I think what keeps a lot of this going are the number of otherwise decent folks who just can't visualize an alternative to the choices they're given. For them, nothing exists outside of the democratic/republican framework except a hazy anarchy -- an easy thing to reject. What they settle upon is what even they would describe as imperfect, but it's familiar, approved, "realistic", and comfortable.
In 1962 no one sat around saying, "Where the hell are the Beatles?"
Absolutely nailed it. It is as simple as that. Henry David Thoreau said most people live lives of quiet desperation. We have to take their shit because we are too busy just surviving.
I don’t think the system is broken! I think any reordering of the system would have the same outcome - people with power would control the narrative to their advantage. That is what human beings are. Capitalism that is not distorted by government interference - as Chomsky describes endlessly - has a prescription. Failure brings annihilation.
I think that was a good article. Caitlin really has a Comsky like ability to pierce.
I’m a capitalist who exploits people for my disproportionate gain. I own a security guard company in Toronto. We are an adjunct service to the real estate industry which is owned by pension funds and other large pools of capital - capitalism incarnate - real bastards.
I have much insight into how government works and I can promise you it has a twisted logic, it is massively inefficient unfocused and perpetually self reinforcing. Government mandarins and bureaucrats keep programs going because it is their job to do so. The rationale is massively distorted, the efficacy of the program is incidental at best.
I think this is the human condition - self interest and duplicity - and capitalism is the solution. Animal spirit, creative destruction, competition and annihilation are altogether essential to keep humans honest. Fear, biblical fear.
It is a very big topic and beyond me, but my 27 years in the fray, where the rubber hits the road has been instructional and that is my take on it.
Caitlin I don’t think your prescription for a solution is advisable - communism has been vilified beyond redemption.
My solution: $20 an hour minimum wage or guaranteed minimum income for all humans and no government programs supporting the poor. Make the poor not poor by creating a liveable bottom echelon of the economy. Government programs syphons to much with its inherent inefficiency and perverse logic. Just give people money. The over educated, well-meaning, program loving amongst us have had their day and it has failed.
Ask poor people what they want! They will say money. Ask them what they think of the programs I have to stand in line for. They will say humiliating. Start saving them from themselves they are not children just give them money.
I think you’re right about almost everything here but I could not retreat because of your naïve defense of communism.
Communism is: you give a small “vanguard” the absolute power to expropriate the rich. They expropriate the rich, so far so good. Then they keep all the riches and become the new rich. Plus they have absolute power. So they starve, persecute, surveil and censor.
I may be wrong, but I don't think Caitlin was giving a ringing endorsement of communism; merely that it's unfair to point out the flaws/shortcomings of a system (as in Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua) that's constantly being hobbled by sanctions, coups, terror, and assault by their northern capitalist "democracy-loving" neighbor.
(Had to delete this to correct it) I certainly agree that we should butt out and let other cultures and nations follow their own path. Maybe they’ll come up with some ideas we never thought of. But communism is a western idea too.
Yeah, history, quite a past and sufficient evidence for me - communism is wrong and murderous.
Generally I think Caitlin is spot on in her diagnosis but her prescription to treat the disease is that of a thinker - maybe not vetted by the practice of power.
Just a word about the vaccine issue. What we should be discussing and more importantly protesting about is the research that produced the virus. That is what the great preponderance of the evidence, and common sense, tells anyone who looks at it. I don't know if Caitlin has latched onto this, but I hope she does. The Chinese-US virus research at Wuhan gave us Covid-19, and the consequences of that should be stopping all such research everywhere. Instead of that, just wait a few days to see what the US "intelligence community" will cough up as their "high confidence" report. My bet is that it will be as follows: "The question of origin cannot be answered but it is extremely important to pour many more millions of dollars into this research in order to make it safer." Read: Give them more money and never mind if the next pandemic is worse than this one.
I take umbrage with Caitlin's assertion that: "Military members who support imperialism get promoted. Those who get to the top go on to work for war profiteers." This stereotype is as common as it is wrong. I spent much of my 32-year military career working closely with flag officers (admirals and generals). I do not recall ever hearing anybody say that they supported American hegemony nor did they do or say anything that could be construed as if imperialism was their motivation for serving. Having sat on promotion boards, I never heard anyone on a board ask about a candidate's achievements promoting US hegemony or imperialism much less their political orientation.
It is important for Americans, journalists too, to look beyond the Hollywood movie stereotypes that Generals got their jobs because they love war and want to be on the boards of directors of some MIC corporation someday. Such stereotypes distract voters from their power at the ballot box to replace the politicians who enable our Foreverwars. Keep in mind that it is POTUS and Congress who set the direction and force of America's hegemony; not the generals who must create the strategies to execute their orders nor the officers who must lead our troops into harm's way while the MIC and their Congressional puppets try to win at Asian dominoes or eradicate nonexistent WMDs in the deserts of the Middle East.
True, many senior military personnel do wind up as MIC executives. That is mostly because they know what their active-duty comrades need to be safe and effective in battle. Few if any who are in those jobs are motivated by greed. Most provide hands-on oversight of new systems to be deployed. In addition, I think it is fair to characterize the late-career pay received for sitting on a MIC board of directors as payback for their decades of low pay. The “average” top CEO annual compensation in 2019 was $14.5 million. Compare that to the US Pacific Commander who leads over 360 thousand troops yet was paid $198 thousand that year. Also, once retired, most flag officers only have a few good year left before retiring for good, so MIC jobs are not hitting the jackpot.
You don't have to say it when all along you are doing it. You don't even have to know what your doing to be all that effective at it if it keeps the MIC moving and thriving.
The Military is not about the MIC, as Eisenhower warned. It is about greedy Congressmen and women who depend on the MIC for money to promote their own political careers. As we have seen, it worked out swell for Obama. Nobody with half a brain would welcome the F-35 - an over-priced, unreliable, gas-guzzling fighter. But our generals and admirals do their best to make it work because their crews are at increased risk of harm if they do not. End Congressional profiteering to get re-elected, and watch the MIC shrink.
Some people think military service is about flag-hugging patriotism. Flags are tools left over from wars before the 20th century. Patriotism is for MAGA ralliers, illegal racist militias, and clueless insurrectionists to justify their fascist activities. Military service is about keeping people safe - the people in your command and innocents in combat zones. Nobody on ships or in foxholes think they are there to expand the empire. I continued to serve after being recalled to active duty after grad school because I could see how my contributions were contributing to improved Navy and DOD policies, and on occassion, by derailing stupid ones.
Wow. So the Congress is greedy and corrupt, but not Lloyd Austin, James Mattis, David Petraeus and Stanley McChrystal. Your apologist reaction for generals reads like a press release from their own desks. They are not just predatory speculators for promoting war with no reachable political goal, but also pathological liars.
No current general has proved better at getting results than Vietnam era four-stars. Such as Westmoreland (reputed to be a naive boy scout and over-optimist) and Abrams (reputed to be a disheveled alcoholic and petty tyrant). But it might be interesting to scientifically rate advances by the U.S. Army in the field of fabricating stories for political gain.
Occasionally we get a dissenting voice like three-star general Douglas Lute, who admitted ten years ago that “We didn’t have the foggiest notion of what we were undertaking” in Afghanistan. Then again this is the same frustrated genius who said that we should consider reinstating military draft calls; apparently unaware that the abolishment of conscription has largely eliminated dissent in the streets about imperialist adventures.
I agree. His gymnastical contortionism apologistic pratt is rather missing the point. The revolving door from Pentagon to Congressional or MIC is a pure example that the military and MIC are forever wed. There is no separating them. not all X doesn't absolve the system that sets up the corruption as front and center.
Of the 4 you mentioned, only Petraeus was a political operative - Flynn, unmentioned, terribly so. Few people have ever even met a general much less have a clue what their workday is like. It may be convenient for you to blame generals for military misdeeds ordered by politicians, but it is not fair. Imagine if Gen Milley had helped Jan 6 happen rather than work to undermine it. We might have had 4 more years of fascism.
The MIC is about money; not conquest. Great PBS interview tonight with Sarah Chayes about the epidemic corruption in Afghanistan. Just like in Iraq, Syria, and of course, Vietnam during that fiasco. BTW my best friend from HS was a conscientious objector while I was in Nam. Today, we both favor a return to the draft because we think it will engage more people with their government. Also, keep in mind that dissent in the streets did not end Vietnam. Dissent in Congress did.
General Milley lied about progress made in Afghanistan in the same manner that various generals lied about progress made in South Vietnam. In both cases, U.S. airpower propped up the faux security forces and disguised a house of cards that collapsed quickly when tested. The PAVN and Taliban were outnumbered by their enemies. They did not have air support for the final drive to home plate and did not need it.
The futile troop surges in Iraq and Afghanistan were not proposed by Congress or the President. You cannot blame politicians for free fire zones that killed thousands of Vietnamese civilians in the lowlands, or the feckless war of hills in the highlands (e.g. Operations Greeley, Speedy Express, Apache Snow, Texas Star).
I don’t why you made a fuss about the Capitol Hill protest. Congress is an organized crime syndicate that has put the nation $30 trillion in debt. So I’m not terribly concerned that the grand pageant of grifting led by Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer was delayed for a few hours. They are the fascists and one of their gun thugs killed Ashli Babbitt, who was not armed and did not lay a hand on the culprit, who has yet to face charges for murder.
It seems unlikely that the Cooper-Church amendment would pass if not for the student demonstrations on college campuses. Your remark about restoring the draft is unsettling. Be careful what you wish for; it might not end well.
1. What surprises me is, not so much that the war on Afghanistan has been going so long, but that the system that give us this pointless war has survived so many parasites for so long.
2. Contrary to popular belief, most political and economic systems can be made to work for a while, if any as long as those systems are run by non-sociopaths. The problem is that power is to sociopaths what catnip is to cats. Therefore, sociopaths will corrode any system, given time. Sociopathic rule and entrenched interests will eventually render any system unreformable, which is when decay and collapse set in, a wiping of the slate, so to speak.
This is why, after some 5,000 of human history, different types of systems have been able to and continue to thrive.
"If anything, the way the deck is stacked in favor of perpetual war, it's surprising it happened that fast."
Yes. And that fact itself, should offer some hope. Not a guarantee or reasonable expectation that things or going to work out. But just a recognition that serendipity can rear its lovely head when we don't expect it.
I think what keeps a lot of this going are the number of otherwise decent folks who just can't visualize an alternative to the choices they're given. For them, nothing exists outside of the democratic/republican framework except a hazy anarchy -- an easy thing to reject. What they settle upon is what even they would describe as imperfect, but it's familiar, approved, "realistic", and comfortable.
In 1962 no one sat around saying, "Where the hell are the Beatles?"
Absolutely nailed it. It is as simple as that. Henry David Thoreau said most people live lives of quiet desperation. We have to take their shit because we are too busy just surviving.
I don’t think the system is broken! I think any reordering of the system would have the same outcome - people with power would control the narrative to their advantage. That is what human beings are. Capitalism that is not distorted by government interference - as Chomsky describes endlessly - has a prescription. Failure brings annihilation.
I think I’ve become a nihilist - that sucks!
I think that was a good article. Caitlin really has a Comsky like ability to pierce.
I’m a capitalist who exploits people for my disproportionate gain. I own a security guard company in Toronto. We are an adjunct service to the real estate industry which is owned by pension funds and other large pools of capital - capitalism incarnate - real bastards.
I have much insight into how government works and I can promise you it has a twisted logic, it is massively inefficient unfocused and perpetually self reinforcing. Government mandarins and bureaucrats keep programs going because it is their job to do so. The rationale is massively distorted, the efficacy of the program is incidental at best.
I think this is the human condition - self interest and duplicity - and capitalism is the solution. Animal spirit, creative destruction, competition and annihilation are altogether essential to keep humans honest. Fear, biblical fear.
It is a very big topic and beyond me, but my 27 years in the fray, where the rubber hits the road has been instructional and that is my take on it.
Caitlin I don’t think your prescription for a solution is advisable - communism has been vilified beyond redemption.
My solution: $20 an hour minimum wage or guaranteed minimum income for all humans and no government programs supporting the poor. Make the poor not poor by creating a liveable bottom echelon of the economy. Government programs syphons to much with its inherent inefficiency and perverse logic. Just give people money. The over educated, well-meaning, program loving amongst us have had their day and it has failed.
Ask poor people what they want! They will say money. Ask them what they think of the programs I have to stand in line for. They will say humiliating. Start saving them from themselves they are not children just give them money.
Stop saving them from themselves they are not children, is what I meant to say, and I must add that communism has been vilified with good reason.
I think you’re right about almost everything here but I could not retreat because of your naïve defense of communism.
Communism is: you give a small “vanguard” the absolute power to expropriate the rich. They expropriate the rich, so far so good. Then they keep all the riches and become the new rich. Plus they have absolute power. So they starve, persecute, surveil and censor.
I may be wrong, but I don't think Caitlin was giving a ringing endorsement of communism; merely that it's unfair to point out the flaws/shortcomings of a system (as in Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua) that's constantly being hobbled by sanctions, coups, terror, and assault by their northern capitalist "democracy-loving" neighbor.
(Had to delete this to correct it) I certainly agree that we should butt out and let other cultures and nations follow their own path. Maybe they’ll come up with some ideas we never thought of. But communism is a western idea too.
Yeah, history, quite a past and sufficient evidence for me - communism is wrong and murderous.
Generally I think Caitlin is spot on in her diagnosis but her prescription to treat the disease is that of a thinker - maybe not vetted by the practice of power.
That’s “I could not retweet”
Just a word about the vaccine issue. What we should be discussing and more importantly protesting about is the research that produced the virus. That is what the great preponderance of the evidence, and common sense, tells anyone who looks at it. I don't know if Caitlin has latched onto this, but I hope she does. The Chinese-US virus research at Wuhan gave us Covid-19, and the consequences of that should be stopping all such research everywhere. Instead of that, just wait a few days to see what the US "intelligence community" will cough up as their "high confidence" report. My bet is that it will be as follows: "The question of origin cannot be answered but it is extremely important to pour many more millions of dollars into this research in order to make it safer." Read: Give them more money and never mind if the next pandemic is worse than this one.
I take umbrage with Caitlin's assertion that: "Military members who support imperialism get promoted. Those who get to the top go on to work for war profiteers." This stereotype is as common as it is wrong. I spent much of my 32-year military career working closely with flag officers (admirals and generals). I do not recall ever hearing anybody say that they supported American hegemony nor did they do or say anything that could be construed as if imperialism was their motivation for serving. Having sat on promotion boards, I never heard anyone on a board ask about a candidate's achievements promoting US hegemony or imperialism much less their political orientation.
It is important for Americans, journalists too, to look beyond the Hollywood movie stereotypes that Generals got their jobs because they love war and want to be on the boards of directors of some MIC corporation someday. Such stereotypes distract voters from their power at the ballot box to replace the politicians who enable our Foreverwars. Keep in mind that it is POTUS and Congress who set the direction and force of America's hegemony; not the generals who must create the strategies to execute their orders nor the officers who must lead our troops into harm's way while the MIC and their Congressional puppets try to win at Asian dominoes or eradicate nonexistent WMDs in the deserts of the Middle East.
True, many senior military personnel do wind up as MIC executives. That is mostly because they know what their active-duty comrades need to be safe and effective in battle. Few if any who are in those jobs are motivated by greed. Most provide hands-on oversight of new systems to be deployed. In addition, I think it is fair to characterize the late-career pay received for sitting on a MIC board of directors as payback for their decades of low pay. The “average” top CEO annual compensation in 2019 was $14.5 million. Compare that to the US Pacific Commander who leads over 360 thousand troops yet was paid $198 thousand that year. Also, once retired, most flag officers only have a few good year left before retiring for good, so MIC jobs are not hitting the jackpot.
You don't have to say it when all along you are doing it. You don't even have to know what your doing to be all that effective at it if it keeps the MIC moving and thriving.
The Military is not about the MIC, as Eisenhower warned. It is about greedy Congressmen and women who depend on the MIC for money to promote their own political careers. As we have seen, it worked out swell for Obama. Nobody with half a brain would welcome the F-35 - an over-priced, unreliable, gas-guzzling fighter. But our generals and admirals do their best to make it work because their crews are at increased risk of harm if they do not. End Congressional profiteering to get re-elected, and watch the MIC shrink.
Some people think military service is about flag-hugging patriotism. Flags are tools left over from wars before the 20th century. Patriotism is for MAGA ralliers, illegal racist militias, and clueless insurrectionists to justify their fascist activities. Military service is about keeping people safe - the people in your command and innocents in combat zones. Nobody on ships or in foxholes think they are there to expand the empire. I continued to serve after being recalled to active duty after grad school because I could see how my contributions were contributing to improved Navy and DOD policies, and on occassion, by derailing stupid ones.
Wow. So the Congress is greedy and corrupt, but not Lloyd Austin, James Mattis, David Petraeus and Stanley McChrystal. Your apologist reaction for generals reads like a press release from their own desks. They are not just predatory speculators for promoting war with no reachable political goal, but also pathological liars.
No current general has proved better at getting results than Vietnam era four-stars. Such as Westmoreland (reputed to be a naive boy scout and over-optimist) and Abrams (reputed to be a disheveled alcoholic and petty tyrant). But it might be interesting to scientifically rate advances by the U.S. Army in the field of fabricating stories for political gain.
Occasionally we get a dissenting voice like three-star general Douglas Lute, who admitted ten years ago that “We didn’t have the foggiest notion of what we were undertaking” in Afghanistan. Then again this is the same frustrated genius who said that we should consider reinstating military draft calls; apparently unaware that the abolishment of conscription has largely eliminated dissent in the streets about imperialist adventures.
I agree. His gymnastical contortionism apologistic pratt is rather missing the point. The revolving door from Pentagon to Congressional or MIC is a pure example that the military and MIC are forever wed. There is no separating them. not all X doesn't absolve the system that sets up the corruption as front and center.
Of the 4 you mentioned, only Petraeus was a political operative - Flynn, unmentioned, terribly so. Few people have ever even met a general much less have a clue what their workday is like. It may be convenient for you to blame generals for military misdeeds ordered by politicians, but it is not fair. Imagine if Gen Milley had helped Jan 6 happen rather than work to undermine it. We might have had 4 more years of fascism.
The MIC is about money; not conquest. Great PBS interview tonight with Sarah Chayes about the epidemic corruption in Afghanistan. Just like in Iraq, Syria, and of course, Vietnam during that fiasco. BTW my best friend from HS was a conscientious objector while I was in Nam. Today, we both favor a return to the draft because we think it will engage more people with their government. Also, keep in mind that dissent in the streets did not end Vietnam. Dissent in Congress did.
General Milley lied about progress made in Afghanistan in the same manner that various generals lied about progress made in South Vietnam. In both cases, U.S. airpower propped up the faux security forces and disguised a house of cards that collapsed quickly when tested. The PAVN and Taliban were outnumbered by their enemies. They did not have air support for the final drive to home plate and did not need it.
The futile troop surges in Iraq and Afghanistan were not proposed by Congress or the President. You cannot blame politicians for free fire zones that killed thousands of Vietnamese civilians in the lowlands, or the feckless war of hills in the highlands (e.g. Operations Greeley, Speedy Express, Apache Snow, Texas Star).
I don’t why you made a fuss about the Capitol Hill protest. Congress is an organized crime syndicate that has put the nation $30 trillion in debt. So I’m not terribly concerned that the grand pageant of grifting led by Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer was delayed for a few hours. They are the fascists and one of their gun thugs killed Ashli Babbitt, who was not armed and did not lay a hand on the culprit, who has yet to face charges for murder.
It seems unlikely that the Cooper-Church amendment would pass if not for the student demonstrations on college campuses. Your remark about restoring the draft is unsettling. Be careful what you wish for; it might not end well.
Boom!
I should add**specifically sars-cov-2 vaccines bc they’re still considered experimental.
What you wrote about vaccine mandates is so on point.
1. What surprises me is, not so much that the war on Afghanistan has been going so long, but that the system that give us this pointless war has survived so many parasites for so long.
2. Contrary to popular belief, most political and economic systems can be made to work for a while, if any as long as those systems are run by non-sociopaths. The problem is that power is to sociopaths what catnip is to cats. Therefore, sociopaths will corrode any system, given time. Sociopathic rule and entrenched interests will eventually render any system unreformable, which is when decay and collapse set in, a wiping of the slate, so to speak.
This is why, after some 5,000 of human history, different types of systems have been able to and continue to thrive.
"If anything, the way the deck is stacked in favor of perpetual war, it's surprising it happened that fast."
Yes. And that fact itself, should offer some hope. Not a guarantee or reasonable expectation that things or going to work out. But just a recognition that serendipity can rear its lovely head when we don't expect it.
https://getoutspoken.com/middle-east/a-resurgent-taliban-promises-to-crush-gays-to-death-by-toppling-walls-onto-them
Oh, so you mean another Saudi Arabia.