To paraphrase James Baldwin, ‘we can love and disagree with each other, as long as that disagreement isn’t about my humanity and right to exist’

Yeah, and I know the Mussolini quote you’re referencing. Mussolini was deliberately dismissing the several aspects of fascism that made it look re brutal than mere corporatism. The integration of mobilized militias with government, the criminalization of all descent and popular organization, the elimination of out groups, etc.

You’re being dismissive of what rights we have to protest and organize. Or the rights of some people to just exist. Guessing you don’t use them so why would you appreciate them.

If you look around the world at the Orbans, the Bolsanaros, the Le Penns, the AfD, etc., you will find that polarization and the rising far right is global. First past the post is not a good thing, but the causes are far deeper.

A past global trend was how the center left parties (Democrats in the US, 2nd International Socialist parties in most of the rest of the world) discredited themselves, abandoning their core constituencies and pushing neoliberal economic policies (in the US, free trade, dismantling welfare, the banking deregulation behind 2008). I think that’s the proximate cause in the rise of the global far right.

The cause of that trend is the inability of regulated capitalism to both provide for everyone AND provide the necessary ever increasing rate of profit.

While there have been stirrings of possible left reformist parties (Sanders, Corbyn, Lula, etc) even those that make it into state power are ineffective at creating a new, stable, political economy.

Meanwhile climate change is haunting the globe and the clock is ticking.

I avoid them if I can. If the store wants me to work for them, they can pay me. If they don’t have any available human checkers, I will pay myself by accidentally not charging some of the items. I have left stores and attempt to tell store managers why.

If we had a sane economic system where jobless folks still got their needs met, I’d be all for automation. But we don’t. So every time we allow the corporations to profit with less human workers, we are fucking over our fellow humans.

"One of the employees at Spirit AeroSystems, which reportedly manufactured the door plug that blew out of an Alaska Airlines flight over Portland, Oregon, allegedly told company officials about an “excessive amount of defects,” according to the federal complaint and corresponding internal corporate documents reviewed by us.

According to the court documents, the employee told a colleague that “he believed it was just a matter of time until a major defect escaped to a customer."

https://jacobin.com/2024/01/alaska-airlines-boeing-parts-malfunction-workers-spirit-aerosystems

They did actually hijack 1 ship and have kept it and it’s crew hostage, the Galaxy Leader. While there have been misses and successful interceptions, several ships have been damaged.

When you insure ships, you take notice of these kinds of things.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houthi_involvement_in_the_Israel–Hamas_war

George Lucas certainly did. The Vietnam War was part of the inspiration for Star Wars.

He says it contains DNA. There’s a grain of truth to that but it’s still bullshit:

https://yourlocalepidemiologist.substack.com/p/dna-in-covid-19-vaccines-7-pieces

Since 2000, the ratio of Palestinian deaths to Israeli deaths is 21:1 (NYT). Rockets? The name evokes weapons from Lockheed or Boeing, but Hamas and Islamic Jihad make them in garages and basement tunnels while Israel has the most hitech interceptors available. It’s still comparatively slingshots to F-16s.

Hamas was created in 1987, and has benefited from disproportionate treatment from the Israelis, who used Hamas to divide the Palestinian resistance. When Israel blows ckekd the negotiation tactics of the secular Palestinian resistance, what else were Palestinians to do? Palestinians in Gaza tried mass civil disobedience I’m 2018 with the Walk of Return, but Israel used live rounds and nearly 300 were killed and thousands wounded. How else were the Palestinians to seek freedom?

Always has been. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2002_Gujarat_riots

You paid money for something and then you find you can’t use it again. You seriously think that isn’t fucked up?

Fascists gonna fasc

Officially “celibate”

There have been many spans of time when Democrats had enough control of government to push through what they profress. They don’t use those opportunities.

Not arguing that the two parties are the same. They are better than the Republicans by far, but the Democrats are still not our friends. They either need to be destroyed or changed.

Since Eugene McCarthy, to the Rainbow Coalition, and then the campaigns of Kuccinch and then Bernie working inside has not worked. Of course, neither has working outside.

I doubt you’ve even seen them. Even the protests organized by Palestinians welcome Jewish Voices for Peace who have signs that say, “Never Again Means for Everyone”. And Jewish Voices for Peace organize a lot of protest themselves. Antifa peeps show up to make sure Nazis don’t infiltrate.

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While voting is a necessary but insufficient way to combat fascism, 96% of voting Ukrainians choosing to not support fascism is a good indicator that fascism is NOT on the agenda in Ukraine. A fascist coup by that 2% supporting fascism would be opposed by the vast majority of Ukraine.

You completely ignore that fact with your hardon for attacking the identity of persons chosen by the Ukrainians.

Edit to explain: I made no argument on what Zelinsky as a Jew or the Muslim cabinet member would be politically, which would be identity politics. This statement of fact (Zelinsky is Jewish) was relevant to the political preferences of the Ukrainian people. Fascists don’t choose Jews and Muslims to represent them.

Zelinsky is a pretty terrible neoliberal, and I’m not actually a fan. But I am a fan a national self determination. So was Lenin.

Who says they aren’t voting Democrat when it comes down to it? They’re trying to improve their voting choice. Ffs.

This is not that. There’s nothing in the article to suggest that they are supporting Republicans.

They even admit they may have to ‘recalibrate’ if their campaign doesn’t achieve results.

They are announcing that they want change from the Democrats. Frankly, this is what environmental, labor, feminist and police reform movements should be doing. The Democrats are better than. Republicans on all those issues, BUT THEY STILL SUCK.

This is pressure to make the Democrats better, whether by changing their stance or getting different Dems.

Would you suggest accepting that the Democrats as they are is enough to stop climate change, end wealth inequality, provide housing and healthcare, end discrimination, reform the police, etc?