POG Politics Thread Version 3
Come on in! Since Dustin is taking his ball and going home, it's time to start a new politics thread.
googling after Mark's cease-fire video, I saw some articles about Irani intelligence officials working on exactly that, with concerns raised that the now-headless Iran doesn't have the capacity to agree to anything - "who's in charge here?" is an expanse of craters, apparently by design
political audiobooks are great for long car rides and directionless dog walks
recently finished Trotsky's Fascism: What It Is And How To Fight It, which is what led me to my Birdman question re: commies joining nazis to defeat the social democrats in pre-ww2 germany
just today started Technofeudalism: What Killed Capitalism by Yanis Varoufakis (former Greek finance minister)
I always wanted to read Trotsky's massive history of the Russian revolution but there just isn't enough time.
What's the brief on the Greek's book? I've seen him speak on this, he seems like he thinks this would all be fine if capitalism were restrained?
They couldn't have known they would kill CHILDREN when they bombed the SCHOOL!
Obviously didn't know it was a school attached to a military base..
I always wanted to read Trotsky's massive history of the Russian revolution but there just isn't enough time.
What's the brief on the Greek's book? I've seen him speak on this, he seems like he thinks this would all be fine if capitalism were restrained?
one beautiful thing about audiobooks is the ability to adjust playback speed. I like 1.8x usually, 2x for fantasy-fiction, 1.5 for heavier lifts and accented readers.
Varoufakis is arguing that capitalism is effectively "dead" in the sense that private profit and material production are no longer society's primary drivers. Instead, we're wrapped up in an essentially attention-based economy governed by various digital fiefdoms. I'm only halfway through Ch. 2, so I'm sure there's more to expound.
He's clearly a fan of regulation and price controls, speaking highly of the Bretton Woods system and blaming its collapse essentially on the Vietnam War (more specifically America's unbelievable expenditures on maintaining the war abroad and buying off associated malcontent at home). He sees the relaxation of economic control under Nixon as the root of the financial crisis in 2008 due to the deregulation of margin-based speculation on consumer debts by banks (which under Bretton Woods was not permitted), and he's just started to explain why the banking community allowed itself to hit such a crisis - despite it seeming retrospectively obvious that it was coming - using the Minotaur as some kind of parable.
He's also referenced Mad Men several times - Draper's ability to manufacture desire (it's not a chocolate bar, it's your dad hugging you for good behavior; it's not a burger joint, it's a family meal w/o distractions) is what I think he is setting up as the final stage of capitalism that causes it to finally consume itself.
The prologue had some really sweet moments involving his dad teaching him rudimentary metallurgy and his mom's lesson about wages capturing merely the exchange value of labor but not the "expression" value ("you can have my time but not my concern") which distinguishes a functioning widget from a beautiful one.
adjust playback speed
took some getting used to at first (driven by impatience), but now 1x is painful and I think maybe intentionally slowed down to improve accessibility
I would not consume what I consider more artful literature via audiobook. The joy of language structuring and the ability to reread phrases is not conducive with mobile lectures. Really enjoying Ivanhoe right now, eg. Rick, I've dumped Silmarillion into my work bag 😉
do the children enter and exit through underground tunnels?
At best, this was a willful disregard of a substantial risk of ... really don't even want to type it ... what happened. There's no way they launched precision munitions without knowing what else was in the area.
At worst, this was deemed an acceptable collateral loss. I don't think anybody (at least here, I hope) is suggesting that this was the goal or purpose of the strike.
He never said it was okay. The event is being investigated.
It seemed excessive!
Death camps!
mark,
if you had to guess, how many schools do you think USA has blown up? and is there a number that would make you rethink of USA as the good guys? like would USA still be the good guys if they blew up an avg of one school a day?
and please no one be too mean to mark. he's our friend, and the only pro child killer here talking about it. I mean at least most of the Dems on here at least lie to themselves about being pro child killing
plus we are sooooooo close to getting mark to becoming a communist revolutionary
sorry guys the weed is kicking in
plus I'm still naturally high from joyce Carol Oates retweeting me yesterday about acab
mark,if you had to guess, how many schools do you think USA has blown up? and is there a number that would make you rethink of USA as the good guys? like would USA still be the good guys if they blew up an avg of one school a day? and please no one be too mean to mark. he's our friend, and the only pro child killer here talking about it. I mean at least most of the Dems on here
I would say that "blowing up schools" in the form of eliminating the department of education and drying up all funding for public schools, is the official position of the Republican party.
Put that in your hash pipe
JCO is a treasure, love her. Wrote a good book on boxing!
watched this thinking about mark saying it was excessive.
felt bad about the marching band guys. the others, meh
This is how a school gets bombed.
Anthropic’s AI tool Claude central...
The military’s Maven Smart System, which is built by data mining company Palantir, is generating insights from an astonishing amount of classified data from satellites, surveillance and other intelligence, helping provide real-time targeting and target prioritization to military operations in Iran, according to three people familiar with the system.
This is how a school gets bombed.
the computer made them do it!
Not exactly but yes.
President Donald Trump announced he was banning government agencies from further using AnthropicÂ’s tools, giving the department six months to phase them out.
The move came after a bitter fight between the company and the military over control of using the tools in mass domestic surveillance and fully autonomous weapons.
scroll down to lower article
Hacked traffic cameras and US intelligence: How a plot to kill IranÂ’s supreme leader came together
what could go wrong?
