluence). Too, moral imbecility is thus redefined as a virtue. The resultant alienation of the individual, ultimately ruinous to social adhesion, is meanwhile encouraged as long as it can be manipulated for increased profit.

The need for health as thusly defined -- that is, maximum material wealth as the most positively functional state of individual consciousness -- is ever more radically reinforced by the re-emergence of the most tyrannosauric forms of capitalism and the total destruction of the socioeconomic safety net that formerly protected us from the worst of capitalism’s depredations.

Capitalist reality is thus immunized -- presumably forever -- against any impulse toward revolution. Indeed revolution itself is thus reduced to a kind of metastases: a pathological process by which the disease of poverty is vectored into a pandemic.

Note too the definitions of affluence and poverty implicit in the consciousness-is-reality credo have both secular and theocratic manifestations: the former is described above; the latter is the dogma that wealth is proof of divine favor even as poverty is proof of divine malice.

Nor can I dismiss it as coincidental how the unspoken belief that affluence is health, poverty is sickness and contact with poverty equals infection has merged into a nearly absolute taboo against universal health care (save as a Hillary-type punishment for poverty): the uninsured (the psychically sick untermenschen ) forced to pay ever-skyrocketing retail prices for insurance, the profits from which make the insurors (the psychically healthy ubermenschen) ever more vigorous.

In the harsher times to come, this same punitive attitude can easily be refined into a demand for genocide: the final solution to poverty -- by now redefined as terminal illness -- justified in the name of avoiding the waste of ever-more-scarce resources on the poor, that is, the terminally ill.

Which is -- not coincidentally -- precisely the fascist (ubermenschen/untermenschen) potential a very few of us tried so desperately to expose and warn against when the so-called “human potential movement” first began injecting its super-reactionary toxins into the U.S. cultural mainstream. Significantly, there is some evidence the injection process was initiated as an offshoot of the CIA’s Operation CHAOS, apparently with the cooperation of Esalen Institute and various “new age” cults: est, Lifespring ad nauseum. However it began, its subsequent, ongoing dissemination via public schools and mass media has turned it into the universal orthodoxy of Moron Nation -- an orthodoxy that simultaneously unites (in the sense a lynch mob or a pogrom is united) and guarantees, by the processes noted above, that any greater unity (that is, a unity based on empathy and thus ultimately on an ideology of empathy) is forever prohibited.

Hence my conclusion, based on the dramatic mind-changes I have witnessed in the immediate aftermaths of various natural disasters, that socialism will not be achieved in the United States until the apocalyptic combination of terminal climate change, petroleum exhaustion and economic collapse teach Moron Nation the humility -- and empathy -- prerequisite to recognizing the ultimate validity of socialist ideals.

The pivotal question, of course, is whether that will happen in time to spare Homo sapiens sapiens (and nearly all other life on this planet) from extinction. I hardly need repeat that I am not optimistic.

As to what keeps us going in the face of such odds, Mary TF describes its Zen perfectly:


When they have that moment of comprehension of truly seeing, its fantastic for both the kid and the teacher.

Not to mention how good it is for the society in which the kid and the teacher live.

Quoth Royokan:

The thief
Left it behind:
The moon at the window.

Oh God lets not talk about money.

No choice there. Either we consciously and intentionally talk about an issue, or we talk about it in the way that modern people approach so many subjects - as though it both does and does not exist simultaneously. That is to say we ignore the objective reality - we pretend that does not exist - and instead believe that it is only what each of us individually believes it to be - we treat that as "real." We make up our own reality, and each person has their own reality, and all realities are equal, and we cannot talk about it for fear of offending a person by challenging "their" reality.

Moron Nation’s core belief is the spurious notion that individual consciousness is the whole of reality -- that nothing exists outside of individual consciousness, and the “collective reality” is therefore by definition nothing more than an illusion -- at best a momentary convergence of individuals who have agreed, for example, to “visualize peace.”

I can remember the first time I heard someone say "well that may be true for you, but it is not true for me" with an earnest look on their face as though they had said something exceptionally profound that required a response. "What the hell are you talking about?" was not the proper response, I soon learned. The correct response included certain "knowing" facial expressions as well as a definite statement of agreement - and not just any sort of agreement. One must not only agree that this is true, one must agree that this is some sort of ultimate truth to avoid offending the person.


The derivative doctrine that governs Moron Nation politics is the equally spurious belief that riches are ultimately the result of one's success at "visualizing prosperity," while poverty is the result of what might be termed (with apologies to George Orwell) "badthink."

This is so destructive, and has led to the most essential and the most socially constructive vocations and activities being punished and the most anti-social behavior rewarded. So long as one is visualizing or feeling the "right" things, all is well. People are not really creating their own reality, they have abandoned recognizing or acknowledging actual reality. They still share a perception of reality, but it is disguised and is immune from critical thinking and not to be discussed any longer. That is perfect for tyrannical capitalism, since it unleashes the most predatory and exploitative behavior and turns the rest of the population into unthinking consuming and feeling automatons, easy to fool and easy to exploit.

By the way, I think this is related to the problem that some of us have with the Obama phenomenon, because we now have a political campaign and program based on visualizing political success. I don't know if that is an accurate perception or not, but it is not outside of the realm of possibility.


Not coincidentally, this formulation reduces class-struggle to a meaningless phrase. It not only divorces poverty from socioeconomic conditions, but redefines poverty as a purely personal pathology: symptomatic proof of stupidity, psychoses or simultaneous affliction by both.

Everything - every thought and action that does not conform to the "you are creating your own reality" lie is seen as personal pathology, with all of the attendant recommendations for "cures" and demands for isolating and quarantining the "sick" person by one means or another. One may not tell the truth about social conditions, about success, about money, about one's career, about one's motivations, about one's history or one's feelings in any context other than self-actualization with impunity. Not conforming to this is dealt with as a threat by people. I find that in trying to put together organizations or projects, the most simple and basic principles are met with blank stares. People start hunting for the self-serving "angle" and when they cannot find one, get angry, confused and frustrated and imagine motives and self-serving tricks,and when that fails, start ascribing pathology to the non-conformist.


The conceptual result -- verbalization of which is taboo -- is a two-caste hierarchy of the healthy (the affluent ubermenschen) versus the sick (the impoverished untermenschen), with additional variations in each caste (for example, the extremely affluent versus the hopelessly poor). In effect, affluence thus becomes synonymous with normal good health while poverty becomes synonymous with disease.

Wealthy=clever=righteous=healthy=self-serving. Anything else is pathological and dangerous and to be destroyed. That is why recently at DU we saw the answers we did to two vital questions:

1. Would you put your life at risk for the sake of your country?

2. Are you willing to go to jail for the cause of social justice?

In both cases, the membership overwhelmingly voted "no!!!" with many people ridiculing and mocking the questions themselves. Apparently only two old farts, Tahiti Nut and I, are willing to risk our lives for our country, and only a small handful of older people are willing to go to jail in the cause of social justice.


Which then perverts a basic human survival instinct -- fear of infection -- into a psychodynamic force for individual isolation. The capability for empathy is thus redefined as vulnerability to contagion (by poverty) and is therefore suppressed by the need for health (affluence). Too, moral imbecility is thus redefined as a virtue. The resultant alienation of the individual, ultimately ruinous to social adhesion, is meanwhile encouraged as long as it can be manipulated for increased profit.

Yes. That is exactly how people are responding to anything we say that is outside of the self-actualization paradigm - as though they are at risk of being infected by merely listening to or considering heretical ideas. People even say things like "I can't go there. I just would go crazy if I thought like that."


The need for health as thusly defined -- that is, maximum material wealth as the most positively functional state of individual consciousness -- is ever more radically reinforced by the re-emergence of the most tyrannosauric forms of capitalism and the total destruction of the socioeconomic safety net that formerly protected us from the worst of capitalism’s depredations.

Capitalist reality is thus immunized -- presumably forever -- against any impulse toward revolution. Indeed revolution itself is thus reduced to a kind of metastases: a pathological process by which the disease of poverty is vectored into a pandemic.

Note too the definitions of affluence and poverty implicit in the consciousness-is-reality credo have both secular and theocratic manifestations: the former is described above; the latter is the dogma that wealth is proof of divine favor even as poverty is proof of divine malice.

Yes. Growing poverty and powerlessness is generating increasing unrest, and if that can be pre-emptively characterized as pathology or evil, the public will have been conditioned to condone and accept and participate in extreme measures in the inevitable suppression of unrest that will be employed by the ruling class.


Nor can I dismiss it as coincidental how the unspoken belief that affluence is health, poverty is sickness and contact with poverty equals infection has merged into a nearly absolute taboo against universal health care (save as a Hillary-type punishment for poverty): the uninsured (the psychically sick untermenschen ) forced to pay ever-skyrocketing retail prices for insurance, the profits from which make the insurors (the psychically healthy ubermenschen) ever more vigorous.

People now see universal health care, or universal prosperity, as though "universal touchdowns" were to be awarded in the sport of football. That would, of course, ruin the game if everyone made touchdowns equally and fairly.


Which is -- not coincidentally -- precisely the fascist (ubermenschen/untermenschen) potential a very few of us tried so desperately to expose and warn against when the so-called “human potential movement” first began injecting its super-reactionary toxins into the U.S. cultural mainstream. Significantly, there is some evidence the injection process was initiated as an offshoot of the CIA’s Operation CHAOS, apparently with the cooperation of Esalen Institute and various “new age” cults: est, Lifespring ad nauseum. However it began, its subsequent, ongoing dissemination via public schools and mass media has turned it into the universal orthodoxy of Moron Nation -- an orthodoxy that simultaneously unites (in the sense a lynch mob or a pogrom is united) and guarantees, by the processes noted above, that any greater unity (that is, a unity based on empathy and thus ultimately on an ideology of empathy) is forever prohibited.

I can remember trying to warn people about this, and how brutal the responses were. People said "do you really think that you are right and all of those other people are wrong? Hmmmmm?" Tough to swim against that current. We are after all social beings, and we seek acceptance and want to belong to the group.


Hence my conclusion, based on the dramatic mind-changes I have witnessed in the immediate aftermaths of various natural disasters, that socialism will not be achieved in the United States until the apocalyptic combination of terminal climate change, petroleum exhaustion and economic collapse teach Moron Nation the humility -- and empathy -- prerequisite to recognizing the ultimate validity of socialist ideals.

I think you are correct in this.


The pivotal question, of course, is whether that will happen in time to spare Homo sapiens sapiens (and nearly all other life on this planet) from extinction. I hardly need repeat that I am not optimistic.

As you know, we part ways somewhat here, because I think that we cannot now what might happen that could shift the context or turn the herd. It is unlikely, perhaps, but I think we are wired to go ahead and try regardless of the likelihood of success. As I said, I am going to dig for the trapped miners whether rescue is hopeless or not.


As to what keeps us going in the face of such odds, Mary TF describes its Zen perfectly:

[quote:1jiil9e6]When they have that moment of comprehension of truly seeing, its fantastic for both the kid and the teacher.

Not to mention how good it is for the society in which the kid and the teacher live.

Quoth Royokan:

The thief
Left it behind:
The moon at the window. [/quote:1jiil9e6]

I have been giving what Mary said much though and reflection. Initially I thought that what we face is not a matter of education, and so dismissed her comments. The more I consider that, though, the more I think that my dismissal of her comments was a mistake.

Another item or two to consider for my "can we get consensus" list:

- It is not possible any longer to engage in ANY socially constructive activity without risking drastic personal consequences.

- No money may be touched without paying a much higher penalty than the value of the money itself.

Anyway, there is a book on the effects of tv on the brain and social conditioning so many reasons why ...you should kill your tv, or something like that, I'll find out tomorrow and post it here. I've not read it, seen parts, but it does talk about the "programming" that goes on. I can testify how much more accepting of true reality I've become in the three years I've been living without it. I'm almost a different person I feel at times, some in my family are a little worried about my ideas. Its like a strange addiction too. I tried to wean, it wasn't until I moved to this house with no cable or antenna that I was able to make the clean break.

I think that's 'Four Arguments For The Elinmination Of Television", by Jerry Mander. finally read it recently, though I've been familiar with some of the arguments for quite some time. It's weird here, my sweetie watches at least 4 hrs per night, me none, is it a surprise that we don't see eye to eye on a lot of shit?

Thats it thanks, the friend I was going to ask called in sick today...anyway love the tee(vee) shirt "thats why they call it programming..."

and look forward to reading all this new stuff when I have a chance from my duct tape lawn chair (now that episode was hysterical, such a shame you've gotta take the whole kit and kiboodle), good night...

And another item for consideration...

- While every sort of interest group and organization is effectively using the Internet, it is a curious and peculiar fact that the Internet is not being effectively used for left wing politics.

[quote:3894f9jh]Hence my conclusion, based on the dramatic mind-changes I have witnessed in the immediate aftermaths of various natural disasters, that socialism will not be achieved in the United States until the apocalyptic combination of terminal climate change, petroleum exhaustion and economic collapse teach Moron Nation the humility -- and empathy -- prerequisite to recognizing the ultimate validity of socialist ideals.

I think you are correct in this.[/quote:3894f9jh]

I sent you a message about this Mike, I don't know if you got it. I've alternately been accused of being a ponderous academic, a solipsist, allied with reactionaries, an Idealist, and plenty more besides -- on this site alone.

What a bitter irony then, that I'm one of the few stalwarts against what should be obvious techno-sophistry of the worst and highest degree. Remove the high-brow talk and psuedo-science and what you are left with is the claim that the human race has run slam into the thermodynamic wall..and lost. Its the irreversible, unstoppable demon of entropy..an even more perverse incarnation of Maxwell's Demon.

Mike, when people start slinging around terms like "Second Law Of Thermodynamics" and "entropy" they are sure-fire 100% full of shit and odds are they're into "Deep Ecology" besides.

Throw in a mix of old time doom-and-gloom religious remonstrations and you've got a particularly turbid brew that makes it easy to seduce conscientious people who do not share their insane agenda (and it is totally fucking insane)

But the fact of the matter is, it has no place "on the Left" let alone in socialist quarters. Is the environment and pollution and "footprint" and conservation an important front in the Struggle? Yes of course.

But I don't accept that you believe the words you quoted above. I see Wolf's perspective flowing from his very dire circumstances and a fatalistic mindset..its a tough spot to be in and I won't condemn him for it. But you wanna be hardcore Mike and the hardcore fucking truth is that what Wolf wrote there is end-times reactionary bullshit x1000.

EDIT: and by the way this prattle sounds a lot like the H-word to me:


As you know, we part ways somewhat here, because I think that we cannot now what might happen that could shift the context or turn the herd. It is unlikely, perhaps, but I think we are wired to go ahead and try regardless of the likelihood of success. As I said, I am going to dig for the trapped miners whether rescue is hopeless or not.

I sent you a message about this Mike, I don't know if you got it. I've alternately been accused of being a ponderous academic, a solipsist, allied with reactionaries, an Idealist, and plenty more besides -- on this site alone.

You did? I miss them sometimes for a little while because I have Firefox set to block pop-ups.

Hey, I just try to draw you out and fire you up, kid.


What a bitter irony then, that I'm one of the few stalwarts against what should be obvious techno-sophistry of the worst and highest degree. Remove the high-brow talk and psuedo-science and what you are left with is the claim that the human race has run slam into the thermodynamic wall..and lost. Its the irreversible, unstoppable demon of entropy..an even more perverse incarnation of Maxwell's Demon.

Mike, when people start slinging around terms like "Second Law Of Thermodynamics" and "entropy" they are sure-fire 100% full of shit and odds are they're into "Deep Ecology" besides.

Throw in a mix of old time doom-and-gloom religious remonstrations and you've got a particularly turbid brew that makes it easy to seduce conscientious people who do not share their insane agenda (and it is totally fucking insane)

I was agreeing that we will hit some sort of catastrophe before things turn around. I don't know what that "wall" will be, and don't know about peak oil yea or nay.

Not sure what you see as the "insane agenda" exactly. Not all predictions of disaster are necessarily eschatological, are they?


EDIT: and by the way this prattle sounds a lot like the H-word to me:

Yes. Habit.

Here is the difference between habit and hope. You'll forgive me for using farming as the source for an analogy.

Habit is what we do today, and it is its own reward. We keep farming, because it is what we do, it is the right thing to do, even though all of the evidence says that small farming won't survive. Each day stands alone. We live to farm today.

Hope is what we imagine about tomorrow. We hope that it will rain, and each day in the meantime is meaningless because of the absence of rain. We live for tomorrow, and today is by inference no good.

KoBH wrote:


what Wolf wrote there is end-times reactionary bullshit x1000.

The point (and it's my fault for not making it clearer) has nothing to do with "end times" dementia. It has to do with what it will take to bring socialist values to a nation that has been conditioned to reject them -- so successfully conditioned no normal agitprop campaign (education and information) could ever possibly break through the New Age trance.

In such circumstances -- think of a nation that is the technological equivalent of Nazi Germany on steroids but suffers an intellectual paralysis more incurable than that of the darkest, most ignorant population in Tsarist Russia. This was the mujiki or back-country peasants -- hopelessly ignorant, enslaved in murderous superstition by the Russian Orthodox Church and utterly vindictive toward anyone who tried to lift them out of their cesspool of prideful imbecility. After they murdered every doctor and teacher sent them by the Soviets, the Soviets began sending extermination squads instead, and indeed the mujiks didn't become functionally socialist until the German invasion showed them the hideous truth of the capitalist alternative. Thus my hypothesis about the United States:

The only way this nation will ever achieve socialism is (A) in the wake of some huge disaster (environmental, economic, industrial, whatever) that -- precisely as I said -- teaches the nation the humility (and therefore the empathy) prerequisite to the acceptance of socialist values or (B) when the nation is conquered from without and socialism is imposed by a new but classically merciless Red Army, probably from a united Latin America armed by Sino-Russian benefactors.

Nor is this really even "my" hypothesis. According to the post-Soviet disclosures of the 1990s, the KGB reached the same conclusion after analyzing the socioeconomic ferment in the U.S. during the 1960s and early 1970s: the minorities had genuine revolutionary potential, but the whites were not only merely pretend revolutionaries AT BEST, they were too racist to accept the minority leadership that might have turned pretense and fad into reality. As you may remember, it was pointing this out to those morons who claimed there had been a "revolution" here in "the Sixties" that got me thrown off DU.

More to the point, if you analyze history -- specifically the last time the U.S. actually was close to a second American Revolution -- the cause was the Depression. Moreover, at that time the Communist Party was the third largest political organization in the U.S. (and the best organized party the nation has ever seen -- and probably ever will see). These conditions -- depression combined with meaningful agitation and functional organization at all levels -- will not be allowed again; the ruling class will fill the concentration camps to stop it --precisely the purpose for which the camps are being built.

Hence Kid what I'm saying -- in huge haste for which I apologize and with a promise to return in about 12 or 18 hours (with links if I can find them) -- is not Abrahamic nonsense at all but rather coldly logical deduction from the works of Marx, Lenin, Trotsky and the unknown Soviet intelligence analysts who wrote the cited reports.

See you in Guantanamo...

_________
Edit: bad typing.

[quote:183zb4he]Hence my conclusion, based on the dramatic mind-changes I have witnessed in the immediate aftermaths of various natural disasters, that socialism will not be achieved in the United States until the apocalyptic combination of terminal climate change, petroleum exhaustion and economic collapse teach Moron Nation the humility -- and empathy -- prerequisite to recognizing the ultimate validity of socialist ideals.

I think you are correct in this.

I sent you a message about this Mike, I don't know if you got it. I've alternately been accused of being a ponderous academic, a solipsist, allied with reactionaries, an Idealist, and plenty more besides -- on this site alone.

What a bitter irony then, that I'm one of the few stalwarts against what should be obvious techno-sophistry of the worst and highest degree. Remove the high-brow talk and psuedo-science and what you are left with is the claim that the human race has run slam into the thermodynamic wall..and lost. Its the irreversible, unstoppable demon of entropy..an even more perverse incarnation of Maxwell's Demon.

Mike, when people start slinging around terms like "Second Law Of Thermodynamics" and "entropy" they are sure-fire 100% full of shit and odds are they're into "Deep Ecology" besides.

Throw in a mix of old time doom-and-gloom religious remonstrations and you've got a particularly turbid brew that makes it easy to seduce conscientious people who do not share their insane agenda (and it is totally fucking insane)

But the fact of the matter is, it has no place "on the Left" let alone in socialist quarters. Is the environment and pollution and "footprint" and conservation an important front in the Struggle? Yes of course.

But I don't accept that you believe the words you quoted above. I see Wolf's perspective flowing from his very dire circumstances and a fatalistic mindset..its a tough spot to be in and I won't condemn him for it. But you wanna be hardcore Mike and the hardcore fucking truth is that what Wolf wrote there is end-times reactionary bullshit x1000.

EDIT: and by the way this prattle sounds a lot like the H-word to me:


As you know, we part ways somewhat here, because I think that we cannot now what might happen that could shift the context or turn the herd. It is unlikely, perhaps, but I think we are wired to go ahead and try regardless of the likelihood of success. As I said, I am going to dig for the trapped miners whether rescue is hopeless or not.[/quote:183zb4he]

Kid, I greatly appreciate your effort to reveal the 'techno-sophistry' which steers the conversation about the ever accelerating ecological crisis. Yet most all lies contain some truth, else they wouldn't work, and some may be 90% truth and be all the more wicked for that.

At the risk of making a wrongheaded assumption might I suggest that you get out of the physics department for a bit and stroll over to the biology department. They sometimes do real science over there, some of it is even observable. :shock: If Dan Simberloff is still there I think you might like him, he's quite the contrarian.

Now I'll make a fool of myself and play the Old Fart Card. You simply haven't had decades of observing the deterioration of our environment. You haven't watched the local weather closely for a quarter century. Watching stuff go away forever, or what might as well be forever, measured in the lives of humans, before your eyes is depressing, frustrating, maddening, and misdirected by capitalist framing results in the antihuman garbage too often associated with the environmental movement. It's hard enough on me, and Wolf's had a decade plus more than me watching the horror show. Ya can't just blow off shit like the growing dead zone in the Gulf or the lingering death of the Chesapeake, we are in deep shit. And only major systemic change in our economy has a chance of at least curtailing this death spiral.

Success! I have been in pitched battles with the liberal hordes recently, and finally I've got em. I have been working at getting clarity on this for a long time, trying to get a comprehensive picture of the modern liberal movement so that I could get the right lever in hand, placed in the right location, and with the right force applied be able to topple the whole rotten mess powerfully and consistently.

First, we had the "plastic bag" wars. Liberals were saying that taxes and fines should be placed on plastic bags - a "carrot and stick" approach, they said - so that the slovenly and stupid asses, otherwise known as the people, could be coerced and seduced into "doing the right thing." When someone pointed out that this placed a disproportionate burden on the poor, all hell broke lose. I argued that from a humanitarian point of view, and a class analysis point of view, there is no way that this could be called "left wing" nor was it truly helping the environment. Blindpig helped. We were actually able to draw people out and get them to make some outrageous statements. The scheme of the liberals was completely exposed as being politically reactionary and right wing.

The next battle was about Google announcing that they were giving free voicemail boxes to all homeless people in San Fransisco for life. (I guess then that we are forced to assume that all homeless people will BE homeless people for life,m or incur a penalty?) I think most of you saw that thread. Once again, the liberal scheme as exposed as reactionary.

The next battle may have seemed unrelated, but it filled in part of the picture that was missing for me - an understanding of the extremely weak political actions by liberals and Democrats to the unfolding actions of the Republican party to take over the government. I posed a simple question - why did Gore concede?" I was amazed by the fuzzy thinking, and by the regurgitation of right wing talking points. That discussion revealed the liberal community to not be in any serious opposition to the ongoing right wing power grab - woefully weak, thoroughly compromised and co-opted into the MSM narrative, and completely unable or unwilling to apply any critical thinking skills to the subject.

Finally, the fourth battle pulled everything together for me. It is over an article in the NYT - abysmal article and it is shocking that the NYT would run it.

The article is here: Forbidden Fruits (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/01/opinion/01hedin.html?_r=4&th&emc=th&oref=slogin&oref=slogin&oref=slogin&oref=slogin)

And the responses from yours truly, which I will place in a quote box, so you can skim them easily.


This article is absurd. I have personally been involved in converting many, many acres from corn to fruit over the years. The USDA in no way prevents or interferes with that. There are thousands of small family fruit growers and the problems of getting their produce into supermarkets have nothing whatsoever to do with the USDA, this is caused by corporate domination of the food supply and inadequate inspections and unfair and unenforced trade agreements.

What the author is complaining about is the withdrawal of a cash subsidy. He will not be growing corn, so he does not qualify for a corn subsidy. Either do any other fruit growers. So what?

Now, whether or not corn should be subsidized (I say "no") and whether or not fruits and vegetables should be subsidized (I say "yes") are separate issues.
...

This article promotes a two-tier food system - "good stuff" for the well to do at their little boutique farmers' markets, and junk for the rest of us. The author is whining because he is not getting federal subsidies for his very small scale ideologically driven hobby farm. NO fruit and vegetable growers get subsidies. What makes him special? I say "hobby" because his ignorance (or dishonesty) about agriculture as revealed in this article is shocking, and because no farmer in his right mind would rent this land for growing what he wants to grow, and then cry because he couldn't make a go of it. If he were a serious farmer, the federal government would help him BUY that land if he would make a commitment to it and to farming. The federal government would also help him with soil and water management, pest control, and with many other areas. And he whines about paying $8,000 a year for land. He has no idea the struggles that thousands of committed professional family farmers are going through and the prices they are paying for land. If he can't make a go of it growing watermelons on that piece of land, the maybe he needs to re-think his farming plan.

...

Where we are failing is in getting fresh produce to poor people, and to minority people. But then we are failing poor people in every way, and this has little if anything to do with agriculture. The USDA and the farmers themselves are not to blame.

The problem with CSA and "organic" - I put the word in quotation marks because it is all an illusion - is that they are privatized solutions to public policy issues, and are driven by libertarian political sentiments. This article is an attack - and an extremely misleading and misguided one - on the public agriculture infrastructure, and this is becoming a pattern from the alternative food industry as it swings further and further to the right. Ron Paul is one of the luminaries promoting this notion that the food industry should be completely de-regulated so we can do whatever we want to on the farm and in food sales.

CSA and organic take food safety and sustainable farming out of the realm of public regulation, and into the free market "choice" world, and that naturally enough is leading to a two-tier food system - the good stuff for those who can afford it and who have "choices" - with a collapsing public agriculture infrastructure struggling to feed the rest of the population. Providing choices for the special few has drastic and horrific effects on the poor people and on the working poor.

Ironically, while this author attacks the USDA - falsely - he expects the USDA to subsidize his little business for him, despite the fact that it is obviously very poorly planned and he has no concept of the realities farming nor of food marketing.

I cannot overstate this - organic and CSA are very dangerous and destructive.

People should be free to eat whatever they like, to run a hobby farm is that is their desire, or to associate with people in leisure time activities such as CSA. If they can afford to do these things, and enjoy them, more power to them. However, they do not have the right to impose that on the rest of us and to tear down and attack the public food safety and agriculture infrastructure by presenting nonsensical privatized solutions to social problems and as legitimate alternatives to public policy and resource management.

...

I work with fruit growers. No one familiar with the field could take the article seriously.

It is simply not true that the USDA "penalizes the market value of the illicit crop" whatever that means. Certainly the USDA does not see fruit as "illicit" so I don't know what that is supposed to mean.

These are not "penalties" - row crops have been subsidized for a long time, fruits and vegetables have not. No one grows fruit with the expectation of getting subsidies, because there have not been any. Switching from a subsidized crop - corn - to a non-subsidized crop - watermelons - means, guess what? You are ineligible for the subsidy. So what? This particular person never was getting any subsidies. Much serious planning gos into any decisions that real farmers make. It is hard to imagine that anyone with even the slightest amount of knowledge or research would expect to receive a corn subsidy when he or she were not growing corn. This not secret or hidden information, and it is just one of thousands of variables that serious farmers keep up to speed on continually.

As far as "growing nothing at all" the idea behind that is to meet an important sustainability goal by subsidizing giving acreage a rest from cultivation.

The rent paid for the land has nothing to do with the USDA nor any prejudice against fruits and vegetables. The USDA does not set property values.

Family fruit growers are facing many challenges. False and misleading articles such as this do not help, and in fact can do much harm.

The author is either very ignorant and not really a farmer, by any serious definition of the word, or he is lying. It is that bad.

...

It is more than omitting facts. He either is not a farmer, because no farmer would make these statements, or he is intentionally skewing the truth to promote an agenda. Nothing about his story makes any sense from a farming point of view.

It is true that row crops are subsidized and specialty crops - fruits nuts and vegetables - are not. But that does not make one lucrative and the other not lucrative. In fact, no one gets into farming hoping for it to be "lucrative" and all farmers are struggling. Expecting to be subsidized for growing warermelon in Minnesota, and renting land both suggest his lack of a serious commitment to farming. His suggestion that fresh produce is difficult to obtain in Minnesota or is somehow suppressed by the government are simply false.

It is not so that people are only able to buy fresh produce at farmer's markets. As with his other assertions, this one is so self-evidently false that it is a wonder anyone would entertain it. There is fresh produce in every supermarket in America year 'round - that is something of a problem and a mixed blessing in my opinion. People have come to expect every sort of fruit or vegetable regardless of season. That demand from the public requires that produce be brought in from the southern hemisphere.

The issue of local produce being available to people in supermarkets has to do with the distributors and brokers - the corporate tail that wags the farming dog and that sucks off 90% of the profits - and is not the fault of the farmer, and certainly not the fault of the USDA.

The author has no credibility, and the NYT has chronically been uncritical about what sorts of articles they accept and approve on the subject of agriculture. They will get a firestorm of criticism for running this one.

The problem with articles such as this is that they are very damaging to farmers. It is one thing to have an informed opinion about agriculture, it is another altogether to be promoting an agenda by misleading the public and misrepresenting farming. No one - trust me on this - no one with any sort of farming background or the slightest bit of knowledge about farming could possibly take anything about this article seriously.

The problem with these ideological approaches to farming, that always make the government the bad guy, is that they are essentially libertarian politically and assist the corporations in smashing up public support for public agricultural policy and regulation which is leading to de-funding and destruction of our once stellar public agricultural infrastructure. This is very dangerous, and is becoming the greatest threat to farming and food safety.

...

"IF you’ve stood in line at a farmers’ market recently, you know that the local food movement is thriving, to the point that small farmers are having a tough time keeping up with the demand."

This is nonsensical, especially coming from a "farmer" who is supposedly in Minnesota which is under extensive fruit cultivation and has an excellent state ag department and one of the best local food programs.

You can hardly go 20 miles anywhere in southern and eastern Minnesota without finding a farm with a market and roadside sales, and some of the best and most conscientious and progressive growers in the world are found there.

There is no shortage of produce for farmer's markets in Minnesota. There is a shortage of farmers at farmers markets, because it is difficult for them to make money there. They do much better to have consumers come to them, and the consumer does much better as well. Minnesota is dense with fruit and vegetable farms within easy reach of most of the population in the state.

Most farmers avoid farm markets, because they are forced to compete there with weekend gardeners and hobby farmers and inefficient and low quality farmers whose sales technique consists of price cutting.

If farmer's markets worked for farmers, there would be 100 times more farmers bringing produce to farmers markets. Farmer's markets work best for gardeners, and part-time and small time weekend hobby farmers. There is a shortage of people like that, because not very many people are affluent enough to farm as a hobby.

...

Farmers markets, CSA and "organic" satisfy the whims and tastes of a few people, and those people should certainly be free to indulge those whims and tastes if they so choose. However, we are enduring a relentless tidal wave of propaganda that seeks to impose these "solutions" onto the general public, and as you point out this will inevitably and seriously harm the less well off, and those suffering the most will bear the burden more than any. The feel-good ideologically driven alternative food movement is causing an erosion of public support for the public agricultural infrastructure, and it cannot be said strongly enough that this is highly dangerous and destructive.

Farmers are under assault from two directions - corporations increasing their dominance over our food supply and actively corrupting and destroying the public regulatory agencies, and the well-funded upscale suburban propaganda movement of CSA and organic and farmers markets that is promoting privatized solutions to social problems and seriously eroding public support for the existing public agricultural infrastructure.

The alternative food movement is driven by right wing zealots who seek first to cash in on a gullible public, and secondly to destroy government. The "liberal" variations on this merely have a veneer of fancy progressive rhetoric and liberal lifestyle choices to fool upscale people who are entirely ignorant about agriculture and who are obsessively focused on their own personal choices into parting with their bucks and into unwittingly supporting and promoting an extremely right wing political agenda.

Reading articles such as this, I am reminded of the Germanic hordes descending on Rome and destroying that which they did not understand in an ignorant and futile attempt to possess it.

This, for me, brings things full circle and I finally have a comprehensive and coherent view of modern liberalism. Notice the consistent themes behind the liberal positions on each of these issues. They were difficult and time consuming to draw out of people, but I think we have a clear picture now.

It is seductive. It all sounds good, whether we are to imagine that we are saving the planet, or promoting safer and better food, or helping the poor and homeless. But there is a consistent theme - privatization at the expense of strong public policy, and that means at the expense of those outside of the small circle of favored ones, especially the homeless and desperately poor and forgotten people, the working poor and blue collar people, and in this case people who are hungry and the small struggling family farmers who are trying to keep them fed.

The combination of a new modern liberalism firmly based on libertarian free-market privatization schemes, and the weak and almost non-existent opposition of the party to the ongoing right wing coup and seizure of government for the benefit of th wealthy and powerful few, is leading us straight off the cliff, and as you effectively and reliably point out, it is those at the bottom of the ladder who are suffering first and the most. We must listen first to the "canary in the coal mine," and we must be willing to look in the mirror and be courageously self-critical if we are to develop the political will to stop the escalating crisis. The lives and well-being of millions of human beings are at stake, and that is not an exaggeration.

I think that it should be abundantly clear from those four battles that modern liberalism in controlled by a relatively small number of people, with a very specific agenda, disguised though it may be, and that they are entirely dedicated to the well being of a small number of people, less than 10% of the population, at the direct expense of the rest of the population and to the destruction of any possibility of a coherent and effective and powerful political left developing. They don't kinda sorta tend to be that way, it is not merely a minor feature of modern liberalism, it is not a matter of them making mistakes or needing to be educated. It is a consistent and intentional and conscious agenda, and it is promoted with a clever propaganda program of deception and dishonesty.

we should also be able to see exactly how to counter it with great confidence and effectiveness, and also we can see how Democratic party politics and modern liberalism are interrelated.

That 10% - overwhelmingly white, educated, suburban, over $70,000 in annual household income (in other words in the upper 10%), and those who aspire to that group, or emulate and admire that group.

Damn. I think we've got 'em.

Kid, I greatly appreciate your effort to reveal the 'techno-sophistry' which steers the conversation about the ever accelerating ecological crisis. Yet most all lies contain some truth, else they wouldn't work, and some may be 90% truth and be all the more wicked for that.

At the risk of making a wrongheaded assumption might I suggest that you get out of the physics department for a bit and stroll over to the biology department. They sometimes do real science over there, some of it is even observable. If Dan Simberloff is still there I think you might like him, he's quite the contrarian.

Now I'll make a fool of myself and play the Old Fart Card. You simply haven't had decades of observing the deterioration of our environment. You haven't watched the local weather closely for a quarter century. Watching stuff go away forever, or what might as well be forever, measured in the lives of humans, before your eyes is depressing, frustrating, maddening, and misdirected by capitalist framing results in the antihuman garbage too often associated with the environmental movement. It's hard enough on me, and Wolf's had a decade plus more than me watching the horror show. Ya can't just blow off shit like the growing dead zone in the Gulf or the lingering death of the Chesapeake, we are in deep shit. And only major systemic change in our economy has a chance of at least curtailing this death spiral.

I agree with all of what you write here. But its important to stop saying its the end of the world. Its just another way to concede BP -- might as well join RigInt and believe that space aliens control everything.

Or we might as well believe that nothing can be done because its too risky -- the government has all the money and the bombs afterall. And if we press too far, they can always create a thermonuclear Apocalypse.

The whole thing is a different brand of liberation theology -- liberation for people who don't want to think about it anymore, let alone do anything.

Or better yet, you get retrograde movements from people who blame industrialization and technology and, ultimately, human beings.

Think about it, BP..we want to save the planet. But we can't save our fucking selves and most of the time our revolutionary activity -- in the name of saving the planet -- is talking about how the planet is surely doomed by our "antrhopogenic" decadence and indifference and in some cases malevolence.

One day the Sun will explode or something like that and it'll all be over.

Now I am going to go for broke.

Two predictions about this...

First, we will be attacked. There are people as I write this who are conspiring to "out" us, discredit us, silence us, harm us.

Secondly, we have in our hands what we need to attract and engage a broader audience.

I am familiar with the objections to these statements. It is "just an Internet board," it doesn't matter, we aren't important enough, we are deluded to think we can have any impact, we are just being self-important to think anyone would bother to attack us, etc. And as anax says, we are paranoid. Right.

I do not think that we are overly suspicious, or paranoid, however I do think that we grab the wrong targets sometimes for our suspicions and misapprehend from which direction danger is approaching. That is my take on the paranoia issue. As to it not mattering what we say, or that we are not important - is anyone here seriously entertaining those notions?

The objections to gaining a wider audience are many - the people are not ready to listen, the timing is not right, the obstacles are too great, and so forth.

I am going to say that it has been the weakness of the message that has been the barrier to reaching a wider audience, as well as the suppression of the message - a message completely understandable and relevant and important for the many and being shut down by the few - and our lack of clarity and understanding about those suppression tactics and subsequently our weak and disorganized efforts at combating and overcoming them.

KoBH wrote:


what Wolf wrote there is end-times reactionary bullshit x1000.

The point (and it's my fault for not making it clearer) has nothing to do with "end times" dementia. It has to do with what it will take to bring socialist values to a nation that has been conditioned to reject them -- so successfully conditioned no normal agitprop campaign (education and information) could ever possibly break through the New Age trance.

In such circumstances -- think of a nation that is the technological equivalent of Nazi Germany on steroids but suffers an intellectual paralysis more incurable than that of the darkest, most ignorant population in Tsarist Russia. This was the mujiki or back-country peasants -- hopelessly ignorant, enslaved in murderous superstition by the Russian Orthodox Church and utterly vindictive toward anyone who tried to lift them out of their cesspool of prideful imbecility. After they murdered every doctor and teacher sent them by the Soviets, the Soviets began sending extermination squads instead, and indeed the mujiks didn't become functionally socialist until the German invasion showed them the hideous truth of the capitalist alternative. Thus my hypothesis about the United States:

The only way this nation will ever achieve socialism is (A) in the wake of some huge disaster (environmental, economic, industrial, whatever) that -- precisely as I said -- teaches the nation the humility (and therefore the empathy) prerequisite to the acceptance of socialist values or (B) when the nation is conquered from without and socialism is imposed by a new but classically merciless Red Army, probably from a united Latin America armed by Sino-Russian benefactors.

Nor is this really even "my" hypothesis. According to the post-Soviet disclosures of the 1990s, the KGB reached the same conclusion after analyzing the socioeconomic ferment in the U.S. during the 1960s and early 1970s: the minorities had genuine revolutionary potential, but the whites were not only merely pretend revolutionaries AT BEST, they were too racist to accept the minority leadership that might have turned pretense and fad into reality. As you may remember, it was pointing this out to those morons who claimed there had been a "revolution" here in "the Sixties" that got me thrown off DU.

More to the point, if you analyze history -- specifically the last time the U.S. actually was close to a second American Revolution -- the cause was the Depression. Moreover, at that time the Communist Party was the third largest political organization in the U.S. (and the best organized party the nation has ever seen -- and probably ever will see). These conditions -- depression combined with meaningful agitation and functional organization at all levels -- will not be allowed again; the ruling class will fill the concentration camps to stop it --precisely the purpose for which the camps are being built.

Hence Kid what I'm saying -- in huge haste for which I apologize and with a promise to return in about 12 or 18 hours (with links if I can find them) -- is not Abrahamic nonsense at all but rather coldly logical deduction from the works of Marx, Lenin, Trotsky and the unknown Soviet intelligence analysts who wrote the cited reports.

See you in Guantanamo...

_________
Edit: bad typing.

Wolf, the Second American Revolution was the Civil War followed by Reconstruction being beaten back by bitterly reactionary and regressive forces. As you say, the Third iteration will be proletariat driven.

KBOH sez:


I agree with all of what you write here. But its important to stop saying its the end of the world. Its just another way to concede BP -- might as well join RigInt and believe that space aliens control everything.

Or we might as well believe that nothing can be done because its too risky -- the government has all the money and the bombs afterall. And if we press too far, they can always create a thermonuclear Apocalypse.

The whole thing is a different brand of liberation theology -- liberation for people who don't want to think about it anymore, let alone do anything.

Or better yet, you get retrograde movements from people who blame industrialization and technology and, ultimately, human beings.

Think about it, BP..we want to save the planet. But we can't save our fucking selves and most of the time our revolutionary activity -- in the name of saving the planet -- is talking about how the planet is surely doomed by our "antrhopogenic" decadence and indifference and in some cases malevolence.

One day the Sun will explode or something like that and it'll all be over.

Well hell, why ya think I'm here instead of hangin with the Derrick Jensen groupies? In the end, contemplating tha abyss just pisses me off, makes me mean and crazy. Anax may have an inner lizard, but I've got an inner snapping turtle.

http://cars.er.usgs.gov/posters/Herpetology/Snapping_Turtles/snapping_turtle_4a.jpg

I've got an inner snapping turtle.

You said it.

Hey BP, we were talking here about not watching TV, so I went out and watched an hour at a friend's last night.

There is this guy, Steve something I think, from Australia - just a complete maniac. It was great. First he pokes around in the water with a stick, hits something solid, and goes into the water - into a hole! - and pulls out a monster Alligator Snapper. Then he removes a gator from a swamp on an air force base. He sees a gator, and runs and leaps onto the damn things back. Then he is swimming around in a spring in Florida, grabbing gators (!!!????) and dragging them up on logs for inspection. He also grabbed an enormous Common Snapper to have a look at that and just about got his nose taken off. Hauls out a huge Florida soft shell at one point, it just went on and on. Man, I was on the edge of my chair for an hour. Best shit I have ever seen.

My friend said the guy got killed not too long ago when a sting ray got him in the chest?? Whoa.

Oh yeah, I forgot. The guy grabbed a big Water Moccasin by the tail at one point, and then later was sexing a gator that he had grabbed that he hadn't restrained other than with his bare hands.

I've got an inner snapping turtle.

You said it.

Hey BP, we were talking here about not watching TV, so I went out and watched an hour at a friend's last night.

There is this guy, Steve something I think, from Australia - just a complete maniac. It was great. First he pokes around in the water with a stick, hits something solid, and goes into the water - into a hole! - and pulls out a monster Alligator Snapper. Then he removes a gator from a swamp on an air force base. He sees a gator, and runs and leaps onto the damn things back. Then he is swimming around in a spring in Florida, grabbing gators (!!!????) and dragging them up on logs for inspection. He also grabbed an enormous Common Snapper to have a look at that and just about got his nose taken off. Hauls out a huge Florida soft shell at one point, it just went on and on. Man, I was on the edge of my chair for an hour. Best shit I have ever seen.

My friend said the guy got killed not too long ago when a sting ray got him in the chest?? Whoa.

That Steve Irwin dude was the ultimate critter cowboy. I've seen some of his stuff years ago, fascinating at first but his over the top Aussie bullshit really grated. Ain't never seen a better critter handler, utterly fearless and highly skilled. Sumbitch would dive into the water at night and catch 8ft saltwater crocs, fuck that shit.He was a great PR flack for wildlife, unfortunately his act fit too well with the standard brand suburban environmentalism, but I suppose it's too much to ask for class analysis from such.

Oh yeah, the PETA types hated him, leave those poor animals alone, boo hoo hoo. And he got in hot water for doing a croc demo with his infant child in his arms, like he was negligent or something. In truth, he was just that good.

I've got an inner snapping turtle.

You said it.

Hey BP, we were talking here about not watching TV, so I went out and watched an hour at a friend's last night.

There is this guy, Steve something I think, from Australia - just a complete maniac. It was great. First he pokes around in the water with a stick, hits something solid, and goes into the water - into a hole! - and pulls out a monster Alligator Snapper. Then he removes a gator from a swamp on an air force base. He sees a gator, and runs and leaps onto the damn things back. Then he is swimming around in a spring in Florida, grabbing gators (!!!????) and dragging them up on logs for inspection. He also grabbed an enormous Common Snapper to have a look at that and just about got his nose taken off. Hauls out a huge Florida soft shell at one point, it just went on and on. Man, I was on the edge of my chair for an hour. Best shit I have ever seen.

My friend said the guy got killed not too long ago when a sting ray got him in the chest?? Whoa.

Anyone else and I'd think you were making a terrible joke, since the Croc Hunter was all over the news when he died :) The stringray thing was a freak accident since almost no one gets killed by one.

He was really popular with kids because he had a wildlife show on Saturday morning..I was a little older by the time he came on though so I don't know much about that. I think he also had a black mark on his career from when he dangled his own baby daughter in front of an alligator.

Just about everybody loved the Croc Hunter and he was important figure for Australia

Anyone else and I'd think you were making a terrible joke, since the Croc Hunter was all over the news when he died :) The stringray thing was a freak accident since almost no one gets killed by one.

He was really popular with kids because he had a wildlife show on Saturday morning..I was a little older by the time he came on though so I don't know much about that. I think he also had a black mark on his career from when he dangled his own baby daughter in front of an alligator.

Just about everybody loved the Croc Hunter and he was important figure for Australia

Interesting. Yeah, I am pretty out of it when it comes to pop culture. It was a thrill for me to see him since as a kid (and still once in a while today) I lived for prowling around in the swamps and grabbing critters. This guy's adventures are beyond anything that was ever in our wildest pre-adolescent imaginations.

Anyone else and I'd think you were making a terrible joke, since the Croc Hunter was all over the news when he died :) The stringray thing was a freak accident since almost no one gets killed by one.

He was really popular with kids because he had a wildlife show on Saturday morning..I was a little older by the time he came on though so I don't know much about that. I think he also had a black mark on his career from when he dangled his own baby daughter in front of an alligator.

Just about everybody loved the Croc Hunter and he was important figure for Australia

Interesting. Yeah, I am pretty out of it when it comes to pop culture. It was a thrill for me to see him since as a kid (and still once in a while today) I lived for prowling around in the swamps and grabbing critters. This guy's adventures are beyond anything that was ever in our wildest pre-adolescent imaginations.

Which brings us back to television. A big problem that I have with that sort of programming is that it produces unrealistic expectations about the natural world in the viewer. I bin doing that sort of thing forever and it's a damn rare day when you have anything near that sort of frequency of animal encounters. It is of course staged with pre-located or fresh caught wild critters or captive stock. Wouldn't make very good viewing, week after week, of Stevo wandering around in the bush hardly seeing anything spectacular. Same with still photography, though I strive for 'in situ'. The result of these expectations is that people go out, are not entertained by Mother Nature and lose interest. Television ain't worth shit for contemplation.

Which brings us back to television. A big problem that I have with that sort of programming is that it produces unrealistic expectations about the natural world in the viewer. I bin doing that sort of thing forever and it's a damn rare day when you have anything near that sort of frequency of animal encounters. It is of course staged with pre-located or fresh caught wild critters or captive stock. Wouldn't make very good viewing, week after week, of Stevo wandering around in the bush hardly seeing anything spectacular. Same with still photography, though I strive for 'in situ'. The result of these expectations is that people go out, are not entertained by Mother Nature and lose interest. Television ain't worth shit for contemplation.

That is a great point. See, watching it I just assumed that were hundreds and hundreds of hours of not finding anything between the filmed segments. Although, for sheer density of herp populations Florida is pretty amazing in my experience.

Ever been to Reelfoot Lake, bp? I saw 12 species of turtles in the wild in less than an hour there once.

Which brings us back to television. A big problem that I have with that sort of programming is that it produces unrealistic expectations about the natural world in the viewer. I bin doing that sort of thing forever and it's a damn rare day when you have anything near that sort of frequency of animal encounters. It is of course staged with pre-located or fresh caught wild critters or captive stock. Wouldn't make very good viewing, week after week, of Stevo wandering around in the bush hardly seeing anything spectacular. Same with still photography, though I strive for 'in situ'. The result of these expectations is that people go out, are not entertained by Mother Nature and lose interest. Television ain't worth shit for contemplation.

That is a great point. See, watching it I just assumed that were hundreds and hundreds of hours of not finding anything between the filmed segments. Although, for sheer density of herp populations Florida is pretty amazing in my experience.

Ever been to Reelfoot Lake, bp? I saw 12 species of turtles in the wild in less than an hour there once.

Yeah, Florida is one of my favorite places, I've kinda specialized in the Panhandle, but it sure ain't what it used to be, I've found it hard to have a 'good day' in recent years, the good spots are going away, the climate's fucked and I'm getting old and wretched.

Read about Reelfoot Lake back in the beginning in Pope and Carr. Never been there, never had a turtle day like that, mebbe 8 species in a day at most., shit, that musta been the entire turtle fauna of that locality. Hotcha.

Read about Reelfoot Lake back in the beginning in Pope and Carr. Never been there, never had a turtle day like that, mebbe 8 species in a day at most., shit, that musta been the entire turtle fauna of that locality. Hotcha.

The lake was created by that big Missouri earthquake. Turtle heaven.

The Kid wrote:


Wolf, the Second American Revolution was the Civil War followed by Reconstruction being beaten back by bitterly reactionary and regressive forces. As you say, the Third iteration will be proletariat driven.

Have to differ with you about the Civil War. The Civil War was the final campaign of the Revolution of 1775, the attempted fulfillment of the vision that -- in what is undoubtedly one of the bravest acts of defiance in human history -- mustered a rag-tag company of local militia to form up on Lexington Green in the early morning fog, there to face the best trained, best equipped, most professional army on the planet. Indeed, the Civil War as the final triumph of the struggle begun at Lexington and Concord was exactly how many northern soldiers viewed it -- including my maternal great-grandfathers, one a captain in the 16th Michigan Infantry, the other a sergeant in the 7th Michigan Infantry. But you are absolutely right about the aftermath of Reconstruction -- as if the White Army (no pun intended) had triumphed in Russia c. 1923. Hence the Second American Revolution is yet to come.

BP wrote:


Which brings us back to television. A big problem that I have with that sort of programming is that it produces unrealistic expectations about the natural world in the viewer. I bin doing that sort of thing forever and it's a damn rare day when you have anything near that sort of frequency of animal encounters. It is of course staged with pre-located or fresh caught wild critters or captive stock. Wouldn't make very good viewing, week after week, of Stevo wandering around in the bush hardly seeing anything spectacular. Same with still photography, though I strive for 'in situ'. The result of these expectations is that people go out, are not entertained by Mother Nature and lose interest. Television ain't worth shit for contemplation.

Agree totally about TV wildlife shows. Moreover, though in my younger days I could stalk an elk to within 15 yards, the best way to spot animals in their native habitat is to emulate the Zen practice: "sitting quietly doing nothing": then you see not only the big guys -- elk, deer, wild boar, bear -- but the smaller folk too, wolf, coyote, otter, beaver, muskrat, various rodents, not to mention myriad avian species ranging from raven and eagle to chickadees, wrens and humming birds, plus insects and the whole exoskeletal world also. Sometimes -- if your stillness is sufficiently in tune with the other indigenous life -- you might even get to see those wilderness sneakmasters, Big Kitty aka cougar and Middle Kitty aka bobcat. Unfortunately however if Big Kitty sees you first, you might end up cat food, unless of course you're packin' something that's measurable by at least a couple 4s.

Trouble is, it's not just TV though: it's the whole alienation from Nature, of which TV is but a part -- both symptom and cause. For the house-bound, a good bird-feeder a few feet beyond a comfortable window-seat is just as cozy as TV and infinitely more informative and entertaining.

The Kid wrote:

[quote]Wolf, the Second American Revolution was the Civil War followed by Reconstruction being beaten back by bitterly reactionary and regressive forces. As you say, the Third iteration will be proletariat driven.

Have to differ with you about the Civil War. The Civil War was the final campaign of the Revolution of 1775, the attempted fulfillment of the vision that -- in what is undoubtedly one of the bravest acts of defiance in human history -- mustered a rag-tag company of local militia to form up on Lexington Green in the early morning fog, there to face the best trained, best equipped, most professional army on the planet. Indeed, the Civil War as the final triumph of the struggle begun at Lexington and Concord was exactly how many northern soldiers viewed it -- including my maternal great-grandfathers, one a captain in the 16th Michigan Infantry, the other a sergeant in the 7th Michigan Infantry. But you are absolutely right about the aftermath of Reconstruction -- as if the White Army (no pun intended) had triumphed in Russia c. 1923. Hence the Second American Revolution is yet to come.

BP wrote:


Which brings us back to television. A big problem that I have with that sort of programming is that it produces unrealistic expectations about the natural world in the viewer. I bin doing that sort of thing forever and it's a damn rare day when you have anything near that sort of frequency of animal encounters. It is of course staged with pre-located or fresh caught wild critters or captive stock. Wouldn't make very good viewing, week after week, of Stevo wandering around in the bush hardly seeing anything spectacular. Same with still photography, though I strive for 'in situ'. The result of these expectations is that people go out, are not entertained by Mother Nature and lose interest. Television ain't worth shit for contemplation.

Agree totally about TV wildlife shows. Moreover, though in my younger days I could stalk an elk to within 15 yards, the best way to spot animals in their native habitat is to emulate the Zen practice: "sitting quietly doing nothing": then you see not only the big guys -- elk, deer, wild boar, bear -- but the smaller folk too, wolf, coyote, otter, beaver, muskrat, various rodents, not to mention myriad avian species ranging from raven and eagle to chickadees, wrens and humming birds, plus insects and the whole exoskeletal world also. Sometimes -- if your stillness is sufficiently in tune with the other indigenous life -- you might even get to see those wilderness sneakmasters, Big Kitty aka cougar and Middle Kitty aka bobcat. Unfortunately however if Big Kitty sees you first, you might end up cat food, unless of course you're packin' something that's measurable by at least a couple 4s.

Trouble is, it's not just TV though: it's the whole alienation from Nature, of which TV is but a part -- both symptom and cause. For the house-bound, a good bird-feeder a few feet beyond a comfortable window-seat is just as cozy as TV and infinitely more informative and entertaining.[/quote:13zsa8ws]

We actually call our bird feeders "cat tv", we have 5 set up, and when we fill them we are "tuning" them. Of course we have too many squirrels, but they're good tv too.

I have just read this thread through again, wow, tons here, great breakthroughs, lots of thoughts that transformed to others. Wolf I think you've pretty much got it pegged and I await the humiliation evoking empathy, ditto Mike your input iis inspiring to me.

Kid, BP's got it right, the frame of reference is different for you than us, though as a delicate female I hate to call myself an "old fart". ;) Did your mom ever tell you to have a glass of water, its free? Do you get freaked out when you see geese flying north on ground hog's day (it just ain't right!). Or have you any idea how much more exciting it might be for me than for you to see the fully mature bald eagle perched in a dead tree on Catskill creek on my way to work yesterday?
They were gone so long! and the bluebirds too! ( but your contributions from your frame of reference are just as critical to refining and defining the discussion).
Mike that 10% has to be increased a little I think, because there are those aspiring to that, and killing themselves to get there so they take on the liberal guise. The internet is slowly being taken over by the corporations, all the hoopla about the fcc and the telecoms are indicative of this; and its not just the "spying"; different servers are censoring, ( I sometimes think that was the problem with the second Kucinich site, cyber attacked somehow to be slow and ineffecutua)l. What I'm basically saying is really good hackers and web savvy people (I think several here?) are going to be necessary to keep on hand. The alternative news sites are starting to ask more and more for support; the best ask only from those who can truly afford it; the lesser ones are cutting services to those who don't subscribe.


Wonderful synopsis about your discussions at DU too, Mike! very "educational"!!

I had so many comments while reading, thanks to all, here's "hope?" for the future from the halls of C-A High School

Boy student one: "Do you even have a brain filter? or do you spew whatever comes to mind?" Boy student two "AAh...I just spew..." no laughter follows.

and to maybe trump Mike's not knowing about Steve Irwin, a friend of mine doesn't know who Johnny Depp is!! (thats a loss!) :wink:

Keep me posted. My "Money Party" articles are ending up on union sites. I couldn't be happier.

Large communities are what's needed for major action.

Who is putting this together?

Keep me posted. My "Money Party" articles are ending up on union sites. I couldn't be happier.

Large communities are what's needed for major action.

Who is putting this together?
"Increasingly in recent times we have come first to identify the remedy that is most agreeable, most convenient, most in accord with major pecuniary or political interest, the one that reflects our available faculty for action; then we move from the remedy so available or desired back to a cause to which that remedy is relevant." John Kenneth Galbraith, 1986

In the 20 some years since Galbraith said that, the problem has gotten much worse. Nothing can happen in the absence of that problem being overcome, and as it is now people refuse to even discuss it.