General Politics Discussion (II) [ARCHIVED] • Page 871

Hilarious:

 

I think Trump just happened to watch the Bart vs. Australia episode

 

Any updates on the prisonn revolt?

 

God I hope this happens a thousand times a day from here on out. And I want pictures (video would be nice too) every single time.

 

How would a war with China even work? Ugh, I don't wanna think about it.

 

Guess he's gonna be looking for a new doctor soon.

 

Like Supreme Leader Trump would give them the franchise.

 

One of my favorite posts since the launch of chorus.fm.

 

Democrats Should Not Fear the Nuclear Option

 

This is to say that the entire discourse pinning the blame for Trump on the “white working class” is suspiciously opaque and impressionistic on matters where precision is vital, and that (partly as a consequence) the argument is incoherent and verging on meaningless. It is nebulous in its definition of class, barely even inaccurate in its apprehension of actual voting patterns, and overly glib and summary in its analysis of whiteness and its functions. The “white working class” which it invokes is a reification, a sock puppet, and a scapegoat. And it is scapegoating in a way that is logically incoherent. "The “white working class” has, like the rest of the US working class, borne a terrible burden in declining workplace conditions, stagnant real wages, the evisceration of industries and unions and in some quarters declining life expectancy. Yet we are also to believe that it, almost single-handedly, chose the most important and powerful global leader. Even if it were the case that they were disproportionately present in Trump’s base, which is far from obvious from exit poll data, one would have to account for the constraining structures of capitalist democracy. The US electoral system is more directly organised by capitalist class power than other democracies, and f Fund-raising requirements are only one part of this problem. The dominance of the system by two parties of business, with barely any democratic or even strictly ‘party-like’ structures, organised by business-aligned elites, makes it very difficult to mobilise alternatives. This is one of the reasons why there has never been a successful labour-based party in the US. The strategy of takeover by the ‘grassroots’ succeeded only in the Republican Party, where the candidate preferred by the base was a self-funding billionaire. Workers, white or not, are left with choices emerging out of a balance of forces favouring capital. The majority, it seems, simply don’t vote.

The trope most likely survives and is perpetuated because, in so many ways, it is a useful cover story. It appears to explain, without actually leaving anyone informed. It appears to critique racism, without actually disclosing anything about it. Worse, it is often used to justify recourse to racist policies in a mournful way, as if it is a necessary evil to prevent far worse expostulations on the part of this mythical group, many of whose notional members are among the first to engage in protest and civil disobedience to obstruct Trump’s ‘Muslim ban’. It even appears to say something about class, although most of its advocates would find reference to the “capitalist class” vulgar: why does no one ever inquire into the racial politics of the white bourgeoisie? Given the salient role of capitalists and administrators of capitalist states in devising racial oppression, be it Jim Crow and equivalent ‘colour bar’ systems, various forms of ‘race management’ in the workplace, or the modern system of mass incarceration, this is an odd oversight. It displaces attention from the sheer, structured weight of white-supremacy as an enduring system rather than just a value on the part of neo-Nazis, militias and Klan members. It is the sort of construction of psephologists and newspaper leader writers that appears profound, and profoundly explanatory. It is at best a far-from-ideal shorthand; at worst, as in these cases, a conservative stopgap for analysis, and one which supports the wider authoritarian and anti-democratic lurch from which Trumpism benefits."


What’s the Matter with the ‘White Working Class’? | Salvage

 

i dont know much, but i know i like this

 

Better cut all federal funding for North Dakota while he's at it.

 

Donald Fucking Trump giving morality lessons, lol.

A reported Donald Trump order that could severely restrict the rights of women and gay people has been leaked and it's terrifying

 

it may or may not have been good strategy, but i can see why Clinton focused on the unique threat Trump presents.

this isn't to ignore the historical through lines.

 

But...I thought we were supposed to be cheering him for declining to kill Obama's LGBTQ protections...

 

So which Democratic senator asks Gorsuch if Garland should have gotten a hearing?

 

My money would be on Franken, Feinstein, or Leahy. If Feinstein really is retiring in 2018 she could be potentially the toughest of them all. Potentially. But barring that, Franken went in hard during the cabinet hearings so I expect him to do the same this time.

 

Who's gonna take her seat? I assumed Newsome was running for Gov....