Fascism 2.0

 

Advanced authoritarianism has no need for prison camps, gulags, and stalags.  Those methods of control are inefficient, expensive, so last century. Now the ruling class has captive ‘news’ and ‘social’ media and zealots to distract, mislead, and indoctrinate the masses in place, in their homes. It is relatively cheap, and you can even make money selling crap to your audience.  Fat golfers can pitch gaudy basketball sneakers.  

 

Better yet, portray yourself as their savior and solicit donations!  Money for nothing and the clicks for free! 

Winkin’, Blinken, and Nod

Proxy wars: that’s what friends are for. It is when one big power uses (‘supports’, pays) people in a small country to fight against another big power. Russia uses the Donbas region natives to fight, and their claims to justify, its war of aggression against Ukraine. In the last century, the US supported the Taliban in Afghanistan against godless Russian Commies. Success of proxy wars depend on how closely the goals of the big and small powers are aligned, which often changes over time. For now, Ukraine is the West’s proxy against would-be conqueror Putin.

The Lincoln Brigade supported the democratic, republican side against Franco’s fascist nationalists in the Spanish Civil War. Many idealistic Americans took up the cause. Most were socialists and communists, and they probably would’ve been appropriately named Marx’s Militia, but they adopted the more widely appreciable name. Now, we could encourage (pay for) a brigade of volunteers to support Ukraine, named (informally) in honor of the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, who has done as much as any American to support Ukraine.

With a nod to reality, we should acknowledge the mix of good and bad nuts in our society. The bad ones like to strut around with ‘long guns’ (rifles) and shoot other humans, including innocent fellow citizens. We should encourage them to join up, go to Ukraine, and channel their demons by shooting Wagner group mercenaries, kept in check with military discipline enforced by good nuts (idealists). 

Better to be sailing the stars with the original trio, but first things first.

NYT Finance/Drama

 

Ad Astra (so we can then go home)

Pitt is an astronaut going to find his dad who was thought to be lost decades ago on an expedition to Neptune but who might be behind energy surges that are killing people on earth. On route, they respond to an emergency call from an animal health orbiter. No reply when they near the craft. Upon entering, they are attacked by crazed monkeys. Pitt then has a psychological profile (one of several, a theme in the movie) where he relates to the monkeys' rage, his rage at his father’s abandonment, his worry that’s all there is. Very flat delivery, nearly emotionless.

Voice over much like "Apocalypse Now" but with less obvious story, less exposition. He fails his next psych profile but stows away aboard the next flight that, after he is told by a secret recording of an apparent mutiny his father put down, is clearly aimed at destroying his dad’s outpost. His presence is detected immediately at launch, leading to a fight where all but the crew dies, not his fault though he accepts responsibility. Aphorisms from his dad, odd videos, more and more AN with dad as Kurtz. Not the heart of darkness but the vacuum of darkness. He finds dad, fights, ‘let me go, son’, ‘why go on…’. But he does, let go and go on.

Amazing graphics. Pinpoint sun, multiple axis of movement, weightlessness, backgrounds, lighting and reflections. Holding a panel like a shield against rocks in orbit, like a snowstorm?! Anyway, interesting use of momentum. Then using the explosion destroying his dad’s outpost to help propel him home?? Trivializes the geometries and forces of interplanetary flight. Final psych profile, ending “submit”: “I am active…focused on the essential to the exclusion of all else…” and wife is waiting. “I will rely on those close to me and I will share their burdens as they share mine.” (Nice line!)

They grafted a ridiculously optimistic ending onto a fundamentally hopeless story, which produced a profit at the box office instead of an expensive dud but did not fool anybody, really, hence the marginal public scores. Not bad. 3.8

A Proposal for Modesty

We all make mistakes, so don’t feel too superior if you find yourself in a discussion over the holidays with a 2016 Trump voter. We all thought Trump would improve his behavior after winning the election, maybe even ‘pivot’ after taking office. Most of his voters probably expected that he would move from provocative to productive, once in power. Even the many who considered him deeply offensive expected him to moderate his rhetoric and try to unify a larger slice of the electorate.

So, admit it, you were probably also surprised (proven wrong) as Trump’s behavior went from bad to even worse. Nobody expected his lying to actually accelerate. Nobody expected him to withhold aid to an ally, in a shooting war with our enemy, in seeking personal political advantage. Nobody expected him to besmirch our long-standing allies and befriend some of the most undemocratic despots. Nobody expected him to blow up the deficit (ok, strike that, many did). Even those who wanted stronger enforcement of immigration laws did not envision the inhuman cruelty of separating children from parents. Even those who wanted to get tough with China did not plan on arbitrary tariffs, withdrawal from beneficial trade agreements, and self-inflicted economic damage with no end in sight.  Even those who think our military is overextended did not expect us to abandon noble allies to suffer the revenge of Syria, Turkey, and Russia.

How do you persuade your interlocutor to change their vote in 2020? Stating the simple truth, that they behaved foolishly and should ‘wake up’, or something like that, won’t produce a pleasant conversation or the outcome you desire. Instead, first try to find something praiseworthy in what motivated them to vote as they did – maybe a general feeling that ‘things are heading the wrong direction’, be it wealth disparity, climate change, trade imbalance, budget deficit… find something. (Presupposing they are not outright racists, acolytes of Ayn Rand, or anti-vaxxers, in which case they are probably allergic to logic or common sense so just quit). Then point out, as gently as possible, how disappointing the last 3 years have been and how unlikely it is to improve. If that doesn’t work, ask them what distinguishes steadfast from just plain stubborn?

Moronge

tRump is the orange lying moron with a bad comb-over.  Superficial does not capture the deep falseness of this creep. How far our country has fallen from the honorable, "cannot tell a lie" Washington and "Honest Abe" Lincoln to the dishonorable "cannot tell the truth" tRump.

Moronge

"America will never be destroyed from the outside.  If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves". -- Abraham Lincoln 

Traitor tRump is doing his utmost to hollow-out our nation, degrade it, make its people lose their decency and honor.  

Foreign "Entanglements" of Recent Republican Presidents

Eisenhower was an excellent president.  With quiet tact and diplomacy, he had successfully led the largest foreign engagement ever, the allied reconquest of Europe.  Like U. S. Grant before him, he knew that war is hell and that almost any 'other means' are better than sending countrymen to hell.  Nevertheless, the Republican Party went straight to hell after him.

Nixon betrayed US peace plans to end the Vietnam war, promising better terms to South Vietnamese President Thieu. This occurred before Nixon was President, making it not only a violation of law but treasonous. Nixon later forced Thieu to take the same deal. The war raged for almost another decade, killing tens of thousands of Americans, hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese, and costing hundreds of billions of dollars.

Nixon, along with unindicted co-conspirator and war criminal Henry Kissinger, secretly and illegally expanded the war into Cambodia and Laos, causing the deaths of tens of thousands, destabilizing Cambodia, and leading directly to the horrors of the ‘killing fields’ of Khmer Rouge.

Reagan re-started the cancelled B1 bomber program, costing a cool $100 billion. The bomber was never needed in war, having been supplanted by the stealth B2 bomber, but it helped the arms industry of Reagan’s home state of California. Reagan also imagined a missile defense system that was developed at a cost of billions but still, even after decades and hundreds of billions of dollars, certainly isn’t reliable and may not work at all.

Reagan sent Marines into Lebanon with no mission. They soon were withdrawn, but not before hundreds were killed in a bombing of their barracks. Reagan was the anti-Teddy Roosevelt: teaching terrorists in the middle east that Americans “talk loudly and carry a limp stick”. This fiasco cost mere hundreds of millions of dollars but also the lives of more hostages and hundreds of Marines.

Reagan encouraged a Marine Colonel to break laws prohibiting arms trafficking to the Contras of Nicaragua. This lowly White House staffer arranged secret sales of missiles and warplane parts to Iran, breaking our own embargo. The sales were intended to curry favor with the Mullahs, but no hostages were released and, predictably, new ones were taken. Money from sales (minus fees) secretly bought arms for the Contras, who were essentially right-wing terrorists opposing the democratically-elected Nicaraguan government. Providing arms was explicitly prohibited by Congress. The cost of this “neat idea” in lives and dollars were relatively light but our reputation as a democracy functioning under rule of law, not subject to the whims of a petty politico-military clique, was tarnished.

Bush (the elder), as VP under Reagan, was responsible for overseeing the arms-for-hostages-and-Contras deal. He could never remember what meetings he attended or what was discussed or decided. He apparently misunderstood his ‘oversight’ responsibility, thinking it was advice to overlook, instead of to stop, malfeasance and illegality.

Bush sent the armed forces to capture Manuel Noriega, a former ally and CIA source.  Seems his buddy had gotten a little greedy in profiting from drug trafficking and was named in a US court.  Hundreds of Panamanians were killed.  It would've been so much easier to just invite his buddy up for a drink and arrest him.

Bush was ‘surprised’ when erstwhile buddy Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, though his ambassador, forewarned, had said "we have no opinion on the Arab-Arab conflicts, like your border disagreement with Kuwait". Bush, goaded by Thatcher to ‘man up’, formed a coalition of the ‘willing and the billing’ to recapture Kuwait. Then he encouraged opponents to rise up in revolt against Hussein. When they did, Bush declined to risk the coalition and allowed Hussein to use his aircraft and tanks to crush the rebellions. This debacle cost the lives of thousands, hundreds of billions of dollars, and further eroded our reputation.

Bush (junior) ignored explicit warnings that terrorists sought to fly ‘airplanes into buildings’. On 9/11, terrorists did exactly that. Bush went AWOL (again), flying off on Air Force One, leaving VP Cheney to start wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Bush, Cheney and the Defense Secretary Rumsfeld all dodged the draft during Vietnam but were eager to send the army overseas in a ‘permanent war’ against terror and terrorists, with unclear or unobtainable goals. Soon, employing torture (enhanced interrogation), kidnapping (rendition), and imprisonment without trial (Gitmo), we had become what we professed to fight.

Bush and Cheney lied about Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction and about his links with Osama bin Laden. Their contrived war against Iraq cost thousands of American lives, tens of thousands of Iraqi lives, and hundreds of billions of dollars. 

Trump, another draft dodger, seems also eager for war with persistent tough talk and saber-rattling. “Conventional” war is not good enough, not big enough for this dotard, he wants to go toe-to-toe, nuclear conflict, with whomever (except the Russians who are so helpful with cash and probably not the Chinese who produce Trump stuff)…but North Korean, Iran…

You could look it up.