Link to an interview with Boots Riley:
Tag: Politics
W.T. Whitney – Climate Change
Link to an article by W.T. Whitney Jr.:
“Climate Change: What About the Marxists?”
Bonus links: “This Changes Some Things” and “Survival of the Richest”
Arun Gupta – A Tale of Two Tweets
Link to an article by Arun Gupta:
Bonus links: “Sorry, Bernie, We Need Radical Change” (this article does a good job summarizing the seemingly non-replicable quirks that led to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s primary election victory, but succumbs to reliance on self-defeating populist demonizations) and Crowds and Party
Zola Carr – Medicalizing Society
Link to an article by Zola Carr:
Bonus links: “Are We Governed By Secondary Psychopaths?” and “The War Inside Your Head” and “Mental Health and Neoliberalism” and “Are the Young People That Shrinks Label as Disruptive Really Anarchists With a Healthy Resistance to Oppressive Authority?” and “Social Service or Social Change?”
Slavoj Žižek – Quote about Democratic Socialists
“what do democratic socialists effectively want? The rightist reproach against them is that, beneath their innocent-sounding concrete proposals to raise taxes, make healthcare better, etc, there is a dark project to destroy capitalism and its freedoms. My fear is exactly the opposite one: that beneath their concrete welfare state proposals there is nothing, no great project, just a vague idea of more social justice. The idea is simply that, through electoral pressure, the centre of gravity will move back to the left.
But is, in the (not so) long term, this enough? Do the challenges that we face, from global warming to refugees, from digital control to biogenetic manipulations, not require nothing less than a global reorganisation of our societies?”
Slavoj Žižek – “The US Establishment Thinks Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Is Too Radical – With an Impending Climate Disaster, the Worry Is She Isn’t Radical Enough”
Slavoj Žižek – Saudi-Canada Spat Reveals the Real New World Order
Link to an article by Slavoj Žižek:
Jason Hirthler – Russiagate and the Men with Glass Eyes
Link to an article by Jason Hirthler:
“Russiagate and the Men with Glass Eyes”
Bonus links: “Clinging to Collusion” and “Fake News on Russia and Other Official Enemies” and “Mueller Investigation Seeks to Implicate WikiLeaks and Julian Assange in ‘Russian Interference'” and “Be Careful What You Ask For: Wasting Time with Manafort, Cohen, and Russiagate” and “Leaked NSA Report Is Short on Facts, Proves Little in ‘Russiagate’ Case” and “Demonization of Russia in a New Cold War Era” and “Remembering Alger Hiss in the Age of Russia-Gate” and “How the Department of Homeland Security Created a Deceptive Tale of Russia Hacking US Voter Sites” and “Hey Intercept, Something is Very Wrong with Reality Winner and the NSA Leak” (plus combative interview) and “Someone Finally Connected the Dots: Russiagate is Helping Trump” (“this massive belief that Russia is some sort of existential threat to western society, is entirely the result of failed western elites needing a scapegoat for their own failures.”) and “Money Still Rules US Politics” and “A Look Back at Clapper’s Jan. 2017 ‘Assessment’ on Russia-gate” and “Iraq’s WMDs Found…In Russia” (with delicious irony: “Surely no reputable newspaper would give front page coverage to unproven allegations made by political operatives working against the Party and personages currently in power, right? Doing so could be perceived as taking sides in an internecine political battle to undo the democratic will of at least a bit more than a quarter of eligible voters.”) and “Finally Time for DNC Email Evidence” and “Why Russiagate Will Never Go Away” and “Russiagate and the Dry Rot in American Journalism” and “RussiaGate as Organised Distraction” and “From Russia, with Panic” and “The Unanswered Questions in the Latest Russian ‘Meddling’ Allegations” and “Western Journalists Are Cowardly, Approval-Seeking Losers” and “On The Media Of ‘Russiagate’ And Related Fake Stories” and “The So Far Non-Existent Vulkan Leaks” and “The Democratic Money Behind Russia-gate” and “Leaked Files Reveal the Steele Dossier Was Discredited in 2017 — But Sold to the Public Anyway”
Alfie Bown – Video Games Are Political
Link to an article by Alfie Bown:
“Video Games Are Political. Here’s How They Can Be Progressive”
Bonus link: “Socialism at Play”
Jodi Dean – Four Theses on the Comrade
Link to a video of a lecture by Jodi Dean:
(Note: Dean begins speaking at about 12:00 minutes in; fast forward to that point)
Her distinction between “survivors” and “systems” here, and suggestions for moving past that dichotomy, are very useful. See also Crowds and Party Review and “The Limits of the Web in an Age of Communicative Capitalism”
Joe Lauria – Clinging to Collusion
Link to an article by Joe Lauria:
Rather curious how much press this unsubstantiated “Russian meddling” trope gets, whereas the old story of tampering with voting machines by Republican party operatives received little: “The Ghost of Rigged Elections Past: New Revelations on the Death of Michael Connell”. See also “Reflections on Media Gone Russia-Wild” and “The Utility of the RussiaGate Conspiracy” and “Why Is Russiagate Rumbling Into the 2018 Midterms?” and “The Road to Disaster?” and “The New York Times as Judge and Jury”