The US government has been run by the wealthy elites since before the Constitution was written. That's why we had genocide against Native Americans and slavery. Once modern, predatory capitalism had taken complete control, the primary enemy of the state became all progressives, socialists and communists. Why? Because they represented the idea that we are all in this together and should all share in the bounty of shared work and work through the trepidations we face together. But that does not fit with the capitalist model, where the work is done by people who have no power, no control, and no say in government. So until capitalism is tamed, regulated and cut down to size, we will never have a progressive, socialist or communist anything. Those ideologies will remain government/elite enemy #1.
The first step, I think, is campaign finance reform. In short, eliminating "legal" bribes.
But with SCOTUS saying that "legal" bribes are a form of protected speech by corporations, there's little hope of real reform.
That's because the powers-that-be are very happy with the system as it exists. Short of powerful revolts, the system will not change. Meanwhile, the masses are kept occupied with work, kept divided by culture war issues, distracted by circuses, and fed an ideology of "work hard and you can be the next Donald Trump--or Bill Gates etc."
The first step is changing the American system of government and governance that enables Vested Special Interests to buy access to that government's legal power, administrative authority, and spending capability so as to advance the agendas and increase the Power and Wealth of those VSIs.
Given the number of people who have been physically and/or economically killed, maimed, or enslaved as a result of Communism, Socialism, and Progressivism in the 20th and 21st centuries, these ideologies need to become "Enemy #1" of every human being on this Planet.
No other countries on earth have killed more people in other countries, overthrown more governments and caused more harm than the US, UK and Germany. Germany killed over 20 million Russians in WWII. How many people died at the hands of UK imperialists since the 1800s? Ask the people of India. The US has killed and displaced tens of millions of people since WWII. Socialism and communism are about empowering working people, so that is pretty much opposite of "enslaving" them. In fact, the US excels at enslaving people as low-wage slaves to tyrannical corporations, who also pollute the air, water and food supply of the workers. So I think you might have to rethink your conclusion about whom is enslaving whom. and which systems are the problem.
How many Ukrainians did the Russians kill with Stalin's Planned Famine?
How many Chinese did Mao kill with his various and sundry Great Leaps Forward, Cultural Revolutions, and so forth?
And exactly where in the USSR, Mao's China, Pol Pot's Cambodia, or anyplace subjected to European or Asian Communism over the last 100 years were "working people" empowered, as opposed to being enslaved?
Was the Berlin Wall built to prevent people from coming into Communist East Germany? Or to prevent those who were already in there from leaving?
The only difference between the American System ~ which is not "Capitalism" at all, but a variant of Fascist Mercantilist Corporatism [as was the UK at its peak of Empire and Germany under the Nazis] ~ and the Socialism/Communism of Russia, China, etc is Who the Ruling Political/Economic Class is. And how they became that Ruling Class.
How many people have been killed by the US and UK over the last 150 years? Tens of millions. So your calculus is very, very biased, and you should think about that.
"The beginning of wisdom is the quest to master one’s fear, the urge to turn away from fear-driven hatreds, to find better, more pacific, more loving ways."
tnx for your elucubrating trilogue, dennis, jg, and wm. as noted, nothing has been made manifest in viscerally significant transformations in millennia. the human zeitgeist grew even more inequitable w/ the rise of monarchies and empires. at 82 and having worked in marine environmental conservation in 37 different countries, i have become a pyrrhonist, no longer a simple-minded optimist or even a still-sanguine pessimist. the only way to shovel the shit out of all the augean stables we've created is for the 'H.s.s.' species to disappear altogether. permanently. i've given up hoping for obama's feckless trope of 'hope and change'. despite the zillions of hours environmentalists have committed their lives to doing so, the corporate elite's structural, endemic esurience prevails..
As an Army Colonel i was once privileged to serve under once put it: "Hope is not a method."
And as Agent Smith from The Matrix once put it: "“I’d like to share a revelation I’ve had during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your species. I realized that you’re not actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with their surrounding environment, but you humans do not. You move to another area, and you multiply, and you multiply, until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet. You are a plague, and we are the cure.”
Unless and Until the American Peoples pull their individual and collective heads out of their collective and individual asses to DEMAND that their politicians at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue and the civilian and military bureaucrats over at the Pentagon make any [let alone some, let alone all] of those proposed 13 wonderful things happen, NOTHING is going to change. Except to get worse.
The American Peoples have let those elected pols and entrenched crats get away with their “Forever War” in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Somalia, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Equatorial Africa, and now Ukraine ever since 9/11. And that isn’t going to change either.
Especially when there is another 9/11, and/or another Pandemic-driven Lockdown Nation II, and/or the bottom falls out of an economy held together with bailing wire and bungee cords with another 2008esque “Too Big To Let Fail” financial “¢risi$.”
And all this just in time for Election2024. Anybody want to bet on whether or not that election will actually happen next November? And even if it does happen, does anybody want to bet on whether the seating of the new Congress and the inauguration of the next President is going to happen in January 2025?
And then, of course, given that America in 2023 is:
* a Bankrupt Debtor State;
* an Imperialist Warfare State [and an Empire that has moved from its “Decline” phase to “Fall”];
* a Redistributionist Welfare State;
* a Secrecy/Surveillance/Security/proto-Police State;
* an Autocratic/Oligarchic/Plutocratic/Patriarchal Deep State;
* a Failing Nation State;
* an Overshoot State; and, perhaps most importantly,
* a People and Nation no longer merely "divided," but fractured ~ even to the point of disintegration ~ in ways not seen in more than 160 years, since the eve of what may end up being merely the First American Civil War…
Given all that, there remains ~ again, yet, and still ~ that ultimate, bottom-line, bullet-hits-the-bone Question:
#USA-CCL???; Or, Will the United States of America Survive to celebrate Its 250th Birthday on July 4, 2026? And if it does, will the American Peoples be in any condition or mood to celebrate anything?
That's OK, Dennis. Let's see what kind of depression they fall into when NZ joins AUKUS to start getting ready for WW III with China right there in the neighborhood.
From Matt Taibbi: NOTE TO READERS ON THE CIA, ANTHONY FAUCI, AND COVID-19… :
Yesterday, the House Oversight Committee led by Ohio Republican Brad Wenstrup issued a press release announcing a whistleblower’s claims that Dr. Anthony Fauci entered CIA headquarters “without a record of entry” to influence agency analysis of the Covid-19 outbreak in the direction of zoonotic origin.
Today, Public is publishing many more details, including news that Fauci also made similar visits to the Department of State and the White House. “Fauci Diverted US Government Away From Lab Leak Theory Of Covid’s Origin, Sources Say” is part of a joint Racket-Public project that’s been in the works for months. [ https://public.substack.com/p/fauci-diverted-us-government-away ]
The story is complex and still evolving, but in the meantime, thanks to Michael Shellenberger, Alex Gutentag, and Leighton Woodhouse for their excellent work on this article. As with previous collaborations, Racket will have its own contribution to this topic in short order. Please stay tuned.
The ultimate solution is very simple: Get Government out of the business of meeting the Human Needs and satisfying the Human Wants of select individuals, groups, organizations, and institutions, and putting it strictly in the business of protecting Human Rights and facilitating the fulfillment of Human Responsibilities.
Very simple. Just not at all easy.
Especially given the total number of those individuals, groups, organizations, and institutions who are totally and completely dependent [and co-dependent] on that Government to meet those Needs and satisfy those Wants.
THE CONSERVATIVE DENIAL OF REALITY by Jacob G. Hornberger / Future of Freedom Foundation 092723
One of the things that has long fascinated me about conservatives — and, well, has long bemused me as well — is their ability to deny reality. They are able to simply set aside what is real and ensconce themselves in their own little fantasy world.
One example involves socialism, an economic philosophy that conservatives have long decried. They will rant and rail against socialism, while proudly proclaiming themselves to be fierce defenders of CAPITALISM, FREE MARKETS, AND FREE ENTERPRISE.
And then comes their ardent support for Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, public (i.e., government) schooling, immigration controls, monetary central planning, farm subsidies, education grants, public housing, and every other socialist program that comes down the pike, with the possible exception of food stamps.
What’s fascinating is that they don’t seem to even recognize the contradiction that lies at the center of their lives. They simply continue to blithely live their lives as if the contradiction doesn’t exist.
And then there is the concept of “limited government,” a concept that conservatives have long favored in their speeches, articles, stationery, websites, seminars, and conferences.
And then comes their ardent support for the national-security state form of governmental structure under which we have lived for the past 75 years. It is a form of governmental structure under which national-security-state officials wield omnipotent power.
And yet, conservatives just keep going happily along without noticing this central contradiction that lies at the center of their lives. They just keep declaring how devoted they are to limited government while, at the same time, declaring their fierce devotion to the Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA, which, as the three principal components of America’s national-security establishment, wield omnipotent powers.
Consider, for example, the national-security establishment’s power of assassination. It is an omnipotent power. It can be exercised against anyone in the world, including American citizens. No one, including the federal judiciary, interferes with the exercise of this omnipotent power.
The situation is the complete opposite in a limited-government republic. Under that form of governmental structure, the Fifth Amendment applies. It prohibits the federal government from killing people without due process of law, which means an indictment and a trial. The Sixth Amendment guarantees the right of trial by jury, rather than trial by a judge or a tribunal.
Yet, conservatives blithely live their lives expressing devotion to “limited government” while proudly defending the national-security state form of governmental structure and its omnipotent power of assassination.
THIS IS ONE OF THE REASONS CONSERVATIVES RESENT LIBERTARIANS SO MUCH AND WISH WE HAD NEVER COME ALONG. BY STANDING SQUARELY IN FAVOR OF INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY, FREE MARKETS, AND LIMITED GOVERNMENT IN A TOTALLY PRINCIPLED WAY, WE MAKE CONSERVATIVES CONFRONT THEIR LIFE OF CONTRADICTION. WE MAKE THEM SEE THE LA-LA LAND IN WHICH THEY LIVE. EVEN THOUGH THEY RESENT US FOR THIS, WE ARE ACTUALLY DOING THEM A SERVICE BECAUSE DENIAL OF REALITY IS NOT A HEALTHY THING.
THE HIGH COSTS OF POST-9/11 SURVEILLANCE Costs of War / Brown University 092623
The expansion of mass surveillance post-9/11 was conducted in secret, often in violation of the Constitution and U.S. law, and comes with enormous costs to society, according to a new report from the Costs of War project at Brown University’s Watson Institute.
While “mass surveillance” is often used to refer to government spying, today it involves a complex grouping of federal agencies, local police, private companies, and even members of the public. The report describes how this “dizzyingly large and complex” architecture built to sustain post-9/11 mass surveillance lacks government transparency, and makes accounting for the true budgetary costs nearly impossible.
Meanwhile, mass surveillance has intensified the criminalization of marginalized and racialized groups, from Muslims and Arabs to Latinx immigrant communities and Black and Indigenous organizers. This focus may leave officials ill-prepared to address rising white supremacist violence. What's more, building a set of institutions and technologies capable of overseeing both mass movement and minute details of individuals’ lives has broadened the powers of law enforcement and corporations, in ways that have often proved difficult to reverse or even oversee.
Thank you, especially for the link to Lt. Col. Yingling's 2007 AFJ article. Nothing has changed in the 'system', nothing has changed in the leadership, nothing has changed in overall competence, and nothing will change in the results.
Will the Pentagon have the gonads to cancel the US$1.7-trillion F-35 boondoggle? A failed project.
And cancel building another (2) US$13.5-billion per pop sitting-duck while elephant aircraft carriers that the US needs like a hole in its head?
What about The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) plans to spend US$16.5-billion to update the U.S. nuclear arsenal in 2023?
With the Congressional Budget Office estimating this program costing at least US$1.25-trillion over the next 30 years - not taking into account the Pentagons history of major cost overruns on large acquisition projects.
Will the Pentagon cancel these plans you reckon Lt. Col. Astore? Want to bet on that?
Did anybody take heed of Seymour Melman's book in 1970? "Pentagon Capitalism: The Political Economy of War". One of the classic studies of the American business of war – and its threat to democracy. For anyone wishing to trace the historical roots of the US's present morass.
Or his "The Permanent War Economy". A work, 50-years ago, full of dire predictions for the US's industrial future, which have turned into the US's dystopian present.
Perhaps, if we should fear anything, it should be those we call our "leaders".
The US government has been run by the wealthy elites since before the Constitution was written. That's why we had genocide against Native Americans and slavery. Once modern, predatory capitalism had taken complete control, the primary enemy of the state became all progressives, socialists and communists. Why? Because they represented the idea that we are all in this together and should all share in the bounty of shared work and work through the trepidations we face together. But that does not fit with the capitalist model, where the work is done by people who have no power, no control, and no say in government. So until capitalism is tamed, regulated and cut down to size, we will never have a progressive, socialist or communist anything. Those ideologies will remain government/elite enemy #1.
The first step, I think, is campaign finance reform. In short, eliminating "legal" bribes.
But with SCOTUS saying that "legal" bribes are a form of protected speech by corporations, there's little hope of real reform.
That's because the powers-that-be are very happy with the system as it exists. Short of powerful revolts, the system will not change. Meanwhile, the masses are kept occupied with work, kept divided by culture war issues, distracted by circuses, and fed an ideology of "work hard and you can be the next Donald Trump--or Bill Gates etc."
And, by the way, fear the Russians and Chinese.
The first step is changing the American system of government and governance that enables Vested Special Interests to buy access to that government's legal power, administrative authority, and spending capability so as to advance the agendas and increase the Power and Wealth of those VSIs.
Given the number of people who have been physically and/or economically killed, maimed, or enslaved as a result of Communism, Socialism, and Progressivism in the 20th and 21st centuries, these ideologies need to become "Enemy #1" of every human being on this Planet.
No other countries on earth have killed more people in other countries, overthrown more governments and caused more harm than the US, UK and Germany. Germany killed over 20 million Russians in WWII. How many people died at the hands of UK imperialists since the 1800s? Ask the people of India. The US has killed and displaced tens of millions of people since WWII. Socialism and communism are about empowering working people, so that is pretty much opposite of "enslaving" them. In fact, the US excels at enslaving people as low-wage slaves to tyrannical corporations, who also pollute the air, water and food supply of the workers. So I think you might have to rethink your conclusion about whom is enslaving whom. and which systems are the problem.
How many Ukrainians did the Russians kill with Stalin's Planned Famine?
How many Chinese did Mao kill with his various and sundry Great Leaps Forward, Cultural Revolutions, and so forth?
And exactly where in the USSR, Mao's China, Pol Pot's Cambodia, or anyplace subjected to European or Asian Communism over the last 100 years were "working people" empowered, as opposed to being enslaved?
Was the Berlin Wall built to prevent people from coming into Communist East Germany? Or to prevent those who were already in there from leaving?
The only difference between the American System ~ which is not "Capitalism" at all, but a variant of Fascist Mercantilist Corporatism [as was the UK at its peak of Empire and Germany under the Nazis] ~ and the Socialism/Communism of Russia, China, etc is Who the Ruling Political/Economic Class is. And how they became that Ruling Class.
My conclusion stands.
How many people have been killed by the US and UK over the last 150 years? Tens of millions. So your calculus is very, very biased, and you should think about that.
"The beginning of wisdom is the quest to master one’s fear, the urge to turn away from fear-driven hatreds, to find better, more pacific, more loving ways."
Definitely the money quote, Bill.
Thanks, Denise.
tnx for your elucubrating trilogue, dennis, jg, and wm. as noted, nothing has been made manifest in viscerally significant transformations in millennia. the human zeitgeist grew even more inequitable w/ the rise of monarchies and empires. at 82 and having worked in marine environmental conservation in 37 different countries, i have become a pyrrhonist, no longer a simple-minded optimist or even a still-sanguine pessimist. the only way to shovel the shit out of all the augean stables we've created is for the 'H.s.s.' species to disappear altogether. permanently. i've given up hoping for obama's feckless trope of 'hope and change'. despite the zillions of hours environmentalists have committed their lives to doing so, the corporate elite's structural, endemic esurience prevails..
As an Army Colonel i was once privileged to serve under once put it: "Hope is not a method."
And as Agent Smith from The Matrix once put it: "“I’d like to share a revelation I’ve had during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your species. I realized that you’re not actually mammals. Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with their surrounding environment, but you humans do not. You move to another area, and you multiply, and you multiply, until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Human beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet. You are a plague, and we are the cure.”
Unless and Until the American Peoples pull their individual and collective heads out of their collective and individual asses to DEMAND that their politicians at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue and the civilian and military bureaucrats over at the Pentagon make any [let alone some, let alone all] of those proposed 13 wonderful things happen, NOTHING is going to change. Except to get worse.
The American Peoples have let those elected pols and entrenched crats get away with their “Forever War” in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Somalia, Libya, Syria, Yemen, Equatorial Africa, and now Ukraine ever since 9/11. And that isn’t going to change either.
Especially when there is another 9/11, and/or another Pandemic-driven Lockdown Nation II, and/or the bottom falls out of an economy held together with bailing wire and bungee cords with another 2008esque “Too Big To Let Fail” financial “¢risi$.”
And all this just in time for Election2024. Anybody want to bet on whether or not that election will actually happen next November? And even if it does happen, does anybody want to bet on whether the seating of the new Congress and the inauguration of the next President is going to happen in January 2025?
And then, of course, given that America in 2023 is:
* a Bankrupt Debtor State;
* an Imperialist Warfare State [and an Empire that has moved from its “Decline” phase to “Fall”];
* a Redistributionist Welfare State;
* a Secrecy/Surveillance/Security/proto-Police State;
* an Autocratic/Oligarchic/Plutocratic/Patriarchal Deep State;
* a Failing Nation State;
* an Overshoot State; and, perhaps most importantly,
* a People and Nation no longer merely "divided," but fractured ~ even to the point of disintegration ~ in ways not seen in more than 160 years, since the eve of what may end up being merely the First American Civil War…
Given all that, there remains ~ again, yet, and still ~ that ultimate, bottom-line, bullet-hits-the-bone Question:
#USA-CCL???; Or, Will the United States of America Survive to celebrate Its 250th Birthday on July 4, 2026? And if it does, will the American Peoples be in any condition or mood to celebrate anything?
Jeff Moebus for President 2024!
Along with Bill Astore for Director, Ministry of Truth. With Dennis Merwood as his Co-Director.
I think Jeff is younger that Trump Bill!
Instead of Obamas "Hope and Change"....
He could have George Carlin's.... "Everything Sucks!"
Or...."It's a big club, and you ain’t in it"
LOL
i prefer Carlin's "Don't vote. It only encourages the Mother Fuckers."
Perfect Jeff!
Hope you are copacetic my friend?
Still following the All Blacks in the Rugby?
I think most Kiwis are in a state of depression with their boys.
Take care.
That's OK, Dennis. Let's see what kind of depression they fall into when NZ joins AUKUS to start getting ready for WW III with China right there in the neighborhood.
Jeff, the Kiwi man in the Street I'm finding is not in favour of NZ joining AUKUS.
Did you know that George Galloway says that have it all wrong.
He says it should be USUKA!
You suckers! LOL
From Matt Taibbi: NOTE TO READERS ON THE CIA, ANTHONY FAUCI, AND COVID-19… :
Yesterday, the House Oversight Committee led by Ohio Republican Brad Wenstrup issued a press release announcing a whistleblower’s claims that Dr. Anthony Fauci entered CIA headquarters “without a record of entry” to influence agency analysis of the Covid-19 outbreak in the direction of zoonotic origin.
Today, Public is publishing many more details, including news that Fauci also made similar visits to the Department of State and the White House. “Fauci Diverted US Government Away From Lab Leak Theory Of Covid’s Origin, Sources Say” is part of a joint Racket-Public project that’s been in the works for months. [ https://public.substack.com/p/fauci-diverted-us-government-away ]
The story is complex and still evolving, but in the meantime, thanks to Michael Shellenberger, Alex Gutentag, and Leighton Woodhouse for their excellent work on this article. As with previous collaborations, Racket will have its own contribution to this topic in short order. Please stay tuned.
The ultimate solution is very simple: Get Government out of the business of meeting the Human Needs and satisfying the Human Wants of select individuals, groups, organizations, and institutions, and putting it strictly in the business of protecting Human Rights and facilitating the fulfillment of Human Responsibilities.
Very simple. Just not at all easy.
Especially given the total number of those individuals, groups, organizations, and institutions who are totally and completely dependent [and co-dependent] on that Government to meet those Needs and satisfy those Wants.
THE CONSERVATIVE DENIAL OF REALITY by Jacob G. Hornberger / Future of Freedom Foundation 092723
One of the things that has long fascinated me about conservatives — and, well, has long bemused me as well — is their ability to deny reality. They are able to simply set aside what is real and ensconce themselves in their own little fantasy world.
One example involves socialism, an economic philosophy that conservatives have long decried. They will rant and rail against socialism, while proudly proclaiming themselves to be fierce defenders of CAPITALISM, FREE MARKETS, AND FREE ENTERPRISE.
And then comes their ardent support for Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, public (i.e., government) schooling, immigration controls, monetary central planning, farm subsidies, education grants, public housing, and every other socialist program that comes down the pike, with the possible exception of food stamps.
What’s fascinating is that they don’t seem to even recognize the contradiction that lies at the center of their lives. They simply continue to blithely live their lives as if the contradiction doesn’t exist.
And then there is the concept of “limited government,” a concept that conservatives have long favored in their speeches, articles, stationery, websites, seminars, and conferences.
And then comes their ardent support for the national-security state form of governmental structure under which we have lived for the past 75 years. It is a form of governmental structure under which national-security-state officials wield omnipotent power.
And yet, conservatives just keep going happily along without noticing this central contradiction that lies at the center of their lives. They just keep declaring how devoted they are to limited government while, at the same time, declaring their fierce devotion to the Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA, which, as the three principal components of America’s national-security establishment, wield omnipotent powers.
Consider, for example, the national-security establishment’s power of assassination. It is an omnipotent power. It can be exercised against anyone in the world, including American citizens. No one, including the federal judiciary, interferes with the exercise of this omnipotent power.
The situation is the complete opposite in a limited-government republic. Under that form of governmental structure, the Fifth Amendment applies. It prohibits the federal government from killing people without due process of law, which means an indictment and a trial. The Sixth Amendment guarantees the right of trial by jury, rather than trial by a judge or a tribunal.
Yet, conservatives blithely live their lives expressing devotion to “limited government” while proudly defending the national-security state form of governmental structure and its omnipotent power of assassination.
THIS IS ONE OF THE REASONS CONSERVATIVES RESENT LIBERTARIANS SO MUCH AND WISH WE HAD NEVER COME ALONG. BY STANDING SQUARELY IN FAVOR OF INDIVIDUAL LIBERTY, FREE MARKETS, AND LIMITED GOVERNMENT IN A TOTALLY PRINCIPLED WAY, WE MAKE CONSERVATIVES CONFRONT THEIR LIFE OF CONTRADICTION. WE MAKE THEM SEE THE LA-LA LAND IN WHICH THEY LIVE. EVEN THOUGH THEY RESENT US FOR THIS, WE ARE ACTUALLY DOING THEM A SERVICE BECAUSE DENIAL OF REALITY IS NOT A HEALTHY THING.
Source: https://www.fff.org/2023/09/27/the-conservative-denial-of-reality/ ; EMPHASES added.
THE HIGH COSTS OF POST-9/11 SURVEILLANCE Costs of War / Brown University 092623
The expansion of mass surveillance post-9/11 was conducted in secret, often in violation of the Constitution and U.S. law, and comes with enormous costs to society, according to a new report from the Costs of War project at Brown University’s Watson Institute.
While “mass surveillance” is often used to refer to government spying, today it involves a complex grouping of federal agencies, local police, private companies, and even members of the public. The report describes how this “dizzyingly large and complex” architecture built to sustain post-9/11 mass surveillance lacks government transparency, and makes accounting for the true budgetary costs nearly impossible.
Meanwhile, mass surveillance has intensified the criminalization of marginalized and racialized groups, from Muslims and Arabs to Latinx immigrant communities and Black and Indigenous organizers. This focus may leave officials ill-prepared to address rising white supremacist violence. What's more, building a set of institutions and technologies capable of overseeing both mass movement and minute details of individuals’ lives has broadened the powers of law enforcement and corporations, in ways that have often proved difficult to reverse or even oversee.
The full report is at https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/papers/2023/surveillance .
one of your longer assays and, for sure, one of your best.
Thank you, especially for the link to Lt. Col. Yingling's 2007 AFJ article. Nothing has changed in the 'system', nothing has changed in the leadership, nothing has changed in overall competence, and nothing will change in the results.
Will the Pentagon have the gonads to cancel the US$1.7-trillion F-35 boondoggle? A failed project.
And cancel building another (2) US$13.5-billion per pop sitting-duck while elephant aircraft carriers that the US needs like a hole in its head?
What about The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) plans to spend US$16.5-billion to update the U.S. nuclear arsenal in 2023?
With the Congressional Budget Office estimating this program costing at least US$1.25-trillion over the next 30 years - not taking into account the Pentagons history of major cost overruns on large acquisition projects.
Will the Pentagon cancel these plans you reckon Lt. Col. Astore? Want to bet on that?
Did anybody take heed of Seymour Melman's book in 1970? "Pentagon Capitalism: The Political Economy of War". One of the classic studies of the American business of war – and its threat to democracy. For anyone wishing to trace the historical roots of the US's present morass.
Or his "The Permanent War Economy". A work, 50-years ago, full of dire predictions for the US's industrial future, which have turned into the US's dystopian present.
The answer is "nyet"!