6th January 2021

Giving evidence on Capitol Hill about the events on 6th January, former Capitol police chief Steven Sund made a series of interesting statements. His defence of the Capitol police was based on two arguments. The first being that the federal agencies tasked with providing intelligence ahead of the event had not warned of anything close to what was being planned. And the second was how, rather than just the usual MAGA rally crowd descending on…

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From Malthus to Trump, via Darwin, Galton, Fascism and Neoliberalsim

In 1798 Thomas Malthus published his ‘An Essay on the Principle of Population’. Originally developed as an argument in response to thinkers such as William Godwin, the aspect of the overall argument that has since become synonymous with the name Malthus is that uncontrolled populations will eventually overwhelm the resources that sustain them, and therefore will inevitably lead to mass-poverty and mass-starvation. In order to understand exactly how this idea came about it is worth…

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Is COVID-19 being used as a smokescreen for embezzling public funds?

Time and time again this government has siphoned money out of the exchequer to redistribute it to their chums. Albeit, chums that were promising to deliver a product or service to alleviate the pandemic, but which almost always turned out to be entirely unfit for purpose. By October, this policy of “pandemic profiteering”, or to put it a little more plainly, embezzling public funds during a public health disaster was being estimated to have reached…

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COVID-19 as a warning sign in an abusive relationship

The American establishment have begun congratulating themselves for the checks and balances built into the constitution which are apparently now heading off an attempted coup by a far-right group within the Republican party. The anchors, editorialists and even late night hosts are applauding one another on how a handful of Judges have seemingly stopped a cult of personality from taking advantage of loopholes in the political system. What is less likely to be mentioned is…

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Capitalism and fascism are two sides of the same coin

The term ‘fascist’ has become a useful term for many on the left for both simplifying and denigrating anyone else’s political position that disagrees with them. One of the key problems with this is that it often overlooks how closely entwined capitalism and fascism actually are. And with most of us, to differing degrees at least, active in the capitalist system it means that if we are not careful we may well overlook our own…

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Hierarchical frameworks are regressive and can only stifle progress

The modern “democratic” systems of state management and organising communities that are used around the world today are almost without exception based on hierarchical frameworks of one type or another. It is worth explaining what I mean by that. I understand a hierarchy as a system of people organising themselves based on different levels and different roles. The hierarchical framework that I am discussing is about political power, and by its very nature about the…

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We are hanging on, but only just

We are coming to the end of July, and it has been 6 months since the world, billionaires and their neo-liberal apparatchiks excluded, first properly acknowledged that we are all facing an imminent and potentially catastrophic global health disaster. At that time certain governments around the world had the basic human compassion and emotional maturity to put the well-being of their respective populations ahead of the wealth and status of their peers. Others did not.…

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The Constitution was designed to maintain exploitation through legalised state oppression, that system can not save us

While the 25th Amendment to the Constitution is the legal mechanism for removing a mentally unstable psychopath from the White House, there is no democratic mechanism for the people of the USA to initiate that process. Similarly, while Article 2 - Section 4 of the Constitution allows for the removal of a criminal or a traitor from the White House, once again the American electorate has no tangible say in that process either. The fact…

Continue ReadingThe Constitution was designed to maintain exploitation through legalised state oppression, that system can not save us

While class deference is most apparent at times of crisis, it is also at its most vulnerable to public opinion

Over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic the cultural mechanisms for maintaining class deference have been at their most apparent in years. While we are told that we are all in this together, time and again the behaviour and the subtle subtexts of the pronouncements of the 1% demonstrate that their true world view is not as egalitarian as they like to pretend. Not only do the rules for the 99% not apply to the…

Continue ReadingWhile class deference is most apparent at times of crisis, it is also at its most vulnerable to public opinion

The question isn’t whether the government should lift the lock-down, it is how many of us have to die before we say enough?

On the 4th May it was reported that an internal UK government document covering their proposed plan for lifting the lock-down had been leaked. How senior members of government, and their civil service advisers had reached the conclusion that their time would be best placed on planning to lift the lock-down is very confusing for most emotionally mature people that have a basic grasp of maths for one key reason. As of the 3rd May,…

Continue ReadingThe question isn’t whether the government should lift the lock-down, it is how many of us have to die before we say enough?