I can't believe I'm giving a note to one of the best writers I read and one of the most informed people i know, but I very respectfully think a better analogy is inquisitors or terrorists rather than witches. Real witches don't hurt anyone, but real inquisitors and terrorists do.
I very much appreciate your work, and if I have the opportunity to start a union some day it will be because of you.
I do think there is a significant portion of Republicans in the PMC (I know of which I speak) who are firmly aware that they do not control capital but still want to literally exact the ‘No food stamps’ kind of punishment. It’s just tied into Prosperity Gospel thinking; the modest wealth and slightly less tenuous position in society is proof that they are the sheep and the poor are the goats. It is a pervasive attitude among conservative Christians that taxation is a diversion of God’s blessings that He bestowed upon them.
Thank you for capturing all of the various thoughts that have swimming around in my head these last few...years? Decades? I've always felt that the most dangerous Republicans have ever been is the Bush era. They were able to fully groom and control their little monkey, and American imperialism spread like wildfire. Just unrelenting. And then they're gifted Barack Obama--a Republican by most measures, but he had the look of someone who cared about poor people. In reality, he was SO FUCKING DOWN to protect the ruling class, if we just gave some of the peasants a little carrot on a stick every once and awhile, as a treat. But like you said, their evil is just too powerful, and the bloodlust has slowly consumed their party. Their only desire is to punish people who aren't white nationalists and, maybe, just maybe, they'll bring the entire empire down with them.
Everything old is new again, maybe. Tricky Dick Nixon put the Democrats on the road to becoming a minority party (which it is, practically speaking) by splitting the racists from the libs (a term I’m using very loosely).
So now, maybe, since history doesn’t repeat, but rhymes, Big Business may have to leave the GOP for the Democrats. As Hamilton notes, Business doesn’t -- or at least shouldn’t -- want a cohort of impoverished, miseducated people. Some are okay, but not the amount that would result from unhinged wing of the GOP. And going full out on optimism, they might actually realize that too much upward transfer of wealth actually isn’t good after all. It’s great for the short term -- a generation or so -- and then it becomes counterproductive.
you'd think it was enough that nixon took a shit in the punchbowl of the american polity, but really it's always reagan. he ruined everything, pretty damn permanently, and we've just been trying to stop the bleeding ever since.
I think this isn't quite right. The wreckers of the Republican Party are not the plebeians, but a *portion* of capital who fund the most insane possible wingnuttery, because they think fascism will be good for them.
Thiel is the *most* sane of them. The rest are worse. The same people are funding Brexit and the UK "National Conservatives".
Remember how Rod Dreher's entire career of crazy awfulness turned out to be funded by a *single* sub-billionaire patron? One sub-billionaire can fund many acres of astroturf, and does.
Fascinated wanderer of knowledge, I delight in perusing the author's cogitations on societal matters. Each musing, a finely honed symphony of reason. Kindly grant me the honor of connecting, Mr. Nolan. Eagerly I await, exhibiting patience's graceful countenance. Feel free to grace my digital doorstep via direct message at your leisure. Let's embark upon a journey of intellectual rendezvous. Please subscribe to unlock the wonders that lie ahead!
This is very true.
I can't believe I'm giving a note to one of the best writers I read and one of the most informed people i know, but I very respectfully think a better analogy is inquisitors or terrorists rather than witches. Real witches don't hurt anyone, but real inquisitors and terrorists do.
I very much appreciate your work, and if I have the opportunity to start a union some day it will be because of you.
I do think there is a significant portion of Republicans in the PMC (I know of which I speak) who are firmly aware that they do not control capital but still want to literally exact the ‘No food stamps’ kind of punishment. It’s just tied into Prosperity Gospel thinking; the modest wealth and slightly less tenuous position in society is proof that they are the sheep and the poor are the goats. It is a pervasive attitude among conservative Christians that taxation is a diversion of God’s blessings that He bestowed upon them.
Thank you for capturing all of the various thoughts that have swimming around in my head these last few...years? Decades? I've always felt that the most dangerous Republicans have ever been is the Bush era. They were able to fully groom and control their little monkey, and American imperialism spread like wildfire. Just unrelenting. And then they're gifted Barack Obama--a Republican by most measures, but he had the look of someone who cared about poor people. In reality, he was SO FUCKING DOWN to protect the ruling class, if we just gave some of the peasants a little carrot on a stick every once and awhile, as a treat. But like you said, their evil is just too powerful, and the bloodlust has slowly consumed their party. Their only desire is to punish people who aren't white nationalists and, maybe, just maybe, they'll bring the entire empire down with them.
When the tent filled with the crazy people they attracted who did they think would lead them?
Everything old is new again, maybe. Tricky Dick Nixon put the Democrats on the road to becoming a minority party (which it is, practically speaking) by splitting the racists from the libs (a term I’m using very loosely).
So now, maybe, since history doesn’t repeat, but rhymes, Big Business may have to leave the GOP for the Democrats. As Hamilton notes, Business doesn’t -- or at least shouldn’t -- want a cohort of impoverished, miseducated people. Some are okay, but not the amount that would result from unhinged wing of the GOP. And going full out on optimism, they might actually realize that too much upward transfer of wealth actually isn’t good after all. It’s great for the short term -- a generation or so -- and then it becomes counterproductive.
🤞🏻
you'd think it was enough that nixon took a shit in the punchbowl of the american polity, but really it's always reagan. he ruined everything, pretty damn permanently, and we've just been trying to stop the bleeding ever since.
I think this isn't quite right. The wreckers of the Republican Party are not the plebeians, but a *portion* of capital who fund the most insane possible wingnuttery, because they think fascism will be good for them.
Thiel is the *most* sane of them. The rest are worse. The same people are funding Brexit and the UK "National Conservatives".
Remember how Rod Dreher's entire career of crazy awfulness turned out to be funded by a *single* sub-billionaire patron? One sub-billionaire can fund many acres of astroturf, and does.
Fascinated wanderer of knowledge, I delight in perusing the author's cogitations on societal matters. Each musing, a finely honed symphony of reason. Kindly grant me the honor of connecting, Mr. Nolan. Eagerly I await, exhibiting patience's graceful countenance. Feel free to grace my digital doorstep via direct message at your leisure. Let's embark upon a journey of intellectual rendezvous. Please subscribe to unlock the wonders that lie ahead!