When I saw that David Atkins tweet I felt the collective validation of 73 million votes sweep through my body. I mean what kind of person talks like that? The arrogance and disdain that academic liberal elite types have for "regular" people continues to blow my mind every day.
After graduating college I switched my registration to Democrat, because I'm pro-choice, pro-drug legalization, pro-action on climate change, etc. but my parents and most of my family are conservative Christians (I happen to be atheist).
I donated to Sanders and Yang. But I truly ended up being motivated to vote for Trump simply because people like David Atkins disgust me *way* more, and they are actually taken seriously. They seem to have no respect for religion, tradition, and other values that my family holds and I'm just truly tired of seeing them get shit on in the media and wider culture.
What I like about your journalism style Matt is the simple fact that you remember there is history behind every story. Unlike most of today's media which continuously acts like everything happens in its own unique bubble.
The alleged "mental illness" of Trump voters isn't new either. They've been floating this for a while now.
"Yale psychiatrist explains how to deprogram Trump supporters who’ve been sucked into the vortex of his lies"
As an ex-Democrat Independent who is quite aware of the "vortex" of Democrat lies, headlines like these made me sit up & go "Huzzawah?"
If we're going to define political mental illness as a blind willingness to believe your chosen party's bullshit, Democrats are at the head of the line.
Obama was an amazingly well spoken shit shoveler, war criminal & corporate cocksucker yet he's revered as some kind of secular saint.
Bill Clinton was a pervy Epstein acolyte who had the morals of a serial rapist yet he & his wife are taken quite seriously among the party faithful.
Finger Fucker Joe is the epitome of polished institutional racism who, if his lips are moving, is most likely lying.
In my opinion Trump was a ritual scapegoat for all the problems facing us as a nation.
Problems brought on by our apathy and neglect as much the nefarious dealings of our corrupted political class.
Was he a mouthy buffoonish asshole?
Well, yeah.
Bush Jr. was no less of a buffoon & no less of an asshole, yet he's quite welcome in the Anti-Trump Cult. It doesn't appear to matter, in the least, that he mismanaged 2 wars & napped while the rich bent the economy over a table for a good corn holing during a time of war.
Trump, with his mean tweets & paranoia, is supposed to be the real version of evil personified.
But I've yet to have anyone explain his actual crime to me.
2 weekends ago I watched a clip of Whoopsie Goldbug tell Republicans they need to get over the election so we can move on as a nation.
On Youtube you can find clips of Whoopsie, fairly soon after Trump's election, already calling for his impeachment.
Evidently what's good for the Republican geese in 2020 wasn't remotely good for Democrat ganders back in 2017.
AOC tweeted something about how those folk who are holding up Joe's benediction are the same people who disguise regime change wars as "promoting Democracy."
That was Obama's entire 8 year foreign policy in a fucking nutshell.
I saw 3 yahoos on MSNBC talking about how we need gatekeepers to prevent that nasty "fake news" from infecting the unwary.
This from a network that fired Phil Donahue & paid off Jesse Ventura in the run up to the Iraq horror show. And then sold that war like it was a Cadillac or a set of steak knives.
This from a network that shoveled Russiagate fake news for 4 fucking years.
I've never been a fan of Republican policy.
I've also never taken this crackpot after election virtue signaling from the winner very seriously either.
This time though I've come to believe that the Democrats, with their Russiagating bullshit, their McCarthyism, their uncritical acceptance of intelligence agency manipulation & their newfound love for censorship have truly veered into the land of pure evil.
Luckily their evil is apparently unhinged enough to compel them to start a war with the side that has, and actually knows how to use, all the guns. I also imagine that most of the military & most of the cops wouldn't be prone to side with the Democrats.
Which leads me to a question that I've been wondering about for a while.
Why does the Democratic Party actually exist?
It's a faux left corporate party that never actually does anything left wing.
It's primary appeal appears to be aimed at college educated upscale wankers who like to playact at caring about approved causes.
They are best at practicing what I call "morality at a nice safe distance."
They'll criticize cops yet they won't become cops.
They'll criticize the bloody outcome of war yet they're often found voting for war.
They'll virtue signal about their love of humanity yet rarely do anything more substantial than tweet their outrage.
As someone who has spent 28 years working with the mentally challenged I have very little patience for folk who can't walk their own long moral talk.
A group of my close friends has been doing a trivia night over Zoom during the pandemic (week 27 at this point, which is sobering). Afterwards, the kids are in bed, we're generally a little roasted and we end up talking politics. This is a fairly diverse group, some dues-paying DSA types, some Trump voters, but nobody viewing the world with a Q Anon or Russiagate lens. So, you know, normies.
The maddening thing is there's near complete agreement about the thesis of this article: we have a government that functions for the donor class, big business, and the ultra-wealthy at the expense of the rest of us. We agree this is bipartisan consensus. We agree that Biden won't change this and that Trump didn't try to either. I just don't know how we can fix it. And while I take some solace that people I know with wildly different politics identify the same root issue, the problem seems so deeply entrenched that I just can't see how any of this changes. It stinks like cheese.
Great piece, Matt. As a middle class, middle of the country nobody, I feel the tension of scraping to make ends meet in the entirety of my family and friends, from the urban liberals to the suburban conservatives, to the rural abandoned Democrats, and everyone that doesn't check a neat box. It's a Red Queen's race to try to keep your head above water, and it's evidence of a system that doesn't work for the majority of people, regardless of race, creed, gender, religious leanings.
Through a six-degrees-of-Kevin-Bacon scenario, I know a family in the 0.1%. Things are going great for them, which is no surprise. With the exception of the matriarch and patriarch of the family, the rest of the clan is a bunch of unemployed, unemployable sacks of shit. They don't need jobs (trust funds take care of that inconvenience) so they don't do anything other than take and consume. There's no volunteering, no pet causes, not even a vanity charity. They stand for themselves and nothing else, all the while sporting an unearned smugness from being born the right way. It's galling that these no-accomplishment, privilege-taking asswipes act like my better even though they're unqualified for a job at Subway.
Finally, I disagree that the Schadenfreude/fling feces factor is why so many people voted for Trump. People don't just want to see the elites knocked down a peg. Rather, they are voting against a broken system. Humans are hardwired for fairness. When we see people repeatedly taking unearned benefits, we go out of our ways to punish them, even at expense to ourselves (aka altruistic punishment). It's human biology that manifests itself as the social contract. Play fair, or we'll burn the whole thing down. If you fuck me, I'll fuck you right back. The Trump presidency was simultaneously a symptom of and salvo against a truly fucked social contract.
I have family members that voted for Trump. They own smallish businesses and always vote republican because of taxes. That’s literally the reason why. The ridiculous portraitures in the popular media of the toothless redneck Trumper might make the suburban wine moms and the elite class feel better about themselves but it’s far from reality. Until the DNC leaves their costal enclaves and comes to live among us middle earthers, they will continue to lose elections at the state level. A more disconnected group of people I have never met! This is seriously like every tail, ever told of the disconnected rulers of society that never saw the guillotine coming. Did they not pay attention to history at their Ive League schools? This is where the saying “well credentialed but undereducated” fits. What’s the point of spending $75K year on school if you don’t learn the important lessons?
Taibbi gets to the heart of the matter. We have to clarify just who exactly is the one we need to be fighting. For the masses, that should not be each other. We need to punch up.
I directionally agree, although I do think that a huge part of the political side of the culture war would be resolved if the left did not always insist on one consistent national outcome. To a conservative, for example, Obama's June 2016 regulation defining the gender rules in local school bathrooms across the country, injected in to the teeth of a presidential campaign, was such an example. People in Oklahoma don't care what California does in such matters -- beyond maybe rolling their eyes -- but when Washington just issues a regulation with one national answer on something that seems like it ought to be a local decision (unless, you know, *everything* has to be a national policy), then the culture war becomes relevant to them and the control of the presidency suddenly seems to be extremely important. (This is but one small example, of course, but in my mind an illustrative one. A great deal of the culture war would diffuse if we simply took the point of view that individual states and locales can make *most* of these rules on their own. And, no, it is not a brilliant refutation to bring up the question of Black civil rights, over which we have ripped our country apart for around 200 years, and say that the interests of every conceivable oppressed group, no matter how small or how recently recognized, requires a similar response.)
I would not worry much about politicians at this point. The road back to democracy is not by reforming politics of victory of any side. It is through the smoldering ruins of the headquarters of Google first and foremost, Facebook, Twitter.
The people are saturated, now more than ever, with politics. Politics have inserted themselves into every choice, every discussion, entertainment, everywhere. While we squabble over politics, it's become pretty clear to me.
Political power is trivial to economic power.
Always was, always will be, so we are distracted with philosophy and ideologies, meanwhile, a few global handfuls of people, continue to skim and rake off, every transaction.
The people's shared interests, the commons , have been bequeathed to the few, that those few, make seek and receive rent, inperpetutidy. Privatization of everything, is about just that. Everything owned and controlled by a few, ever incrementally increasing rent charged, squirreled offshore, tax free. it is conservatively estimated today, there is more than $50 trillion, with a T, hoarded off shore in places like the caymans. The sheer power, the potential, that amassed sum represents, beyond measure.
I watched a great documentary a number of years ago, "Let's make Money" and it exposed me to Mont Pelerin society ideas. Subsequent research elaborates and informs the topic. I wrote this summary as an effort to inform others, what has been happening, incrementally, for decades.
The Mont Pelerin Society's (Austria 1940's) favorite "economist" F. v Hayek proposed path of "liberty" and "freedom", 4 "planks": [only for the 1% (Neoliberalism)] (Buchanan, Friedman, the "Chicago School", were later disciples and advocates)
1) Deregulate global financial markets - DONE
2) Deregulate global trade - DONE
3) Create the illusion and urgency of national bankruptcy with fake (fiat) debt (thereby neuter a nation's capability to enforce laws - eliminate the people's ability to defend against being overwhelmed and consumed by the 1%) - DONE
this manufactured illusion of bankruptcy is critical path for the 1%'s agenda. the "debt" is used to justify austerity measures for the people, and to tee up, the privatization plan, which is about transforming the public debt, into private debt, where the 1% can extract usury, ad infinitum.
#AusterityIsCode4Looting - austerity measures are plain evidence, the system has already been looted by generational globalist wealth.
then lastly, the kill shot:
4) Privatize Everything. recreate us ALL as permanent rent payers of even the most basic necessities of life (Air, water, food, shelter, health care). the public debt of a nation has been effectively eliminated, transmuted into private debt (bonds); the service of which (usury) is FOREVER- Almost COMPLETE
#PrivatizationIsTheft - privatization today is STRICTLY about prioritizing national productivity (work) away from the commons and general welfare, extracting and transferring it to the 1% rent-seeking parasites (Extreme Redistribution of wealth from the people TO the Billionaires, NOTHING for the people)
the use of "liberal" in this context, describes the "liberal" (freely used, as one would "liberally" spread butter on toast) projection of any and all force available to maintain, enhance, and grow, a condition of monopolized wealth and power, in the hands of a small group of generational feudal lords.
my crude hashtag:
#HostLife - The people have been turned into "hosts" (a food source - rent payers) for the 1% parasites (leeches - rent collectors) by the re-establishment of the "West Virginia Coal Mine Experience"™ (circa 1900).
By incrementally monopolizing necessities (food, water, shelter, utilities), by debt expansion, and by wage suppression: we now work in their company "mines" (cube farms, whatever), live in their company housing (mortgage), shop in their company store (credit card debt), pay MONOPOLY prices for necessities.
Literally, cradle to grave slavery to a small collection of "Nanny" Transnational Corporations (all owned at the top by a handful of investors)
Great piece. I’m left wondering, though, how do we start approaching solutions to this problem? That is the second order of thinking we need right now.
I didn't vote for Trump (I chose not to vote for any presidential candidate), but if you're a Republican, voting for Trump was a perfectly logical and rational decision. Trump became a fairly orthodox Republican in terms of policy substance; it's his personal style that's highly unorthodox. For a member of the DNC and a Washington Monthly contributor (someone in a position of authority who should be expected to act responsibly) to argue that the 75 million people who voted for Trump are all essentially enemies of war who've been defeated and now must be occupied and "reconstructed" is disturbing. Elites like Mr. Atkins are another "Blundering Generation" tearing the polity apart because they can't compromise and take for granted that "it couldn't happen here." Such vindictiveness effectively vindicates the fears of the people who voted for Trump - that "he's the only thing standing between them and us." Voting for Trump shouldn't be pathologized. Almost all of the Trump voters whom I know are normal Republicans (most of the Trump voters whom I know from work are the much-discussed Floridian Hispanics/Latinos) who complain about his clownish behavior but figure that based on their political values he's better than any of the alternatives. I've met very few people who have any patience or tolerance for "The Trump Show." Elites like Mr. Atkins need to log off Twitter, turn off the TV, and get out more.
Suggestion for an article: the amazing unwillingness of liberals/progressives to hear anything other than their beliefs. Jihadi Muslims are more willing to debate
I think your assessment of the 2008 mortgage crisis is oversimplified. Government policies encouraged, almost required, that lending standards be loosened. It seems to me a typical case of wanting to do good - give more people access to home ownership - without thinking through the consequences.
That was really great Matt, as always. You often make me kick myself for not seeing sooner what you see.
And yes, I feel really dumb for wanting to decouple from China and cut back on these stupid wars. But the Perpetual War Party returns to Versailles. I wonder which country Biden will attack first?
I remember watching the GOP primaries in 2015-2016 and wondering what made Trump so popular because it clearly wasn't his personality. Then I heard him give an interview where he promised to get rid of the carried interest loophole before going on a rant about how rich people pay nothing in taxes between a bunch of "believe me, I know these people" quips. I thought ah-hah! It's economic populism after all, the same reason Bernie gave Hillary a run for her money. Maybe the dam is finally starting to break!
Then Trump passed a deficit-busting upper-class tax-cut and tried to repeal the ACA. Oh, and when said tax-cuts turned out to add more than $1 trillion over ten years, they included sunset provisions *but only for people making less than $75k a year*. Ok, so economic populist rhetoric to get elected, toss people a meager tax-cut to make them feel better about all the stock buybacks and then sunset those cuts and, I guess, try to blame it on Democrats. Whatever.
Then Bernie gets another shot in 2020 and does... not great. I guess the theory is he drank too much woke Kool-Aid?
Now Biden is pulling a New Coke on us and everyone is celebrating a return to "normalcy", but normal was forever wars and plutocrats sucking the life out of the working class. It's now just a matter of time before the US blunders into another overseas military adventure and we all have to "tighten our belts" to absorb the huge deficits that Republicans are suddenly going to start caring about again.
The whole cycle is infuriating. Matt hits the nail on the head; none of this would be possible if we weren't all at each other's throats, accusing our neighbors of being communists or part of a death cult. Ignore the rich assholes rubbing their contempt for you in your face with "opportunity zones" and laughable assertions that corporate tax rates dictate wages. It's way more important to own people on Twitter and punch someone in the face for wearing a mask... or not wearing a mask... or whatever.
I love the recent PR from whichever Koch brother is still alive where he is totally sorry for inciting the culture war --- as if he just meant for the Tea Party to stir the pot a little, you know, just enough to get some deregulation zealots elected. In reality, he just admitted to everything Matt wrote about in this article; people like the Kochs stoke the culture war because it distracts us while they rob us blind from their protected enclaves.
When I saw that David Atkins tweet I felt the collective validation of 73 million votes sweep through my body. I mean what kind of person talks like that? The arrogance and disdain that academic liberal elite types have for "regular" people continues to blow my mind every day.
After graduating college I switched my registration to Democrat, because I'm pro-choice, pro-drug legalization, pro-action on climate change, etc. but my parents and most of my family are conservative Christians (I happen to be atheist).
I donated to Sanders and Yang. But I truly ended up being motivated to vote for Trump simply because people like David Atkins disgust me *way* more, and they are actually taken seriously. They seem to have no respect for religion, tradition, and other values that my family holds and I'm just truly tired of seeing them get shit on in the media and wider culture.
What I like about your journalism style Matt is the simple fact that you remember there is history behind every story. Unlike most of today's media which continuously acts like everything happens in its own unique bubble.
The alleged "mental illness" of Trump voters isn't new either. They've been floating this for a while now.
Here's one from 2019
https://www.rawstory.com/2019/05/yale-psychiatrist-explains-how-to-deprogram-trump-supporters-whove-been-sucked-into-the-vortex-of-his-lies/
"Yale psychiatrist explains how to deprogram Trump supporters who’ve been sucked into the vortex of his lies"
As an ex-Democrat Independent who is quite aware of the "vortex" of Democrat lies, headlines like these made me sit up & go "Huzzawah?"
If we're going to define political mental illness as a blind willingness to believe your chosen party's bullshit, Democrats are at the head of the line.
Obama was an amazingly well spoken shit shoveler, war criminal & corporate cocksucker yet he's revered as some kind of secular saint.
Bill Clinton was a pervy Epstein acolyte who had the morals of a serial rapist yet he & his wife are taken quite seriously among the party faithful.
Finger Fucker Joe is the epitome of polished institutional racism who, if his lips are moving, is most likely lying.
In my opinion Trump was a ritual scapegoat for all the problems facing us as a nation.
Problems brought on by our apathy and neglect as much the nefarious dealings of our corrupted political class.
Was he a mouthy buffoonish asshole?
Well, yeah.
Bush Jr. was no less of a buffoon & no less of an asshole, yet he's quite welcome in the Anti-Trump Cult. It doesn't appear to matter, in the least, that he mismanaged 2 wars & napped while the rich bent the economy over a table for a good corn holing during a time of war.
Trump, with his mean tweets & paranoia, is supposed to be the real version of evil personified.
But I've yet to have anyone explain his actual crime to me.
2 weekends ago I watched a clip of Whoopsie Goldbug tell Republicans they need to get over the election so we can move on as a nation.
On Youtube you can find clips of Whoopsie, fairly soon after Trump's election, already calling for his impeachment.
Evidently what's good for the Republican geese in 2020 wasn't remotely good for Democrat ganders back in 2017.
AOC tweeted something about how those folk who are holding up Joe's benediction are the same people who disguise regime change wars as "promoting Democracy."
That was Obama's entire 8 year foreign policy in a fucking nutshell.
I saw 3 yahoos on MSNBC talking about how we need gatekeepers to prevent that nasty "fake news" from infecting the unwary.
This from a network that fired Phil Donahue & paid off Jesse Ventura in the run up to the Iraq horror show. And then sold that war like it was a Cadillac or a set of steak knives.
This from a network that shoveled Russiagate fake news for 4 fucking years.
I've never been a fan of Republican policy.
I've also never taken this crackpot after election virtue signaling from the winner very seriously either.
This time though I've come to believe that the Democrats, with their Russiagating bullshit, their McCarthyism, their uncritical acceptance of intelligence agency manipulation & their newfound love for censorship have truly veered into the land of pure evil.
Luckily their evil is apparently unhinged enough to compel them to start a war with the side that has, and actually knows how to use, all the guns. I also imagine that most of the military & most of the cops wouldn't be prone to side with the Democrats.
Which leads me to a question that I've been wondering about for a while.
Why does the Democratic Party actually exist?
It's a faux left corporate party that never actually does anything left wing.
It's primary appeal appears to be aimed at college educated upscale wankers who like to playact at caring about approved causes.
They are best at practicing what I call "morality at a nice safe distance."
They'll criticize cops yet they won't become cops.
They'll criticize the bloody outcome of war yet they're often found voting for war.
They'll virtue signal about their love of humanity yet rarely do anything more substantial than tweet their outrage.
As someone who has spent 28 years working with the mentally challenged I have very little patience for folk who can't walk their own long moral talk.
So sue me.
A group of my close friends has been doing a trivia night over Zoom during the pandemic (week 27 at this point, which is sobering). Afterwards, the kids are in bed, we're generally a little roasted and we end up talking politics. This is a fairly diverse group, some dues-paying DSA types, some Trump voters, but nobody viewing the world with a Q Anon or Russiagate lens. So, you know, normies.
The maddening thing is there's near complete agreement about the thesis of this article: we have a government that functions for the donor class, big business, and the ultra-wealthy at the expense of the rest of us. We agree this is bipartisan consensus. We agree that Biden won't change this and that Trump didn't try to either. I just don't know how we can fix it. And while I take some solace that people I know with wildly different politics identify the same root issue, the problem seems so deeply entrenched that I just can't see how any of this changes. It stinks like cheese.
Great piece, Matt. As a middle class, middle of the country nobody, I feel the tension of scraping to make ends meet in the entirety of my family and friends, from the urban liberals to the suburban conservatives, to the rural abandoned Democrats, and everyone that doesn't check a neat box. It's a Red Queen's race to try to keep your head above water, and it's evidence of a system that doesn't work for the majority of people, regardless of race, creed, gender, religious leanings.
Through a six-degrees-of-Kevin-Bacon scenario, I know a family in the 0.1%. Things are going great for them, which is no surprise. With the exception of the matriarch and patriarch of the family, the rest of the clan is a bunch of unemployed, unemployable sacks of shit. They don't need jobs (trust funds take care of that inconvenience) so they don't do anything other than take and consume. There's no volunteering, no pet causes, not even a vanity charity. They stand for themselves and nothing else, all the while sporting an unearned smugness from being born the right way. It's galling that these no-accomplishment, privilege-taking asswipes act like my better even though they're unqualified for a job at Subway.
Finally, I disagree that the Schadenfreude/fling feces factor is why so many people voted for Trump. People don't just want to see the elites knocked down a peg. Rather, they are voting against a broken system. Humans are hardwired for fairness. When we see people repeatedly taking unearned benefits, we go out of our ways to punish them, even at expense to ourselves (aka altruistic punishment). It's human biology that manifests itself as the social contract. Play fair, or we'll burn the whole thing down. If you fuck me, I'll fuck you right back. The Trump presidency was simultaneously a symptom of and salvo against a truly fucked social contract.
The defund the police movement is from academia, not poor neighborhoods.
I have family members that voted for Trump. They own smallish businesses and always vote republican because of taxes. That’s literally the reason why. The ridiculous portraitures in the popular media of the toothless redneck Trumper might make the suburban wine moms and the elite class feel better about themselves but it’s far from reality. Until the DNC leaves their costal enclaves and comes to live among us middle earthers, they will continue to lose elections at the state level. A more disconnected group of people I have never met! This is seriously like every tail, ever told of the disconnected rulers of society that never saw the guillotine coming. Did they not pay attention to history at their Ive League schools? This is where the saying “well credentialed but undereducated” fits. What’s the point of spending $75K year on school if you don’t learn the important lessons?
Taibbi gets to the heart of the matter. We have to clarify just who exactly is the one we need to be fighting. For the masses, that should not be each other. We need to punch up.
I directionally agree, although I do think that a huge part of the political side of the culture war would be resolved if the left did not always insist on one consistent national outcome. To a conservative, for example, Obama's June 2016 regulation defining the gender rules in local school bathrooms across the country, injected in to the teeth of a presidential campaign, was such an example. People in Oklahoma don't care what California does in such matters -- beyond maybe rolling their eyes -- but when Washington just issues a regulation with one national answer on something that seems like it ought to be a local decision (unless, you know, *everything* has to be a national policy), then the culture war becomes relevant to them and the control of the presidency suddenly seems to be extremely important. (This is but one small example, of course, but in my mind an illustrative one. A great deal of the culture war would diffuse if we simply took the point of view that individual states and locales can make *most* of these rules on their own. And, no, it is not a brilliant refutation to bring up the question of Black civil rights, over which we have ripped our country apart for around 200 years, and say that the interests of every conceivable oppressed group, no matter how small or how recently recognized, requires a similar response.)
I would not worry much about politicians at this point. The road back to democracy is not by reforming politics of victory of any side. It is through the smoldering ruins of the headquarters of Google first and foremost, Facebook, Twitter.
Thank you so much Matt.
The people are saturated, now more than ever, with politics. Politics have inserted themselves into every choice, every discussion, entertainment, everywhere. While we squabble over politics, it's become pretty clear to me.
Political power is trivial to economic power.
Always was, always will be, so we are distracted with philosophy and ideologies, meanwhile, a few global handfuls of people, continue to skim and rake off, every transaction.
The people's shared interests, the commons , have been bequeathed to the few, that those few, make seek and receive rent, inperpetutidy. Privatization of everything, is about just that. Everything owned and controlled by a few, ever incrementally increasing rent charged, squirreled offshore, tax free. it is conservatively estimated today, there is more than $50 trillion, with a T, hoarded off shore in places like the caymans. The sheer power, the potential, that amassed sum represents, beyond measure.
I watched a great documentary a number of years ago, "Let's make Money" and it exposed me to Mont Pelerin society ideas. Subsequent research elaborates and informs the topic. I wrote this summary as an effort to inform others, what has been happening, incrementally, for decades.
The Mont Pelerin Society's (Austria 1940's) favorite "economist" F. v Hayek proposed path of "liberty" and "freedom", 4 "planks": [only for the 1% (Neoliberalism)] (Buchanan, Friedman, the "Chicago School", were later disciples and advocates)
1) Deregulate global financial markets - DONE
2) Deregulate global trade - DONE
3) Create the illusion and urgency of national bankruptcy with fake (fiat) debt (thereby neuter a nation's capability to enforce laws - eliminate the people's ability to defend against being overwhelmed and consumed by the 1%) - DONE
this manufactured illusion of bankruptcy is critical path for the 1%'s agenda. the "debt" is used to justify austerity measures for the people, and to tee up, the privatization plan, which is about transforming the public debt, into private debt, where the 1% can extract usury, ad infinitum.
#AusterityIsCode4Looting - austerity measures are plain evidence, the system has already been looted by generational globalist wealth.
then lastly, the kill shot:
4) Privatize Everything. recreate us ALL as permanent rent payers of even the most basic necessities of life (Air, water, food, shelter, health care). the public debt of a nation has been effectively eliminated, transmuted into private debt (bonds); the service of which (usury) is FOREVER- Almost COMPLETE
#PrivatizationIsTheft - privatization today is STRICTLY about prioritizing national productivity (work) away from the commons and general welfare, extracting and transferring it to the 1% rent-seeking parasites (Extreme Redistribution of wealth from the people TO the Billionaires, NOTHING for the people)
the use of "liberal" in this context, describes the "liberal" (freely used, as one would "liberally" spread butter on toast) projection of any and all force available to maintain, enhance, and grow, a condition of monopolized wealth and power, in the hands of a small group of generational feudal lords.
my crude hashtag:
#HostLife - The people have been turned into "hosts" (a food source - rent payers) for the 1% parasites (leeches - rent collectors) by the re-establishment of the "West Virginia Coal Mine Experience"™ (circa 1900).
By incrementally monopolizing necessities (food, water, shelter, utilities), by debt expansion, and by wage suppression: we now work in their company "mines" (cube farms, whatever), live in their company housing (mortgage), shop in their company store (credit card debt), pay MONOPOLY prices for necessities.
Literally, cradle to grave slavery to a small collection of "Nanny" Transnational Corporations (all owned at the top by a handful of investors)
Great piece. I’m left wondering, though, how do we start approaching solutions to this problem? That is the second order of thinking we need right now.
I didn't vote for Trump (I chose not to vote for any presidential candidate), but if you're a Republican, voting for Trump was a perfectly logical and rational decision. Trump became a fairly orthodox Republican in terms of policy substance; it's his personal style that's highly unorthodox. For a member of the DNC and a Washington Monthly contributor (someone in a position of authority who should be expected to act responsibly) to argue that the 75 million people who voted for Trump are all essentially enemies of war who've been defeated and now must be occupied and "reconstructed" is disturbing. Elites like Mr. Atkins are another "Blundering Generation" tearing the polity apart because they can't compromise and take for granted that "it couldn't happen here." Such vindictiveness effectively vindicates the fears of the people who voted for Trump - that "he's the only thing standing between them and us." Voting for Trump shouldn't be pathologized. Almost all of the Trump voters whom I know are normal Republicans (most of the Trump voters whom I know from work are the much-discussed Floridian Hispanics/Latinos) who complain about his clownish behavior but figure that based on their political values he's better than any of the alternatives. I've met very few people who have any patience or tolerance for "The Trump Show." Elites like Mr. Atkins need to log off Twitter, turn off the TV, and get out more.
Suggestion for an article: the amazing unwillingness of liberals/progressives to hear anything other than their beliefs. Jihadi Muslims are more willing to debate
I think your assessment of the 2008 mortgage crisis is oversimplified. Government policies encouraged, almost required, that lending standards be loosened. It seems to me a typical case of wanting to do good - give more people access to home ownership - without thinking through the consequences.
That was really great Matt, as always. You often make me kick myself for not seeing sooner what you see.
And yes, I feel really dumb for wanting to decouple from China and cut back on these stupid wars. But the Perpetual War Party returns to Versailles. I wonder which country Biden will attack first?
I remember watching the GOP primaries in 2015-2016 and wondering what made Trump so popular because it clearly wasn't his personality. Then I heard him give an interview where he promised to get rid of the carried interest loophole before going on a rant about how rich people pay nothing in taxes between a bunch of "believe me, I know these people" quips. I thought ah-hah! It's economic populism after all, the same reason Bernie gave Hillary a run for her money. Maybe the dam is finally starting to break!
Then Trump passed a deficit-busting upper-class tax-cut and tried to repeal the ACA. Oh, and when said tax-cuts turned out to add more than $1 trillion over ten years, they included sunset provisions *but only for people making less than $75k a year*. Ok, so economic populist rhetoric to get elected, toss people a meager tax-cut to make them feel better about all the stock buybacks and then sunset those cuts and, I guess, try to blame it on Democrats. Whatever.
Then Bernie gets another shot in 2020 and does... not great. I guess the theory is he drank too much woke Kool-Aid?
Now Biden is pulling a New Coke on us and everyone is celebrating a return to "normalcy", but normal was forever wars and plutocrats sucking the life out of the working class. It's now just a matter of time before the US blunders into another overseas military adventure and we all have to "tighten our belts" to absorb the huge deficits that Republicans are suddenly going to start caring about again.
The whole cycle is infuriating. Matt hits the nail on the head; none of this would be possible if we weren't all at each other's throats, accusing our neighbors of being communists or part of a death cult. Ignore the rich assholes rubbing their contempt for you in your face with "opportunity zones" and laughable assertions that corporate tax rates dictate wages. It's way more important to own people on Twitter and punch someone in the face for wearing a mask... or not wearing a mask... or whatever.
I love the recent PR from whichever Koch brother is still alive where he is totally sorry for inciting the culture war --- as if he just meant for the Tea Party to stir the pot a little, you know, just enough to get some deregulation zealots elected. In reality, he just admitted to everything Matt wrote about in this article; people like the Kochs stoke the culture war because it distracts us while they rob us blind from their protected enclaves.