Patriot Act 2.0 will be rolled out with a lot of mindless bleating about white supremacists and fighting fascism and the actual policies and laws put into place will have virtually nothing to do with any of those things. It will be geared at preventing the revolutionary changes that need to be pushed for via grassroots activism in the United States.
How might we get out of the current mess? For a possible answer, I'll go back to last summer's fit of statue-tipping.
It was as if we collectively slapped ourselves on the head and exclaimed, "Hey, wait a minute! The Confederate generals lionized in the statues were TRAITORS! And they owned SLAVES!! Tear them down!"
But why were the statues there in the first place? There were specific reasons in different places but the general attitude was one of reconciling ourselves to our past and trying to symbolically welcome back into the union (with spotty success) the many southerners who fought for what they regarded (with some justification) as a noble cause. Through the erection of statues and a few other gestures, a somewhat greater peace was achieved than would likely have occurred otherwise.
I see no such impulse in the current environment to acknowledge the frustrations of many Trump voters who feel (with some justification but little fact-based specificity) that they've been trod upon and held in contempt for decades by a heartless corporate and elite establishment in ways that have very little to do with race and quite a lot to do with class. In fact, there seems to be a trend in the opposite direction among the elites, who appear to feel empowered (among other things) by the outcome of the Senate elections in Georgia.
So maybe we need to start thinking about how we can re-erect those statues.
Sleepy Joe is now being given credit for being the "author" of the Patriot Act- pushed it in the 90's, but was shelved until GWOT was declared. Patriot 2 will be for "domestic" terrorists and liberals will cheer them rounding up white gun nuts and "insurrectionists", until they come for their progressive causes. Most Americans are basically ahistorical, in that they can barely remember yesterday, much less the lessons of history. Look up eco-terrorists and animal rights activists- early FBI targets of domestic terrorists.
Reforming the FCC should be first and foremost. Reinstating the Fairness Doctrine, which would take down FoxNews, possibly Rush and Alex Jones kinds of things (as to why - noted below). Repeal the 1996 Telecommunications Act which takes the corporate cable ownership and other regulatory actions that originally were put in place to protect freedom of the press. Having a station use our airwaves to create cults, and promote lies and propaganda needs to be omitted. That's not censorship. It's recognizing that the Television/ and now computers invade homes and its too easy to capture their lives with that kind of stuff. It's the same to me as making subliminal messaging illegal. Manipulation of people is not free press - its a whole other intent.
I'm new to your work and I agree with a lot in this piece. A couple questions though:
1. Are there a few articles or resources online one could use to "wake up a critical mass of people to how fucked things really are"? (i.e. what are some good comprehensive articles for someone whose interested / not a shitlib)
2. when you say, "Those institutions don't give a shit about silencing the right, they want to implement measures to silence you." who is the "you", and haven't they been silencing the right for years?
How might we get out of the current mess? For a possible answer, I'll go back to last summer's fit of statue-tipping.
It was as if we collectively slapped ourselves on the head and exclaimed, "Hey, wait a minute! The Confederate generals lionized in the statues were TRAITORS! And they owned SLAVES!! Tear them down!"
But why were the statues there in the first place? There were specific reasons in different places but the general attitude was one of reconciling ourselves to our past and trying to symbolically welcome back into the union (with spotty success) the many southerners who fought for what they regarded (with some justification) as a noble cause. Through the erection of statues and a few other gestures, a somewhat greater peace was achieved than would likely have occurred otherwise.
I see no such impulse in the current environment to acknowledge the frustrations of many Trump voters who feel (with some justification but little fact-based specificity) that they've been trod upon and held in contempt for decades by a heartless corporate and elite establishment in ways that have very little to do with race and quite a lot to do with class. In fact, there seems to be a trend in the opposite direction among the elites, who appear to feel empowered (among other things) by the outcome of the Senate elections in Georgia.
So maybe we need to start thinking about how we can re-erect those statues.
Sleepy Joe is now being given credit for being the "author" of the Patriot Act- pushed it in the 90's, but was shelved until GWOT was declared. Patriot 2 will be for "domestic" terrorists and liberals will cheer them rounding up white gun nuts and "insurrectionists", until they come for their progressive causes. Most Americans are basically ahistorical, in that they can barely remember yesterday, much less the lessons of history. Look up eco-terrorists and animal rights activists- early FBI targets of domestic terrorists.
Don't worry, 'we' have ten years?
“ . . . our best estimate is that the net energy
33:33 per barrel available for the global
33:36 economy was about eight percent
33:38 and that in over the next few years it
33:42 will go down to zero percent
33:44 uh best estimate at the moment is that
33:46 actually the
33:47 per average barrel of sweet crude
33:51 uh we had the zero percent around 2022
33:56 but there are ways and means of
33:58 extending that so to be on the safe side
34:00 here on our diagram
34:02 we say that zero percent is definitely
34:05 around 2030 . . .
we
34:43 need net energy from oil and [if] it goes
34:46 down to zero
34:48 uh well we have collapsed not just
34:50 collapse of the oil industry
34:52 we have collapsed globally of the global
34:54 industrial civilization this is what we
34:56 are looking at at the moment . . . “
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxinAu8ORxM&feature=emb_logo
Reforming the FCC should be first and foremost. Reinstating the Fairness Doctrine, which would take down FoxNews, possibly Rush and Alex Jones kinds of things (as to why - noted below). Repeal the 1996 Telecommunications Act which takes the corporate cable ownership and other regulatory actions that originally were put in place to protect freedom of the press. Having a station use our airwaves to create cults, and promote lies and propaganda needs to be omitted. That's not censorship. It's recognizing that the Television/ and now computers invade homes and its too easy to capture their lives with that kind of stuff. It's the same to me as making subliminal messaging illegal. Manipulation of people is not free press - its a whole other intent.
I'm new to your work and I agree with a lot in this piece. A couple questions though:
1. Are there a few articles or resources online one could use to "wake up a critical mass of people to how fucked things really are"? (i.e. what are some good comprehensive articles for someone whose interested / not a shitlib)
2. when you say, "Those institutions don't give a shit about silencing the right, they want to implement measures to silence you." who is the "you", and haven't they been silencing the right for years?
A very short equation I came up with:
1. "Legacy media narrative minus objective debate = PROPAGANDA"
2. Er...
3. ...that's it.
Thank you Caitlin for voicing exactly what I think/feel. Keep up the good work
Yes!