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keep_left

keep_left's Journal
keep_left's Journal
February 14, 2025

It's telling that not only was there no mention of Russia, Ukraine, etc...

...but also no mention of several other problematic European regimes, Orban's Hungary in particular. That's probably because Trump, Vance, Eloon, et al. see Orban's "leadership" as a how-to manual for the USA.

February 14, 2025

Oh, yeah, I think that's definitely true when it came to...

...movement conservatives, the Orange County type in particular (see the book Suburban Warriors for a good discussion of this especially pernicious strain of movement conservatism). But the postwar planners were largely not movement conservatives. They were largely the Kennedy liberals. An argument could be made that they got bogged down with their ambitions in Vietnam, but there was probably more to it than that. Part of it (at least) is that our leadership just got complacent. And then they were ultimately defeated by the movement conservatives, who have laid waste to the New Deal consensus for 40 years now--and they continue to do so.

https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/suburban-warriors-lisa-mcgirr/1129969754

February 14, 2025

The worst part of the nation's decline is that 50 years ago...

...any idiot could see what was coming if we didn't get some sort of plan. The post-WWII economy was dominated by the US mostly because we were the only large economy that hadn't been completely smashed. Wartime and post-war planners both knew things wouldn't stay that way forever. By the '60s, Japan had made huge strides in technology, and I don't need to belabor the point by discussing the history of Japanese auto manufacturing in the '80s. But throughout all of this, American business and government leaders did little or nothing. Soon those of us in the Midwest began seeing metastasizing urban wastelands and brownfields, which later became known as the "rust belt".

February 14, 2025

We all benefit from Federal programs, Eloon...

...even those we don't use personally. Many of them help people and create additional jobs in secondary and tertiary ways. Like how food stamps help out the American farmer, not to mention the local grocer. But unfortunately, our nation has chosen to go down the road of that old Thatcher aphorism "there is no such thing as society": the very distillation of neoliberalism. Richard Pryor called it "the logical conclusion of the logic", where absurdities are believed without question.

https://democraticunderground.com/100219543234#post7
https://democraticunderground.com/100219530804#post19

February 13, 2025

RFK Jr also said that he wants the CDC to "take a break"...

...for several years when it comes to studying infectious diseases. You know...diseases like Covid and avian flu.

February 13, 2025

Yeah, I was going to suggest that. It seems to me that most...

...of the Trump regime should be sterilized based on that criteria. Certainly those like Stephen Miller, Corey Lewandowski, etc.

February 13, 2025

Yep. There were stories in the press (posted here)...

...about MAGA idiots denying Covid as they were breathing their last. Then there was the sad spectacle of Covid patients asking for the vaccine on their deathbeds, long after it would have helped.

February 13, 2025

Nothing speaks to the MAGA death drive like antivax politics.

How many Americans did we lose to this virus? 1,000,000+?! And we're quite possibly on the brink of another pandemic (avian flu). Yet these morons want to throw away our toolbox for fighting Covid. It's just infuriating!

February 12, 2025

Does anyone know what Trump's fixation with the Kennnedy Center...

...is about? This has to be some sort of Kulturkampf thing, but I'm at a loss as to why. I'm guessing it has to do with some obscure passage in the Project 2025 documents, or maybe it's because Trump overheard one of Steve Bannon's alt-right Nazi rants about "degenerate art".

Whatever the case may be, I've never heard an account of why Trump has suddenly become so interested in the performing arts. When (or if) we get a cogent explanation, it's bound to be equally entertaining and colossally dumb, I'm sure.

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Member since: Thu Apr 15, 2004, 05:56 PM
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