🗽UNITED STATES POLITICS 🦅
<Benediction EditionThread for the hellish discussion related to
the scourge of the earth, the destroyer of nations, the king of coups, the sultan of sanctions, the emir of the embargo, the autocrat of austerity, the doge of deregulation, the baron of busting unions, the prince of privatization, the lord of loan sharks, the patron-saint of proxy wars, the sponsor of settlers, the guarantor of genocides, the Divided $nakkkes of Amerikkka™
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>>2394968If he actually believed in anything there would be no need to put pressure on him to keep to his convictions.
But of course, he only believes in saving capitalism.
What did Marx mean by this?
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-manifesto/ch02.htm>But let us have done with the bourgeois objections to Communism.
<We have seen above, that the first step in the revolution by the working class is to raise the proletariat to the position of ruling class to win the battle of democracy.
>The proletariat will use its political supremacy to wrest, by degrees, all capital from the bourgeoisie, to centralise all instruments of production in the hands of the State, i.e., of the proletariat organised as the ruling class; and to increase the total of productive forces as rapidly as possible.
>Of course, in the beginning, this cannot be effected except by means of despotic inroads on the rights of property, and on the conditions of bourgeois production; by means of measures, therefore, which appear economically insufficient and untenable, but which, in the course of the movement, outstrip themselves, necessitate further inroads upon the old social order, and are unavoidable as a means of entirely revolutionising the mode of production.
>These measures will, of course, be different in different countries.
>Nevertheless, in most advanced countries, the following will be pretty generally applicable.
<1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes.<2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.<3. Abolition of all rights of inheritance.<4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.<5. Centralisation of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly.<6. Centralisation of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State.<7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the State; the bringing into cultivation of waste-lands, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.<8. Equal liability of all to work. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.<9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country.<10. Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children’s factory labour in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production, &c, &c. Is Marx a filthy "electoralist" (where did this word come from by the way?)
>>2394987It's pretty telling that you posted a clip from a "comedy" made by avowed fascists to support your stance of why we should support Mamadani.
The big man was right. Social democracy is objectively the moderate wing of fascism.
>>2395025not quite, right after your highlighted "battle of democracy":
<The proletariat will use its political supremacywhich means there has already been a successful proletarian revolution which has smashed the bourgeois state which is its class dictatorship and established a proletarian state where the proletariat has political supremacy in the "public sector"…
>to wrest, by degrees, all capital from the bourgeoisiethis is not reformism under capitalism but gradual confiscation of bourgeois private property by the above-mentioned proletarian state. it's only gradual because they will resist violently and be put down violently
>to centralise all instruments of production in the hands of the Statewhich is to say nationalization and state-owned monopoly and central planning
>i.e., of the proletariat organised as the ruling classreiterating that the revolution has already happened and the proletariat is the ruling class
>and to increase the total of productive forces as rapidly as possible.here the goal is to lower the socially necessary labor time of essential commodities by advancing technology to the degree of post-scarcity
>Of course, in the beginning, this cannot be effected except by means of despotic inroads on the rights of property"despotic inroads" again, a proletarian dictatorship. not a pluralist liberal multiclass democracy.
>and on the conditions of bourgeois productionyou inherit the conditions and scars of the capitalist society and can't change everything at once, hence the "gradual" not in the reformist sense, but in the sense of needing time to transform things through the proletarian dictatorship.
>by means of measures, therefore, which appear economically insufficient and untenable, but which, in the course of the movement, outstrip themselves, necessitate further inroads upon the old social order, and are unavoidable as a means of entirely revolutionising the mode of production.it will take time to reach a post-scarcity society
If you wanted to make the point you were trying to make you should've quoted Lenin in pic related, not Marx.
>>2395052Never said any of that, stop the strawman.
the point is that brasilian third worlders aren't that keen on Lula because he's not that guy, he's barely a succdem, much less a champion of the third world.
and the Hat war was just a little show with no substance.
>>2395077I posted this:
>>2395053>>2395060>>2395071and then you say "you post only memes." revealing you are not serious. so suck my dick.
>>2395080Ehh, the combativeness is still there. It’s just directed at each other, is usually sad as shit because of how poorly thought out it was, and ultimately just pointless nihilism.
Like after Jan 6th and Trump’s mansion being raided, didn’t some boomers try shooting at FBI offices and got killed?
>>2395084As a NEET I'm more than happy to do this, but the actual workers you're fighting for will call you an enemy if you even suggest violence or even sabotage. Liberalism has so firmly consumed the proletariat in this country that they've devolved into a learned helplessness, and any attempt to break them out of it is seen as too radical. Most proles in America unfortunately don't actually want more control in the workplace. They just want more money. America's worker culture is totally devoid of analysis because workers do not see themselves as part of a class but merely individuals all struggling down the same path, trying to escape the unfortunate fate of being "poor".
I'm not sure to what degree it's a chickeuygh situation but Liberalism has completely stripped the American worker of any kind of class identity or solidarity, and I don't see how this can possibly be repaired without going down the path of race war.
>>2395084Ahem:
>>2395033SOCIALIST. BOXING. RINGS.
Even now you yearn for the belt. You long for the arena. What do you think Spartacus was? That’s right, a gladiator, aka ancient UFC.
>>2395099The antidote to liberalism and individualism is collective action, and the way you get to collective action is by getting groups of people to fight back, and you get more people to fight back by demonstrating bravery on your own. We're already starting to get the ball rolling: Luigi Mangione has a huge approval rating especially among the youth, and the ongoing federal occupation of California is being met with increased efforts of communities to hamper ICE's kidnapping attempts. People are scared and apathetic, but they're slowly starting to wake up. By making a point of resisting more and resisting harder, we inspire more to take up the mantle.
So hey, maybe you just need to gather some buddies and BREAK STUFF. Even if it doesn't do much, the simple act of BREAKING STUFF as it were will inspire others to BREAK STUFF harder and better, because you've shown that it's possible to do it and get away with it. Rome wasn't built in a day and all that
>>2395101I dont wanna fight other socialists though, I wanna bash the fash with baseball bats!
>>2395089The combativeness of Americans is mostly only ever directed downwards on the social/class hierarchy. Because America is the Great Satan. People will abuse retail workers because they are below them. They will abuse low level public servants for the same. Taking out your frustrations on those who don't have the power to defend themselves is an American pastime. Americans will die to protect those above them in the hierarchy from prosecution, commit any financial crime to take the fall for their corporate leaders, but when it comes to Epstein or Uvalde, when it's about protecting those who are the most vulnerable, those who cannot reward you and only ask you to help out of the goodness of your heart, Americans are completely helpless and unable to act.
Anyway, I've come to the conclusion that America's proles are their own worst enemy and the only actual path to Communism in America is through the collapse of the state; whether it's through violent revolution or foreign invasion or Trump dying of a heart attack without a successor.
pic unrelated
>>2395103Stupidpol thought
Bernie? Social fascist
Trump? A man of the people who could easily be brought to our side
>>2395110>So hey, maybe you just need to gather some buddies and BREAK STUFF. Even if it doesn't do much, the simple act of BREAKING STUFF as it were will inspire others to BREAK STUFF harder and better, because you've shown that it's possible to do it and get away with it. Rome wasn't built in a day and all thatLemme give you an example of the helplessness of the American prole:
I live in a relatively middle class city, or about as middle class as you can be in the Bay Area I guess. The local sanitation worker union has been on strike for weeks now over contract disagreements, and garbage is piling up in people's trashcans. You would think workers would have some empathy with the people that pick up their trash every week and keep the city clean. But most boomers you talk to will just say they hope the city sues the union for "disrupting" their garbage pickup schedule. I think the strike ended today but I was disheartened everyday seeing people at work shitting on the sanitation workers for using what little bargaining power they have.
>>2395116Nah, White women are just racist against Asian women for some reason. Also they lie about liking plus size women but would never wanna be plus sized themselves. Also men are racist against black women.
>>2395149His whole idea was “yeah we could live in a socialist utopia but people are evil so they deserve to suffer and die in the gulags”
He wasn’t a prínciped Marxist-Leninist but he also wasn’t an edgelord who used communist imagery purely for shock value like some people paint him as
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/07/18/this-is-a-much-better-place-wsj-bombshell-unites-a-frayed-maga-00464182‘This is a much better place’: WSJ bombshell unites a frayed MAGA>The Wall Street Journal’s report alleging Trump sent a lewd birthday letter to Epstein offered the administration and the president’s supporters a chance to shift the narrative to more comfortable ground where Trump is the victim and the so-called elites are the target. And they believe it gives credence to the president’s argument earlier this week that the Epstein story has been a “witchhunt” that plays into Democrats’ hands.>“Thank God for Dems and media overreach on this,” said a person close to the administration, granted anonymity to speak candidly. “It saves us every time.”..
>The sudden rush to defend Trump comes after weeks of intraparty fighting during which influential conservatives such as Laura Loomer warned the “poorly” handled Epstein saga could “consume” Trump’s presidency, and the president said he no longer wanted the support of people who believed in the Epstein “hoax.”>But within hours of the Wall Street Journal publishing, even those who had accused the Trump administration of mishandling the Epstein episode were rushing to defend the president.>Loomer called the story “totally fake.” Elon Musk, who last month in a since deleted social media post said Trump was in the Epstein files, said the letter “sounds bogus.” Charlie Kirk, who pushed Trump for more Epstein transparency, said the Journal piece “doesn’t pass the smell test.”>“The ‘new’ target is the ‘original’ target — the Deep State and its media partners. President Trump and MAGA are always more effective on offense,” Steve Bannon, the former Trump strategist and War Room podcast host, told POLITICO. “Unity of forces to attack, attack, attack.”..
>But it’s unclear how long the reprieve will last. In the wake of the Journal report, Trump also called on Bondi to unseal “pertinent” grand jury material from the Epstein case. But that may not be enough to quell the calls from Trump supporters who want the entirety of the Epstein files released.>Matthew Bartlett, a GOP strategist and former Trump administration appointee, said the Journal piece has made the Epstein story a “purely partisan issue” — but it remains to be seen how long the MAGA unity lasts. Additional action in the courts and among bipartisan lawmakers calling for the release of all of the files could drag out the MAGA backlash, he said.>But, for now, Loomer, Kirk and Bannon are again singing from the same hymnal. >>2395187>America would be nothing without Jews."white cannibal settler society needs Jews" oh yeah?
>>2395256<Negroes Are Anti-Semitic Because They're Anti-White by JAMES BALDWIN, April 9, 1967https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/98/03/29/specials/baldwin-antisem.html<It is true that many Jews use, shamelessly, the slaughter of the 6,000,000 by the Third Reich as proof that they cannot be bigots–or in the hope of not being held responsible for their bigotry. It is galling to be told by a Jew whom you know to be exploiting you that he cannot possibly be doing what you know he is doing because he is a Jew. It is bitter to watch the Jewish storekeeper locking up his store for the night, and going home. Going, with your money in his pocket, to a clean neighborhood, miles from you, which you will not be allowed to enter. Nor can it help the relationship between most Negroes and most Jews when part of this money is donated to civil rights. In the light of what is now known as the white backlash, this money can be looked on as conscience money merely, as money given to keep the Negro happy in his place, and out of white neighborhoods. …
< The Jew's suffering is recognized as part of the moral history of the world and the Jew is recognized as a contributor so the world's history: this is not true for the blacks. Jewish history, whether or not one can say it is honored, is certainly known: the black history has been blasted, maligned and despised. The Jew is a white man, and when white men rise up against oppression, they are heroes: when black men rise, they have reverted to their native savagery. The uprising in the Warsaw ghetto was not described as a riot, nor were the participants maligned as hoodlums: the boys and girls in Watts and Harlem are thoroughly aware of this, and it certainly contributes to their attitude toward the Jews. <But, of course, my comparison of Watts and Harlem with the Warsaw ghetto will be immediately dismissed as outrageous. There are many reasons for this, and one of them is that while America loves white heroes, armed to the teeth, it cannot abide bad n*ggers. But the bottom reason is that it contradicts the American dream to suggest that any gratuitous, unregenerate horror can happen here. We make our mistakes, we like to think, but we are getting better all the time. >>2395563>yet you have no problem with the CPUSA being openly zionist and advocating for a two state solution with palestinians stuck on shrinking bantustans as the zionists slowly do what zionism was built to do, exterminate the palestinians.I want the same thing that Hezbollah and Hamas wants: a two-state solution. they are offering their blood and flesh to resist the state of Israel. if that's what they want, under their material conditions, I'd support that.
I don't think the CPUSA is zionist for that. but I don't like the CPUSA too much either (more preferable than many loldead or to-be-extinct orgs filled with ultras with no material plan or whatsoever)
>>2395577Nobody ever claimed Israel would do it voluntarily.
>>2395578More or less this, but Hamas' 2017 charter is very clear that the Palestinian state would not relinquish its claim to the entirety of Palestine, and that the establishment of such a state would not mean the end of their struggle.
>>2395581israel will not do it at all unless they were utterly defeated militarily. which the CPUSA is against.
so what they support is the same thing Genocide Joe Biden, their approved candidate, also supports. Palestinians on shrinking bantustans as they are slowly wiped out by far-right Zionists acting as the shock troops for the so called "moderate" Israelis that the CPUSA fetishizes.
israel has no right to exist, nor should it.
>>2395594most of the genocide was carried out by the CPUSA approved candidate Joe Biden, who gave the zionists every possible weapon and assistance even when his administration was well aware that it was being used for genocide. there is no significant difference in foreign policy between the two parties.
CPUSA supports this, just like they support the existence of Israel as a jewish state. meaning they are zionist. you cannot be zionist and communist at the same time.
>>2395521>defensive Iron Dome capacitiesMmmmmm that's some good jargon. It's always funny to me when AOC code switches into soldier-speak. She didn't say
kinetic operations so it's okay.
>>2395603They all do that. I remember the first time I heard Mr. Hope and Change Obama code switch, and it really felt like his body had become a vessel for the state department. I remember Max Blumenthal confronting this congressperson about Venezuela a few years ago and a vote I think he already made, and the guy's response was:
>I wasn't at the briefing earlier so I'm not prepared to speak on thatThat's literally how all our politicians are. Just mouth pieces for the deep state, on "both sides of the aisle."
>>2395621trump is going to die a penniless pedophile
maybe justice does exist 😁
Lol first they airlift all the Ethiopian Jews to Israel, now they're going to airlift all the Palestinians to Ethiopia. Can't make this shit up.
https://www.axios.com/2025/07/18/israel-send-palestinians-gaza-indonesia-ethiopiahttps://archive.is/SSWokScoop: Israel seeks U.S. help on deals to move Palestinians out of GazaThe director of Israel's Mossad spy agency visited Washington this week seeking U.S. help in convincing countries to take hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from Gaza, two sources with knowledge of issue tell Axios.
The spy chief, David Barnea, told White House envoy Steve Witkoff that Israel has been speaking in particular with Ethiopia, Indonesia and Libya.
Why it matters: The Israeli government's goal of removing much of Gaza's population is hugely controversial. While Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government claims such a "relocation" would be "voluntary," U.S. and Israeli legal experts have labeled it a war crime.
Behind the scenes: In their meeting earlier this week, Barnea told Witkoff that Ethiopia, Indonesia and Libya had expressed openness to receiving large numbers of Palestinians from Gaza, the two source say.
Barnea suggested that the U.S. offer incentives to those countries and help Israel convince them.
Witkoff was non-committal, and it's not clear if the U.S. will actively weigh in on this issue, one source said.
The White House, the Israeli Prime Minister's Office, and the foreign ministries of Ethiopia, Indonesia and Libya did not respond to requests for comment prior to publication.
Flashback: In February, President Trump proposed the removal of all two million Palestinians from Gaza to rebuild the enclave.
But the White House cooled on the idea after getting significant pushback from Arab countries, U.S. officials say, and it hasn't gone anywhere.
Israeli officials say the Trump administration told them that if Netanyahu wants to pursue this idea, Israel needs to find countries that are willing to take Palestinians from Gaza.
Netanyahu tasked Israel's Mossad foreign intelligence agency with finding countries that would agree to receive large numbers of Palestinians displaced from the Gaza Strip.
The big picture: Nearly every Palestinian in Gaza has been displaced during the war, often multiple times. Most buildings in Gaza have been damaged or destroyed.
Israel has been developing a plan for moving all two million residents of the enclave to a small "humanitarian zone" near the border with Egypt.
That plan has sparked concerns in Egypt and many Western countries that Israel is preparing for the mass displacement of Palestinians out of Gaza, something Netanyahu's ultranationalist coalition partners and many inside his own party have been pushing for years.
A senior Israeli official claimed that, as part of the understandings with the three countries, the transfer of Palestinians would be "voluntary and not forced," and that Israel would commit to allowing any Palestinian who leaves to return to Gaza at any time.
However, the idea that such mass departures could be considered "voluntary" under the circumstances has been disputed.
What they are saying: When Netanyahu visited the White House last week, Trump was asked about this issue and deferred to the Israeli Prime Minister.
Netanyahu said Israel is working with the U.S. "very closely" to find countries that will agree to take Palestinians from Gaza and stressed that "we are getting close to finding several countries."
"I think President Trump had a brilliant vision. It's called free choice. You know, if people want to stay, they can stay, but if they want to leave, they should be able to leave. It shouldn't be a prison," Netanyahu said.
After the dinner a senior Israeli official told reporters that Trump has shown interest in continuing to push the "relocation" of Palestinians from Gaza. The White House didn't comment at the time.
>>2395627Because Trump NOT suing them would be tantamount to admitting that he did indeed write a pervy birthday card to his pedo buddy, and part of the Trump brand is to never admit defeat or fault even when it's obvious that you've dug a hole for yourself. So pretty much the only way for him to save face with is base is to deny everything even as evidence piles up around him, which has kinda been the Qanon playbook since its inception as well. Invent a narrative and demonize everything that contradicts it as fake news
It's a bold strategy, let's see if it pays off
>>2395631GODran is based.
SSanders is a fraud.
Simple as.
Hello, it's Houdini and I need help. I don't have very many support networks in my life that I can ask for help. I am asking the members of this community because, at the very least, a certain portion of people here do enjoy having me around. I am in a bit of a pickle. I have secured a room that is weekly, not daily, weekly. That is a W because it's significantly cheaper than the last motel I was staying at. I have a couple of jobs waiting on calls back for. I haven't been online, and I've been trying to dig myself out of the pit that I'm in. Logged off and locked in on the grind. Unfortunately for me, I have not been able to work hard enough to do that. As it stands, I'm about $300 short of getting this room for another week, and I don't really know who else to ask. I've reached out to a couple of my friends, and hey, here's $10. That's how broke my friends are. That helps. That got me $50 altogether, but I don't really know where else to go. I don't know what else to do, and I've posted here in looking for support before, and I'm hoping that I can do that again without people attacking me, essentially. Here is my cash app. I am terribly sorry to be in this position, and I wish that I had other people I could ask. Thank you.
https://cash.app/$slimcongnito>>2395666not today, satan trips, i'm 2 blessed 2 b stressed
zhengjiu women ba, xi zhuxi
>>2395686Zohran is based and the future of American socialism.
JIDF sectarian anons ITT are just paid mossad shills.
>>2395707> Anti-zionist Socialist not what Zion Dronebomby is
not what Earnie $camders is
not what Genocidria Ofashio Wartez is
try again
>>2395713Sanders and AOC are proven frauds.
Zohran Mamdani is Anti-zionist Socialist. If you disagree you're spreading Hasbara JIDF lies.
>>2395707AOCIA is literally a Zionist though. She believes Israel has a right to exist as a Jewish state. Therefore she is Zionist. Therefore she is fascist.
What do you call someone who is both a socialist and a fascist?
A strasserite.
>>2395726If you stick to the native language of your listener it makes communication easier.
Also what is the difference between Bourgeoisie and Bourgeois? Do you know?
>>2395707>Rallying behind an Anti-zionist Socialist who shares 99.9%anon pliiisss
>Literal reformist social,-fascism! I'd rather praise MTG and Tucker Carlson! HAIL MIGA!!things no one said.
>>2395768Mamdani is further to the left and explicitly Anti-zionist unlike Sanders.
You're doing ahistorical and un-materialist analysis by refusing to compare their policies and seeing how they differ in practice.
>>2395788the only thing close to
>Literal reformist social,-fascism! I'd rather praise MTG and Tucker Carlson! HAIL MIGA!!is
>>2395673 >Not him but Tucker Carlson and MTG have done far more for the anti-Zionist cause and made far less of a fool out of themselves than whatever DSSA radlib of the week you want to promoteit's not the same as a praise, rather a criticism. and he's not wrong. the chance AOCIA had to prove herself being different than any other fascist from the demokkkrap party, comes in MTG and shows, despite MTG others Karen-ish facets, that she was outflanked from the left by MTG.
you have to accept and come to terms with these things.
>>2395797AOCIA is a fraud.
Zohran is Anti-zionist Socialist.
Simple as.
>>2395836CPUSAnon
any thoughts on this video?
>>2395660is china corporatist?
>>2395748Explain to me how Manadani will accomplish anything but watered down DNC policies when he only has 10% of the city council on his side.
No DSAcel has managed to do this yet.
Using your precious bourgeois system that you want to support and perpetuate will lead to complete political impotence. This is by design and you know it.
>>2395838the squirrel is right
give it the order of lenin
>>2395867So now the DSA has lost her to the Democrats entirely and essentially stripped itself of power.
Damn, it's like they make the worst possible decisions on purpose or something. But then, AOCIA was never going to make their fabled "dirty break" with the Democrats anyway.
As I've told you all hundreds of times, the DSA literally and explicitly exists to destroy the left and funnel it's energy into the Democratic party, where it can safely be dissipated. Michael Harrington founded the organization for this purpose and this purpose alone.
>>2395890You overestimate the power of peaceful protest.
>>2395904Explain to me how Mamdani will accomplish anything with only 10% of the city council on his side. Why are you so afraid to do this?
>>2395914His political platform makes no mention of how he will pass any of this with only 10% of the city council on his side. He cannot answer that question and neither can you because there is only one possible answer and it doesn't make the DSA look good.
Mamadani will do one of two things.
Either A: Nothing
Or
B: He waters down all his policies so they're palatable to the Democrats who make up most of the council.
>>2395921>Woke Authoritarianism and Right-Wing Woke Extremism Are Two Sides of the Same Coin - And Jews Are the Canary in the Coal Mine
>The left has traded liberalism for authoritarian identity politics. Under the guise of “anti-racism,” figures like Mamdani label Zionism as white colonialism, and AOC parrots slogans like “from the river to the sea,” turning a genocidal chant into a progressive talking point. The goal isn’t peace - it’s erasure. It’s a new Marxism, where Jews are labeled “privileged whites” and cancelled for surviving.
<And here's the twisted paradox at the heart of it all: <The left says Jews are too white to be oppressed. The right says Jews aren’t white enough to belong. <We are both “too privileged” and “not pure” at the same time.<Both sides attack Jews - just from different angles.<And what’s worse: both sides love authoritarianism.
>The far left idolizes central planning, censorship, and reeducation - see campus speech codes, DEI mandates, and street mobs that decide who gets to speak.>The far right peddles fascistic hierarchy, loyalty tests, and strongman politics - idolizing Putin, Orban, or the idea of a “pure nation.”
<Social media has murdered the political center.<Algorithms reward outrage, not nuance. Tribalism wins.<And Jews? Jews are once again the canary in the coal mine.
>When the left says Jews are too powerful, and the right says they’re not loyal enough - history has already shown us where this ends.
<Both extremes are dangerous, and both dream of centralized power, rigid conformity, and a world without dissent.If we don’t fight for the center - for liberalism, for truth, for open debate - we lose everything.
>>2395921They were right, zionists will loose their genocidal minds.
iran should get nukes and have one aimed to any place with more than a 1 israeli.
>>2395929>uhh horseshoe theory !symbol of the midwit to discredit criticism, thinking everything is perfect.
Centrist impotence is not the answer to anything.
>>2395927The NYC mayoral office comes with executive powers, no? If he gets roadblocked by the city council he can simply just railroad shit through with the ol "because I said so" clause and let the liberals scramble over each other figuring out how to deal with it. Even without that he'll be able to appoint people that will follow his directions.
That said if it really truly comes down to the rest of the council stonewalling him on everything, it will require mass mobilization of the base to strongarm the legislature. So maybe some liberals are getting cold feet on the whole "city run grocery store" thing, well then as long as they stonewall that the garbage collectors can go on strike with full support from the executive. And that's just one example, with a motivated base you can pretty much bring daily life to a standstill in pursuit of getting what you want. Plus strikes are legal so this still fits in with his commitment to "legalism"
>>2395881Mamadani
Manadani
Magadani
>>2395937No. The mayor is allowed to appoint the heads of the NYPD and FDNY and that's about it.
Strikes are not allowed for political purposes and no one is going to risk their jobs for free bus fare. Unions in America are explicitly economist in nature.
>>2395942You are vastly overestimating the size and influence of the DSA. If they had the ability to do any of this, why have they never done it?
>>2395948This. Fuck Marx. That uygha didn't do
SHIT.
>>2395929I can't believe I just read a rational statement. Good work anon, too bad you will be cannibalized and or ignored.
I have always found it interesting that the lefties eat their young and are made up of so many opposing factions. Also interesting is their obvious racism which they seem blind and deaf to their own racist ideas. Truly no better than the fascist right, same ideas just a different tribe.
The center is creamy goodness and is slurped out by the Boglims of both the right and the left to sustain their energies.
What would a coherent, hierarchical and organized center party look like I wonder? When will the centrists say, "Enough!" and stop their drift to the right or left just to have a sense of belonging?
>>2395951Who gives a shit if a strike is "allowed"? If enough people decide to strike, it's a strike, and capital can moan and complain all its wants about it but without outside intervention the NYPD is going to be helpless to actually stop it. And his policies are a lot more than just free bus fare. Also the mayor of NYC can appoint a lot more than just those two, you've got the City Planning Commission, Departments of Housing, Homeless Services, and Transportation, among other things. The mayor of NYC has a surprising amount of leverage
As for that other part you kinda answered your own question, the reason they haven't done so yet is because they dont have power. With a mayor of America's most populated city talking about seizing the means of production on the other hand, radical unions are going to be bolder and outpace the more popular economist ones in terms of direct action.
>>2395897The French loanword you are talking about already became "Burgess" in English. The modern french word Bourgeois is still considered foreign.
Nothing wrong with using the word with Marxists and leftists but to the average American just saying capitalist or business owner works fine.
>>2395951The mayor is also in charge of the city budget and can prioritize program funding.
>>2395955Prove it.
The unions are legally barred from striking in favor of any political cause or candidate and so their hands are tied. They can do nothing as long as they continue to work in a system which was designed to perpetuate the power of the bourgeoisie.
>>2395962There has literally never been a general strike in America and if the unions tried to do a wildcat they would be decertified and replaced with scabs. Its obvious that you understand nothing about how labor law "works" in America. The system that you so desperately cling to is explicitly designed to stop any left wing movements from gaining traction. You cannot change the system from within because the system is the problem. It must be destroyed.
>>2395964>>2395897"French loanwords"
/leftypol/ is on the cutting edge of 1984 Newspeak, I learn a new concept everyday.
Also in case you needed to know, English is a Germanic based language and thank god for the Black Plague or we would all be speaking that nonsense French language everyday. If you really want to get deep and learn something, French WAS the language of the bourgeios language of the past, while English was considered the dirty language of the illiterate working class prior to the black plague wiping out the majority of French speaking aristocracy.
>>2395966>They system is the problem and must be destroyedWith what?
The problem with you good sir is that you are not as well read as you'd like to imagine. Your idealism is naieve and your understanding of "the system" is next level dunning kreuger.
Capitalism is and has been a factor in some of the finest innovations in science and the art that the world has ever produced. I mean if you want some jagged pills, your computer, this dumbass imageboard and the fact that you can just run your mouth like an idiot are all products of a free market and innovation.
Your ideas are not your own but you cling to them like you came up with the concepts, proved them and are caught aghast in disbelief that no one will listen to your "rational" pleas. Try centering yourself in reality once in a while, take a trip to North Korea or Cuba.
>>2395849I'm not the biggest expert on the fine points of China's economics, so just based on the video itself, a few things stand out. First:
>The flag bitnow I might be wrong, but I'm pretty sure the stars on the flag have no "official" meaning. So saying objectively "Oh, these are all the classes with the Chinese Communist Party governing all of them" may be a bit dishonest.
>Communist Party members existing within the company structureHonestly if you're gonna try and do some kind of "market socialism" type deal with a Vanguard party, I personally don't know how else you maintain some level of control over the Bourgeoisie.
>That pic of the corporatist structure.It looked familiar and, wouldn't you know it, I found the same pic of Fascist Italy's corporatist structure AND China's economic structure on Zoltanous' substack. If you ain't familiar with the guy, he's a pretty explicit Fascist, albeit an educated one. He's read Marx and Giovanni Gentile, funnily enough his stance on groups like the ACP is
>"They hate that I think they're Fascist but I think that's a good thing."Now I'm not sure if he specifically made those charts, the dude translated Fascist texts from Italian to English IIRC and seems to have some talent for photoshop, so I think he could make those charts, seem to match the style he uses a lot.
Like I said, the dude's an explicit Fascist, albeit one that is far more tolerant of Marxist-Leninist states, so he's far more likely to say "Stalin/Xi were/are BASED FASCISTS" than anything.
So I'm gonna say tentatively that China can
look corporatist, but I'm gonna refrain from passing judgement. Namely because I feel like applying a term like that will just boil down the issue into a black or white thing. Y'know how I've talked about some Communists making Communism into a religion? That's kind of why. I think we can all agree that "not having electricity" is a bad thing, but there are people on this board who are convinced that Socialism would destroy the electric infrastructure of the first world because "That's heckin' treatlerism!" Once you start thinking in such a bizarre ideological way, things aren't good or bad on their own merits or for material reasons, but for however much one thinks its "ideologically pure." I, for example, consider Socialism as a good for what it
does, not as a good in itself. So if Socialism means making people poorer and destroying modern infrastructure 'cause "muh treats" I don't see any reason to support it. By contrast, others will support such things just because they consider Socialism a good in itself. If I said "China is corporatist" than in the minds of some people I might as well be saying "China did the holocaust" because "corporatism = bad = fascism", which really doesn't exist as a distinct ideological tendency so much as a catch-all term for secular Satanism. Even old ᴉuᴉlossnW and Oswald Mosley themselves were trying to portray their fascism as a kind of Socialism. So it's not some Manichean "either-or" thing I think.
>>2395990Yo Cpap, what do you think of the odds of Zohran attempting to strongarm a radical agenda
>>2395937 >>2395962 >>2395980I'm kinda just running with what I know on mayoral powers and historical possibilities, but my current conclusion is that while it's feasible to attempt it would certainly result in severe reprisals from the feds, including armed intervention. Which I mean if communism can only be implemented through civil war seems like a good thing in the long run
>>2395973Because both the unions and the DSA are strictly legalist in nature and cannot/will not break the law to accomplish their goals.
>>2395980Again there has literally never been a general strike in America. The unions are specifically prohibited from doing them and the DSA absolutely does not have the numbers required to force the issue, even in NYC. Even if the DSA was willing to try this (and to be clear, they absolutely ARE NOT) they couldn't.
So again, how is Mamadani going to implement any of his policies with only 10% support in the bourgeois electoralist system that he absolutely WILL NOT step outside of?
>>2396000They COULD take up arms and wage war against the bourgeois state, but they are just as likely to do that as they are to do a wildcat strike.
Do you even know what a wildcat strike is and what happens if you do one?
>>2395988Not bogus and not my point. I believe every system of government is valid, to certain scales, circumstance and context.
Socialism has not proven itself to be very awesome when is comes to sharing, ironically. I've met enough Eastern Bloc immigrants to know that for the most part, it just doesn't scale up properly, especially when it comes to food security.
You can try to debate me with your books and intellectualistic proffering however, you won't be able to shake me. This is because I live in reality, have spoken with those who have lived in reality and understand that the best source of information are going to the places and talking with the people who have experienced socialism on a large scale.
That being said.
The U.S. Military is a socialist program, bet you're a big supporter of them no?
>>2396006Why don't you post the images? Why do you assume we've seen their house?
>Is this normal, or do houses outside of suburbia just look like that?What do you mean house outside of suburbia? A farm house?
>>2395998Oh I see your point. IF we measure everything by using only one example, you will be correct and I will be wrong.
Guess what doodybrain? You can't learn a goddamn thing if you already "know it all." My wish for you is to become more rational and stop using cheap tactics to land low blow "gotcha" gimmicks. Shit doesn't fly in reality, only on imageboards filled with dumbasses. Fuck your infographic by the way, no one has been to outer space yet.
>>2396007>I believebehold, "science"
>socialism is good at sharingnot what it's about
>it doesn't scale up when it comes to food securitylmfao socialist countries had problems with food security because they were outnumbered, embargoed, and sanctioned in a majority capitalist world. It is capitalism that has a problem with food security: it deliberately destroys food if it becomes unprofitable to sell. Read the section titled "The deliberate destruction of the productive forces" in Chapter 3 of "Fascism and Social Revolution" by Rajani Palme Dutt.
>You can try to debate me with your books and intellectualistic proffering however, you won't be able to shake me. This is because I live in reality, have spoken with those who have lived in reality and understand that the best source of information are going to the places and talking with the people who have experienced socialism on a large scale.wow le consensus of talking to random people, so scientific
>The U.S. Military is a socialist program, bet you're a big supporter of them no?This has to be a troll, right? Socialism is when the govt does stuff and the more stuff it does the socialister it is. What about the fact that the bourgeoisie are still the ruling class?
>>2396012They don't have the numbers and are explicitly and constitutionally anti-communist in nature. They will never form a Soviet.
What will happen if they try to wildcat is that the union will be immediately sued, decertified and broken, and the bosses will gleefully replace the union workers with cheaper scabs. Especially since the current federal government is in charge of arbitration.
American trade unions are specifically designed to PREVENT the thing you talk about from happening. It's literally why they exist.
>>2395986>Capitalism is and has been a factor in some of the finest innovations in science and the art that the world has ever produced.hi, /pol/
get rekt, /pol/
>>2396016Wow, real smart guess you're right again. NOthing I said was meant to troll and you being utterly dismissive of the fact that visiting the places and talking to the people who have come from your concept of an ideal goverment means nothing, tell me all I need to know about how to weigh your insights and value your opinions, like Zimbabwean currency. Inflated Ego ass.
>>2396018A dusty little town up the road, one phone for the whole town to use. One post office 100 miles away and the only other people I've seen all fly in black helicopters, strange folk.
>>2395929>>2395957I've read a lot of stuff like this coming from American Jews. The thing is, when they say "the left labels Zionism as white colonialism" and the far right peddles nationalism, "and we are against those things," they're deluding themselves because Zionism is Jewish nationalism. The left focuses on the settler-colonialism part but tends to ignore the intensity of the nationalist component. (I believe this to be a mistake BTW but that's not what I'm arguing about right now.)
To illustrate this: this music video by some Israeli rappers is emblematic of why nationalism is still a relevant force in the world. In the video, there are secular Jewish ravers (recalling the Nova festival) and one guy who looks gay, and also religious Zionists wearing beards and white dress shirts in front of a truck advertising their rabbi (I think it's the chief Sephardic rabbi of Israel?). And these rappers are the lumpen jingo arsim (i.e. gopniks) who are bringing everyone together! Nationalism is a form of social infrastructure that allows disparate, contradictory groups to unite under the same banner. (Then a bunch of dancers in all black come pouring out of shipping containers wearing skull masks over their faces.) You know these guys probably like Orban a lot too, because he's friends with Bibi and supports Israel. Anyways, this refrain is a famous Israeli song from the 1980s about not showing fear, and the bars between the refrain is about why they give zero fucks about what the rest of the world (and especially Roger Waters) thinks and that they're proud of blowing up those beepers. Pretty loud and clear, that.
It's a form of identity politics. But as "ugly" as it looks, this is also much stronger than the liberal centrism as promoted by that @destinationXIX account, because these Jews will fight and kill for it. You can't be a tribalist and also complain about tribalism. You can't complain about campus speech codes and loyalty tests while demanding them for anyone who criticizes Israel. (And then you cry about being afraid?) That's like being a naughty nun.
>>2396024Good shit, just because a concept came from the USSR doesn't mean it's owned by anyone you capitalist pig.
Look at you trying to seize the means of production you little scoundrel. Next you be stating that the sound my ass makes after eating Taco Bell was first produced in France, who gives a fuck its my ass gas now.
You suck at debating and this imageboard is NOT helping you sharpen up.
>>2395979> is on the cutting edge of 1984 Newspeakwe have a vast knowledge in social sciences, yes? linguistics is one of the social science, yes?
your point?
>English is a Germanic based language and thank god for the Black Plague or we would all be speaking that nonsense French language everyday>le bad French language.>imblyyyyiiinnngare you stupid?
>French WAS the language of the bourgeios language of the past, while English was considered the dirty language of the illiterate working class prior to the black plague wiping out the majority of French speaking aristocracy.and Engels and Marx praised Polish nationalism, and look how things have turned.
that the Frenchmen have lost a lot of imperialistic relevancy (except on Africa), that doesn't help your case.
>>2396029I will profile you now. Enjoy the inner rage.
You are White.
Upper Middle Class.
College Educated.
Easy Life.
Dismissive of others because you got a big ol' safety net and you know it, fat little piggy.
OH but please don't let this stop you from your "revolution" I can't wait to hear your name called in the streets after the great things you will surely accomplish with your B.A. and Apple Computer.
>>2396038mixed
working class
didn't want debt so didn't go
have multiple dependents, including children and elderly
no safety net
guessed wrong
>>2396044"Things that never happened for $1000 Alex"
LOL, you're a joke man. If you came to terms with the fact that your lack of problems led you down this path to inventing them, you might pull out of this tailspin and reintegrate into a life you want to live anon. Just stop lying to yourself, you rich, white, loved and cherished fat little piglet.
https://www.racket.news/p/note-on-new-trump-russia-disclosuresNote on New Trump-Russia Disclosures
>As has been rumored all week, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard began releasing documents this afternoon related to intelligence community shenanigans committed in the waning days of Barack Obama’s presidency, before and after the 2016 presidential election. It’s damning stuff that exposes the Trump-Russia hysteria as a complete and utter fake, and should obliterate the reputation of the commercial news media. There is no answer to these documents.
>To take one example, intelligence officials on December 8th, 2016 were prepared to release a Presidential Daily Briefing concluding that “Russian and criminal actors did not impact recent US election results by conducting malicious cyber activities against election infrastructure”:
>That “did not impact” memo — exactly the opposite of what the Obama White House would claim a month later — never reached the public, thanks to the intervention of a senior official in Director of National Intelligence James Clapper’s office:
>On the following day, December 9th, 2016, members of Obama’s National Security Principals Committee — including Clapper, CIA director John Brennan, Susan Rice, John Kerry, Brian McKeon, Loretta Lynch, Andrew McCabe, and Avril Haines — gathered for a meeting, after which each received an email titled, “POTUS Tasking on Russia Election Meddling.” The email tasked the members with the creation of a new “assessment per the President’s request.”
>From that moment forward, intelligence officials began leaking “blatantly false” information about a nonexistent “secret assessment” that Russia intervened to influence the “outcome of the election.” This leaking continued unabated until January 6th, when a new, hastily-crafted Intelligence Community Assessment was released, triggering a series of developments that led to the publication of the Steele Dossier and an explosion of media stories linking Trump and Russia in an unprecedented scandal.
>The material is bolstered throughout by explanations of a whistleblower from then-Director of National Intelligence James Clapper’s office. Just this handful of documents holds explosive implications, implicating a much bigger pool of White House officials than previously understood, including Obama himself, in what appears to be a top-down effort to create a false narrative about Russia meddling to help Donald Trump. If there’s an analog in American history, I can’t think of it.
>This is a major action taken by Tulsi Gabbard, whose office was earlier reported by Paul Sperry of RealClear Investigations to have hosted an “urgent” meeting in a secure facility last Sunday. They met to discuss “new Russiagate information” with Trump’s Presidential Intelligence Advisory Board as well as officials from the Department of Justice. With this material, she and the rest of this team are taking on a long list of powerful predecessors, and it’s expected she’ll be made the focus of an all-out negative publicity campaign. “Will be a wild ride,” is how one source put it tonight.
>More material is coming. I was working on a different part of this story, about plans for possible charges, when these documents came out this afternoon, so I’ve had to start over. More will be out beginning in the morning. It’s a fascinating moment, and we’ll make sure Racket readers are kept in the loop as new material comes out. Have a good night, everyone. >>2395933tariffs will only work if paired with nationalization and reindustrialization
but that won't work with keeping a high trade deficit which is necessary for maintaining dollar hegemony, and besides, neither party actually wants to nationalize and reindustrialize. They just want to spam tariffs and hope it makes them win.
Free trade will only work with dollar hegemony, but dollar hegemony is dying.
The US bourgeoisie is fucked. They have no good long term strategies and their only short term strategies are war and austerity.
>>2396058Ridicule is a tactic used by fascists in order to be dismissive of problematic information.
Also, /pol/ is the same as this board. Full of hate, infighting and irrational logic. Just like you, project harder anon, project harder. I'm gonna cum.
>>2396052I don't care that you don't believe me. anyone can just make up shit in their head and then double down when the other person refuses to dox themselves.
here. i am going to profile you now:
pedophile
billionaire
rich
cannibal
any attempt to deny this will confirm my belief
>>2396058show me the quote.
protip, doubledare you: no splitting the text.
>>2395990Oh, one addendum: make sure you know why you dislike things beyond "it's the bad thing". If you turn around and say China is bad solely because "muh corporatism", then I don't think there was a genuine reason anyone liked China in the first place beyond "muh socialism".
>>2395996I think you're hitting the nail pretty close on the head, though one thing I'd say is that you want to find a way to make your "hill to die on" something that'll look infinitely bad if the Bourgeoisie try pushing back on hard. You want to make it a spectacle. If the cops come to arrest you, just start drawing attention to it. You want the perception of most people to be "Zohran appropriated apartments from the worst landlords and cut the rent in half, so the police arrested him".
>>2396194The Bolsheviks were willing to break the law and combined legal with illegal organizing because they wanted to build workers power and overthrow their government. The DSA is strictly legalist because they want to maintain and preserve their government and so will not violate any of its laws.
Hope this helps. Read lenin before you talk about what the Bolsheviks did.
>>2396165I saw Zohran Mamdani at a bodega yesterday. I told him how cool it was to meet him in person, but I didn’t want to be a douche and bother him and ask him for photos or anything. He said, “Oh, like you’re doing now?” I was taken aback, and all I could say was “Huh?” but he kept cutting me off and going “huh? huh? huh?” and closing his hand shut in front of my face. I walked away and continued with my shopping, and I heard him chuckle as I walked off. When I came to pay for my stuff up front I saw him trying to walk out the doors with like fifteeuygh Sandwiches in his hands without paying. The girl at the counter was very nice about it and professional, and was like “Sir, you need to pay for those first.” At first he kept pretending to be tired and not hear her, but eventually turned back around and brought them to the counter. When she took one of the bars and started scanning it multiple times, he stopped her and told her to scan them each individually “to prevent any electrical infetterence,” and then turned around and winked at me. I don’t even think that’s a word. After she scanned each sandwich and put them in a bag and started to say the price, he kept interrupting her by yawning really loudly.
https://x.com/JMGreerWriter/status/1946219660212375747
>During the last decades of the Classic Lowland Maya civilization, the ahauob or “divine lords” who ruled the Mayan city-states did nothing constructive to deal with the subsistence crisis that was spiraling out of control around them, as the swidden agriculture system that supported their entire civilization collapsed under the strain of too many people farming fragile tropical soils too intensively, while bitter cyclical droughts made things worse. They had options—the intensive wetland polyculture that made the Aztec capital Tenochtitlán nearly self-sufficient in food centuries later was already under development, and other local sustainable foods such as ramόn nuts could also have become the focus of intensive cultivation.
>The problem was that maize farming was central to the ideology of the classic Maya, and control over the corn crop was equally central to the Mayan class system and the political superstructure that ran the city-states. So the ahauob put the resources that could have saved their civilization into ever more elaborate ceremonial buildings. It’s impossible to tell from the surviving written records whether there were two parties among the ahauob, one that insisted nothing was wrong and another that insisted that everything would be fine if only they just kept on building bigger pyramids. The evidence certainly doesn’t disprove that hypothesis, however.
>Then, when the final crisis arrived, they doubled down on failure by going to war with neighboring city-states in a desperate attempt to steal enough corn to stave off starvation. That was what kicked off the rolling collapse of Lowland Maya civilization and turned dozens of proud cities into crumbling ruins sinking back into the jungle. The ahauob of Brussels and Washington DC have shown themselves just as eager to go to war to steal resources as their Mayan equivalents, and most of them are at least as willing to raise pyramids of solar farms and wind turbines to the greater glory of the gods of high finance, so the likelihood that they will follow their Mayan equivalent down the same ruinous track seems uncomfortably high. https://prospect.org/power/2025-07-17-meet-disaster-capitalists-alligator-alcatraz/Meet the Disaster Capitalists Behind Alligator Alcatraz
<Incompetent and militarized ‘emergency response’ is on track to be a trillion-dollar industry by the end of Trump’s second term.
>One company just forced the state of Illinois to fork over $1.3 million for a detention center it never built, and boasts an armored car subsidiary that “lost track of” tens of millions of dollars in cash belonging to banks, businesses, and the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. Another recently won a $70 million contract from the state of Oregon to remove dead trees to mitigate wildfire risk—then ordered contractors to indiscriminately chop down tens of thousands of healthy trees. A third has been sued in Florida for allegedly orchestrating a sprawling insurance fraud ring that ended up screwing over hundreds of Hurricane Ida victims, stiffing the claim adjustors they hired, then suing its conspirator law firm for failing to make good on the 582 percent annualized return its partners had allegedly promised.
>Still a fourth built a $22 million COVID-19 field hospital in New York that never ended up treating any patients because Andrew Cuomo thought nursing home residents could use some company and sent all the COVID patients to long-term care facilities—though, to be fair, a lot of stuff like that happened during the pandemic.
>I speak of course of the bastions of free enterprise that converged upon a wildlife preserve south of Miami last month to build, in the miraculous space of eight days, a 3,000-bed nylon and barbed wire concentration camp for abusing and humiliating random people dragged from strip mall parking lots and park benches and tow yards. The air conditioners shut off chronically, but the interrogation lights never do; the floor is flooded with human waste from overflowing toilets; and the price tag now exceeding $600 million means there’s room for all the grifters to get a piece.
>“It’s monumental, the wealth creation that’s being done,” Stephan Crétier, the billionaire founder and CEO of the Canadian security and surveillance conglomerate GardaWorld, gushed to Bloomberg from his home base in Dubai. Crétier wasn’t referencing the Alligator Alcatraz prison camp, which was likely just a footnote in Stephen Miller’s fascist run of show when he gave the interview back in November. But then again maybe he was; his company is staffing the camp now, after all. Like the journalist and critic Naomi Klein, Crétier and GardaWorld were born in Montreal, and reading about the company’s ascent into the world’s largest private security firm can give one the queasy suspicion he read Klein’s 2007 odyssey The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism as a “get rich quick” guide.
>Eighteen years ago, The Shock Doctrine used the adventures of Blackwater during Hurricane Katrina to show how natural-disaster response across the globe was rapidly becoming carceralized, for ideological reasons and due to the overall post–Cold War slide into kleptocracy. Some of the contractors involved in Alligator Alcatraz have their roots in security: Crétier launched GardaWorld with a handful of friends from Montreal law enforcement. Others, like Miami’s CDR Maguire, Toronto’s Access Restoration Services (ARS), and Galveston, Texas’s SLSCO got their starts in disaster response, then moved into more punitive industries. But for most companies in the emergency response business these days, the distinctions between providing emergency assistance and intimidating/terrorizing the victims of said emergency have blurred.
>SLSCO got its start cleaning up flood and hurricane damage and later won more than $1 billion in contracts to erect and maintain the Texas border wall, which the company then staffed with armed security guards they illegally smuggled in from Mexico on a special pathway they built to breach the wall that was supposed to be “impenetrable,” according to a whistleblower lawsuit in which the Trump Justice Department declined to intervene; the case was settled out of court the following month. SLSCO also built the doomed field hospital in New York, and at Alligator Alcatraz it engaged in construction. ARS is a spin-off of a Toronto construction firm known for restoring homes damaged in hurricanes and fires, but it just nabbed $5.1 million in Alligator Alcatraz contracts to provide “armory systems” and “air operations” to the concentration camp (on top of a $19.6 million contract it obtained last month to send planes to Israel to evacuate hundreds of Floridians who got stuck there during the 12-day war with Iran).
>By far, the most traditional, dyed-in-the-wool government contractor involved in Alligator Alcatraz is the CDR group of companies, whose founder Carlos Duart and his wife, both second-generation Cuban Americans affiliated with ardently free-market think tanks, have given nearly $2 million to campaign slush funds supporting Gov. Ron DeSantis and other Florida Republicans and are regulars at charity balls and society events of that nature. CDR is an outgrowth of Duart’s eponymous Miami construction company that diversified into federal project management after the real estate crash of the early Obama years. During the pandemic, it administered tens of thousands of vaccines, and nowadays its most booming business seems to be disaster relief, but it also has a division that provides health care to prisons in three states, which is the one that nabbed the contract at Alligator Alcatraz.
>In 2020, the company was hired to clear dead trees after two virulent wildfires burned through more than a million acres of northern Oregon, but CDR, eager to bill as quickly and liberally as possible, constantly expanded the “scope” of damage that warranted removal, and ultimately ordered unqualified, drug-using contractors to mow down tens of thousands of perfectly healthy trees, according to whistleblowers who testified before the Oregon state Senate. CDR, for its part, claims it was the target of a “misinformation” campaign drummed up by a Eugene environmental nonprofit, that it only removed trees that presented a fire hazard, and that it maintains a zero-drug-use policy. It was the only Alligator Alcatraz contractor that returned calls from the Prospect, though a spokesman apologetically said the state emergency services department had warned all contractors not to speak to the press.
>It is probably safe to say competence isn’t the core competency of any of the contractors involved in the Florida concentration camp. ARS, the company providing “air operations” to the gulag, has been sued by roughly a dozen former employees who say the company’s owners Giuseppe and Domenico Gagliano used them as pawns in an audacious scheme to file hundreds of vastly inflated Louisiana hurricane damage claims against insurance companies, then refused to pay them for all the hours they worked. Before that, ARS had come under fire for littering immigrant assistance centers with glossy brochures promising bus tickets and relocation assistance to any migrant willing to supply ARS with an unusual amount of data and documentation on their situations.
>GardaWorld has rolled up more than a dozen smaller companies with the help of junk debt and private equity backers over the past 20 years, but its decision in 2005 to diversify into the armored cash transport business dominated by Brinks courted disaster. Crétier spent nearly $400 million to acquire a family-owned Brinks competitor in California, and spent the next decade or so attempting to emerge from the balance-sheet hole while displaying a knack for losing track of customers’ cash on a scale that calls to mind Iraq reconstruction under L. Paul Bremer. In 2007, the company even lacked the cash—or the insurance policy—to pay off the kidnappers of four of its U.K.-born bodyguards who’d been taken hostage in Iraq by Iraqi police officers who belonged to an insurgent militia; they all died in a botched escape attempt even as GardaWorld continued to charge USAID $4,000 a day for their “services.”
>A month or two after the kidnapping, Crétier allegedly threatened to have the company’s mercenaries assassinate the family of any executive who disclosed the company’s financial problems to outsiders. In a 2018 whistleblower complaint, a former executive of the cash transport business accused the company of hiring novice drivers, who often lacked valid driver’s licenses and were involved in an average of 100 collisions per month, to transport large sums of cash that often just went missing, then lying to customers (including the Federal Reserve) about how much cash they had on hand. “On a daily basis, Garda ‘robs’ Peter to pay Paul,” the complaint alleged. “Because not every customer will ever audit at the same time, Garda has been able to pull off the ‘perfect bank robbery’ and do so on a continuous basis.”
>But Garda by that point had moved its headquarters to Boca Raton in a successful bid to ingratiate the company to then-Florida Gov. Rick Scott, and the Trump Justice Department declined to intervene in the case. In 2022, Cretier’s high-net-worth “private CIA” business Crisis24 inked a joint venture with Palantir; last year, he bought back a majority stake in GardaWorld from his old private equity backers in a transaction that somehow made him Canada’s newest billionaire. Hilariously, a prominent Canadian conservative earlier this year wrote a newspaper column advising the next prime minister to “emulate Trump and appoint a prominent CEO like Elon Musk—perhaps Garda World’s highly successful Stephan Crétier—to advise on inefficiency and waste in government.”
>The forecasters of such things predicted last winter that “emergency management” will be nearly a trillion-dollar sector of the economy by 2030. And that was before Trump declared eight new national emergencies during his first week in office, then went about variously nuking and systematically dismantling every federal agency equipped to respond to emergencies. Disaster capitalism’s windfall could come a year or two early, so don’t let this lesson escape you. Those who fail to procure a no-bid contract to build the next concentration camp may be condemned to live in it. Or as Crétier himself put it in 2020: “I see the world in a very predatorial way. You’re either on the menu or you’re looking in the menu.” >>2396267American education says that nonviolent protests are the most effective, and points to the civil rights movement as an example.
They're just doing what they think will work the best
>>2396267well the bigger lesson is that protesters shouldnt go astray from the crowd
police always single out isolated individuals for the worst violence
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