Geoff > Status Update

Manny wrote: "Zadignose wrote: "What will happen when Kushner is forced to resign for not having disclosed his meetings with Russians as part of his security clearance process?

Hopes for near future: Bannon go..."

Wouldn't hurt.

And furthermore...

If anyone's got Trump's ear, you might want to tell him something he probably ignored on that one-page briefing with lots of pictures and maps: North Korea's usual tactic in situations like this (though they're unpredictable... see YeonPyeong Island shelling attack a couple of years back) is to act as though there was never any plan to test a nuke, go on peacefully and ominously quietly, wait until the world's attention has drifted elsewhere, and then in about three and a half months, test the nuke and say what are you gonna do now?

It's a pretty obvious angle to take. And it leaves one wondering. What are you gonna do?

Let's watch Trump be surprised by this and have no plan.

Curious article from Russia Today

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.rt.c...

Please America, don't go provoking the apocalypse.

Manny wrote: "I suppose spy agencies around the world are tracking the White House kitchen's activities to see if they're baking more chocolate cake. A lot of comic potential here when they make the movie."

Uh-oh...hide the pot brownies!!

Zadignose wrote: "And furthermore...

If anyone's got Trump's ear, you might want to tell him something he probably ignored on that one-page briefing with lots of pictures and maps: North Korea's usual tactic in sit..."

Trump is surprised by everything!!! Because jhe simply has no clue...so everythhing is therefore a surprise!

Fox News soundtracked footage of the bombing of Afghanistan to Toby Keith "Courtesy of the Red White & Blue"? How can you live with yourself? What sheer cyncical barbarism and childishness and cruel insanity. The shame knows no limits. I'm embarrassed for you all on the right.

Some 'moderate' conservatives who initially had doubts about Trump's temperament to be commander-in-chief are now being won over by his willingness to blatantly provoke world war 3.

Geoff wrote: "Fox News soundtracked footage of the bombing of Afghanistan to Toby Keith "Courtesy of the Red White & Blue"? How can you live with yourself? What sheer cyncical barbarism and childishness and crue..."

Geoff,

You have to admit that it was a better choice than Variable Doorways. Can you imagine how much more pissed off you would be? By the way, "VD 5" is fantastic, sublime. Love the wow and flutter of the oscillators. Must message you about what gear you use as I am a bit of an analog synth collector.

Okay, back to the end of the world...

Everything's so stupid I can barely stay alive. But yes, analog synthesizers are wonderful things - here's to hoping the power grid survives the first round of bombings and fallout. Seriously, how can the right live with itself?

Trump/Pence actually want WW3. Please, the sane right, if you are out there, do what's honorable - remove this administration. Impeach them. There's enough there already to get the job done.

Geoff wrote: "Trump/Pence actually want WW3. Please, the sane right, if you are out there, do what's honorable - remove this administration. Impeach them. There's enough there already to get the job done."

If Russia and the US are on the same side, I have an unpleasant feeling that some military strategists may consider WW3 winnable. You can kind of see how the argument is going to go. It'd result in a few millions (probably tens of millions) of fatalities, but it wouldn't destroy the whole world.

Melenchon now tied with Le Pen in the polls. Communism may still have a chance to save the world.

David wrote: "Melenchon now tied with Le Pen in the polls. Communism may still have a chance to save the world."

Yeah, historically it's been so successful. If that's what we're pinning our hopes on, we are doomed.

Capitalism is doomed. Socialism or barbarism, now more than ever.

(Sorry, I don't mean to be flip about the history of communism, although I do think it's usually written with a heavy dose of victors' justice and a whitewashing of capitalism's often comparable crimes...I just think the current system is failing badly, and I hope for an alternative other than the right-wing goon squad.)

David wrote: "Capitalism is doomed. Socialism or barbarism, now more than ever."

Do you know many people that lived under communist regimes? I know tons. Not a single one would agree with you. As for barbarism, I don't know if you're joking. I know you used to live in a "communist" community, but you did so within a larger apparati that allows for plurality of belief--or at least used to. They ain't the same thing.

Are you aware that demographic studies of the former Soviet Union show that the imposition of capitalism in the nineties led to millions of excess deaths?

The end of communism meant horrible immiseration for the vast majority of people.

David wrote: "Are you aware that demographic studies of the former Soviet Union show that the imposition of capitalism in the nineties led to millions of excess deaths?

The end of communism meant horrible immis..."

What about the, oh, 45-million or so deaths that occurred under Stalin? Was that better? And any Romanian of a certain vintage will tell you that the hardships they endured were far better than Ceaușescu'a various pogroms.
Not that the examples are limited solely to the USSR or Eastern European countries, or even history for that matter. North Korea and China are shining examples of communistic happiness.

Stalin died in '53. I'm talking about the nineties.

There's a certain ideological scale to which atrocities are remembered and which are forgotten. Like, who even knows about this artificial, preventable famine. Yet Churchill is usually remembered as a great hero where Stalin is seen as the embodiment of evil. http://www.tehelka.com/2014/06/rememb...

No, I'm not joking when I call capitalism barbaric.

You said communism or barbarism, not that capitalism was barbaric.

And what year did Ceaușescu die?

Are you contending that these people were in any way good or that communism worked in their countries?

In a word, no.

It is true, however, that the dissolution of the USSR was a catastrophe for the vast majority of its citizens (the study I mentioned did not include Romania, as it was Soviet bloc but not technically part of the USSR).

I actually said socialism or barbarism. You're right, communism is a more loaded term and I somewhat regret using it. I do really hope Melanchon wins, however. A lot is riding on the Fench election.

I don't think it's at all unreasonable to say that the current system - capitalism- has us racing towards a cliff and we need to try and build an alternative.

David wrote: "In a word, no.

It is true, however, that the dissolution of the USSR was a catastrophe for the vast majority of its citizens (the study I mentioned did not include Romania, as it was Soviet bloc ..."

Not unreasonable at all. Promoting barbarism is a different matter though. Same with communism.

This book could be of interest here.

Organic Marxism

David wrote: "Yet Churchill is usually remembered as a great hero where Stalin is seen as the embodiment of evil. ."

I gagged when I saw that mass-murdering chemical weapons-using racist bulldog on the #1 spot of the 100 greatest Britons of all time.

I reckon defeating Nazism was enough to absolve him of all his war crimes. But no thanks is given to the Soviets without whose help the war couldn't have been won.

My British friends react with total surprise when they hear Churchill taken to task, esp by the desis. They have not been told the full story of "the greatest Briton."

Clearly the Bengal famine was a horror and a disaster. A large part of the blame should likely go to imperialism, war, and corruption.

It's also a more ambiguous case than the three prior major famines in India under British rule, in 1769-70, 1876-79, and 1896-1900, which were economic and policy failures more easily and directly attributable to the British, and responsible for a total of maybe 26 million deaths, though there have been both higher and lower estimates.

The wiki article on the 1943-44 famine is surely worth a read, and I know, I know, wiki is not the be-all-end-all, but it surely gives a different perspective than the linked Tehelka.com article which lays 100% of the blame on the British, and indulges in such pronouncements as "the British, managed to kill almost 4 million Indians in just over a year, with Prime Minister Winston Churchill cheering from the sidelines." It might well be that the British were partially blame for some of the 1.5 million deaths with a coldly indifferent Churchill shrugging on the sidelines... bad enough, but... this was not an act of intentional genocide to be compared with the Nazi extermination policies.

Post-scarcity and fully automated World Communism sounds like a pretty boring and meaningless existence for humanity. Not that this postmodern late-capitalist spectacle is very meaningful in any way.

But meanwhile, yeah, stop Trump NOW.

That's the main point, right? He's a bum, and a threat to all. A moron and a maniac. And should not be propped up nor ever called "presidential."

Niklas wrote: "Post-scarcity and fully automated World Communism sounds like a pretty boring and meaningless existence for humanity. Not that this postmodern late-capitalist spectacle is very meaningful in any way."

I have to say - on a personal, aesthetic level - I do get a certain frisson living in the grotesqueness of late capitalism.

As to the conversation above, sure, historical communism was a brutal failure, destroying millions of lives and bringing out the worst tyrannical instincts of humanity. When all is said and done, the exact same thing will be said of historical capitalism. There has to be a different way forward.

Zadignose wrote: "such pronouncements as "the British, managed to kill almost 4 million Indians in just over a year, with Prime Minister Winston Churchill cheering from the sidelines." "

Yes, this is hyperbolic. The consequences of Churchill's policies shouldn't be compared with the genocidal Nazis, but he hardly deserves the gong-giving plaudits showered upon him from right and left. History is much more murky than the sanitised image he's come to enjoy. Not to mention his love for chemical weapons.

Sir Winston Churchill would get a posthumous trial if there was any justice in international affairs. But we know that will never happen.

For Trump, sometimes I wish he wakes up one morning after a night of unsettling dreams and finds himself transformed in his bed into a monstrous cabbage.

Why not, the guy has an IQ of Fox news anyway...

Love David avoiding every question and point Cody brought up. He's lost his fucking mind. Enjoy your pipe dream of a communist Utopia. Your openness for violence in the name of Marxism is complete lunacy and yet everyone here gives you a pass for it.

Nick wrote: "Love David avoiding every question and point Cody brought up. He's lost his fucking mind. Enjoy your pipe dream of a communist Utopia. Your openness for violence in the name of Marxism is complete ..."

It would be absurd for Marxists to deny the violence and destruction that historical communism brought - it would also be absurd for capitalists to deny the violence and destruction that keeps capitalism limping along. David is pointing out this problem.

Nick wrote: "Love David avoiding every question and point Cody brought up. He's lost his fucking mind. Enjoy your pipe dream of a communist Utopia. Your openness for violence in the name of Marxism is complete ..."

Relax. I don't think anyone in here is seriously rallying for a return to Communism and its horrors, but it would be nice to rein in uncontrolled capitalism for a change.

That said, while Commusim has been dead and buried for decades, I do think that capitalism and its excesses the world over get a free pass. No one is serious in talking about capitalism's wars and the theft of resources from weaker people/nations. Those who raise the issue are dismissed as starry-eyed commie throwbacks.

Not just historical. Lest we forget those in North Korea and China. I'm not denying anything laid at capitalism's door. I just think that communism as a solution is absurd. You're right, Geoff, there has to be a better way. But it certainly isn't communism. Its inefficacy in practical application has been vetted. How about trying something else, cause neither are working.

North Korea might be seen as an unholy extension of historical Commusim, they are surely behind time.

China is communist in name only. It stopped being communist a long time ago.

Yeah, China at this point is authoritarian capitalism.

China's humanitarian crimes against its own is unspeakable since the advent of communism. Call it what you will. They still see fit to call it communism.

Cody wrote: "China's humanitarian crimes against its own is unspeakable since the advent of communism. Call it what you will. They still see fit to call it communism."

Yeah, and we like to call ourselves a democracy...

Cody wrote: "China's humanitarian crimes against its own is unspeakable since the advent of communism. Call it what you will. They still see fit to call it communism."

uh, you guys do know, don't you, that Marxism and Communism are not the same thing? well, maybe you don't

Marxism is explicitly enshrined as part of the Chinese constitution. "Communism" a la Stalin is not. Anyway, I've about had it will this discussion. 3000 posts is enough for me.

Geoff wrote: "Cody wrote: "China's humanitarian crimes against its own is unspeakable since the advent of communism. Call it what you will. They still see fit to call it communism."

Yeah, and we like to call ou..."

You really think the US and China are comparable in terms of atrocities to their populations?

Cody wrote: "Geoff wrote: "Cody wrote: "China's humanitarian crimes against its own is unspeakable since the advent of communism. Call it what you will. They still see fit to call it communism."

Yeah, and we l..."

No. Not to their own populations. To the world at large, I'm not so sure. I also think a lot about climate and workers rights and labor deaths and things like arms supplies and violence encouraged or enabled rather than directly committed. Our violence is not just in our bombs and drones. It's entwined in our business interests, our military and our economy are one and the same, on the world scale. On the world scale, historically, we are probably worse. You know that some years 75% of the world's armaments are supplied by the US?

Ted wrote: "Cody wrote: "China's humanitarian crimes against its own is unspeakable since the advent of communism. Call it what you will. They still see fit to call it communism."

uh, you guys do know, don't ..."

Thanks for your condescension. Really moves the conversation forward.

China's Marxist ideology has resulted in catastrophe, be it now or in recent-late history.

Or you might want to ask the overwhelmingly black prison population how they feel the United States treats its own population. Or all those whites dying unemployed from opioid addiction or suicide. Ask them how the US is helping them out.

Cody wrote: "Geoff wrote: "You really think the US and China are comparable in terms of atrocities to their populations? "

How far back are we allowed to go? 1900s? 1800s?....1600s?

Jibran wrote: "Cody wrote: "Geoff wrote: "You really think the US and China are comparable in terms of atrocities to their populations? "

How far back are we allowed to go? 1900s? 1800s?....1600s?"

Lol yeah I was keeping it present tense but really the reply should have been SLAVERY

Geoff wrote: "Or you might want to ask the overwhelmingly black prison population how they feel the United States treats its own population. Or all those whites dying unemployed from opioid addiction or suicide...."

Did I ever say they were? Do you think I don't know that the country was borne upon the bloodied backs of slaves? Or that the institutionalization of white supremacy is synonymous with America. Give me a break. America has always been dispositioned towards anything not white and male. You think I fucking agree? No.

Cody, I was only saying perspective is everything here - the US is many things. It is wonderful to men like Donald Trump. It is a death sentence to people like Trayvon Martin.

And it should also be remembered the US never does things only to its own population - all our business, and the consequences of what we do on all scales are global. All our stuff is made elsewhere, our pollution crosses all borders, our workers are Indonesia's workers, our technological needs are the Congo's problems as much as they are ours, etc. Globalization doesn't permit borders. This is the problem with Trump's (faux?) isolationism. It doesn't describe the world as it is.

I've never once advocated for Trump. I hate the fucking maniac. I don't know why you assume I'm unaware of the intrinsic evils of globalization. You're forgetting to mention the rise of monoculture as one of its more unforgivable crimes. I personally celebrate the variety of different cultures, all invariably disappearing in the name of money.
I gotta get some sleep.