Weird that the Trump administration is trying to collect a national database on people with autism even as they’re eliminating programs to help them or even merely to oversee how they’re treated by other institutions.
If the goal of tracking them down and keeping tabs on them isn’t to help them, then what is it?
(That’s a rhetorical question).
To the degree that fascism has a distinctive economic system, one of its most notable qualities is a combination of private ownership of the means of producton with government/corporate partnership and a “revolving door” by which powerful individuals pass back and forth between business and political leadership positions.
I propose a new term - “malscurrocracy” - government by evil clowns.
Mm… yeah. I should’ve stipulated that nobody is doing anything to stop him (or even really to slow him down).
The Supreme Court and virtually the entirety of the Republican party - federal, state and local - are actively aiding and abetting him, which, yeah, does count as doing something.
Just the latest in an ever-growing string of obviously corrupt acts involving this obviously corrupt politician.
In less than a year, the US has gone from a nation that at least punished the most egregious corruption to a nation in which the highest elected office in the land is held by the most brazenly and openly corrupt politician in modern US history, and nobody is doing a thing about it.
The US is circling the drain.
One of the defining characteristics of this era is the legacy media from time to time timidly noting the possibility of something that’s been recognized as at least nearly certain down here in the trenches for months or even years.
Of course Russia is co-opting far right groups to attack western democracies. Any honest person who’s been paying attention should’ve figured that out by now - it’s not like they’ve been subtle about it or anything. And it’s been commonly recognized for months now (and less commonly asserted for years).
But at this late date, along comes the Guardian, hesitantly saying, "Um… well… you know… it might just barely be sort of possible that maybe…
That’s a seriously creepy face.
There’s a bubbling cauldron of naked rage not quite managing to hide behind those clamped-down features.
In a world gone Onion, that’s easily the most Onion’ish true story I’ve seen. So far…
They’re literally suing the company for not being evil enough.
That’s so insane that merely taking part in that suit should be seen as grounds for a psych hold.
That’s always been the basic GOP agenda - they’re just more brazen about it now, since they have an unapologetic wannabe dictator taking the lead.
But particularly from Reagan on, their exact strategy has been to win angry, stupid people over with bigotry, fear and hatred, then spend their time in office fucking over the common people (including the angry, stupid ones who voted for them) in order to expand the privilege of the wealthiest few.
They - and the angry, stupid people who vote for them - are the reason we’re where we are today.
Nazi works, but if he’d prefer something else, “technofascist” and “neo-feudalist” are both arguably even more accurate.
Or we could go a different way - “psychopathic douchebag” has a nice ring to it, or maybe “delusional fuckhead.”
Right - it has nothing to do with the fact that Israel has been trying to goad Syria into a war for years now - the nation of minority oppressors is suddenly all worried about someone else’s oppressed minority. Uh huh.
If only it was that simple…
Sorry Mike, but one of the good things that’s come out of the internet is that it’s made people far more aware of just how much of the value their labor creates goes to paying for the privileged lives of worthless shitheels like you.
By design.
And the 1% are going to ride it out in their purpose-built private enclaves, then buy the world at disaster auction prices and make themslves into feudal lords.
The US has a number of institutional failures that need to be addressed if it’s to have any hope of surviving and the Trump presidency is not only not going to address them, but has for all intents and purposes taken it as its mandate to specifically focus on exacerbating them.
It’s dealing with wealth inequality by increasing it. It’s dealing with political corruption by institutionalizing it. It’s dealing with fragile and ineffective public health, public education and social service systems by breaking them. It’s dealing with rapacious corporations by eliminating constraints on them. It’s dealing with climate change by encouraging it. It’s dealing with diminished international stature by alienating literally everyone. It’s dealing with the threat of economic collapse by destroying international markets. It’s dealing with the threat of social unrest by fanning the flames of bigotry and hatred. And on and on.
It’s essentially the equivalent of a cancer patient taking up smoking. In a house lined with asbestos and uranium.
And at that point, it really doesn’t matter who wants to save them or how much they want it.
I would’ve likely been better off with a broader term - something like “the wealthy and empowered few” - particularly since the subject at hand concerns the United States, in which the line between private wealth and power and political power grows more vague and hazy day by day.
But yes - ultimately I conclude government, since government is the entity that has established the legal fiction of corporations, that has acted to protect the private wealth by which the political influence to establish things like a predatory health insurance system can exist and has utterly failed to do one of the few things that is a mandate for a government from the start - to protect citizens from harm brought by others and/or to punish those who bring it.
Or to be more precise, if the government had done its job of protecting Americans from a destructive and predatory health insurance system (as opposed to literally mandating it), Luigi’s vigilantism likely wouldn’t have occurred in the first place, and certainly wouldn’t have had so much support if it had.
But since they didn’t do their job, it happened, and if they continue to not do their job (as it appears they’re determined), then it will happen again, and worse.
Who said anything about “being shitty humans?”
I’m talking about a very specific dynamic - a civilization in which there is widespread citizen discontent and whether the government acts to alleviate that discontent legitimately or merely acts to divert or stifle it.
The former allows for solutions so allows for recovery. The latter leaves the problems to rot and fester, and is a death sentence.
This is the primary reason that I say the United States is terminally ill - that the only possible future is collapse.
When faced with popular discontent, the leaders of a nation have exactly two choices - to attempt to deal with the issues that cause the discontent, or to refuse to deal with the issues and instead just try to squash or distract from the discontent.
A nation that has chosen the latter is living on borrowed time, since the discontent is still there, lurking below the surface, will always be there as long as the cause remains unaddressed, and will, sooner or later, burst into the open again, even more toxic and violent than it was the last time.
Much though the ruling class might wish to believe otherwise there is no third alternative. There’s no magic wand they can wave to make the discontent vanish. They can either work to eliminate it by eliminating its cause(s), or they can watch while it weakens and eventually destroys the nation.
And the US has clearly chosen that latter path. In fact, it could broadly be said that that’s the exact purpose of the Trump presidency - a concerted and organized effort by elements of the ruling class to establish a government specifically dedicated to refusing to address the causes of discontent and to instead merelybtry to distract from it or squash it.
And it will ultimately fail. It can’t do otherwise.
Israel is a rogue state.