Week-end Wrap – Political Economy – January 19, 2025
By Tony Wikrent
Strategic Political Economy
Can nonviolent struggle defeat a dictator? This database emphatically says yes
[Waging Non-Violence, via Naked Capitalism Water Cooler 01-14-2024]
“[T]he Global Nonviolent Action Database, or GNAD, built by the Peace Studies department at Swarthmore College. Freely accessible to the public, this database — which launched under my direction in 2011 — contains over 1,400 cases of nonviolent struggle from over a hundred countries, with more cases continually being added by student researchers. [T]he database details at least 40 cases of dictators who were overthrown by the use of nonviolent struggle, dating back to 1920. These cases — which include some of the largest nations in the world, spanning Europe, Asia, Africa and Latin America — contradict the widespread assumption that a dictator can only be overcome by violence. What’s more, in each of these cases, the dictator had the desire to stay, and possessed violent means for defense. Ultimately, though, they just couldn’t overcome the power of mass nonviolent struggle.”
[Lambert Strether: “I would like for this to be true. I would also want to check those 40 cases for contamination by spook-driven color revolution, and the geopolitical context.”]
Krzysztof Tyszka-Drozdowski [American Affairs Journal, via Naked Capitalism 01-18-2025]
REVIEW ESSAY
Le Défaite de l’Occidentby Emmanuel Todd
Gallimard, 2024, 384 pages
....European elites have yielded to what Todd calls the anti-ideology of “Europeanism.” It is an anti-ideology insofar as it does not allow for any active political community to emerge: the upper classes have been captivated by the belief that nations should not exist. In this respect, Europeanism is very similar to Anglo-Saxon ultraliberalism, which also dismisses the nation as a pernicious fiction. According to Todd, this belief manifests in various ways, primarily through efforts to abolish nations via European integration or to fragment them by geographically separating minorities, ultimately increasing atomization in the name of multiculturalism.2 Without a shared moral compass, society disintegrates “into isolated bubbles, confined to their own problems, pleasures and pains.” In this condition, the governing establishment constitutes nothing more than another “autistic group,” says Todd, with the only difference being its greater visibility.3
At a more practical level, the abandonment of the national framework in economic thinking has led to many policy mistakes that have weakened European states. Alternatives to liberalism have been stamped out, reducing economic policy exclusively to making the labor market more flexible or to cutting public spending. Another consequence of rejecting the concept of the nation is the neglect of demographic issues....
David Leonhardt [New York Times, via Naked Capitalism Water Cooler 01-16-2024]
“one major part of Biden’s agenda has a decent chance of surviving. It was the idea that animated much of the legislation he signed — namely, that the federal government should take a more active role in both assisting and regulating the private sector than it did for much of the previous half-century. This idea has yet to acquire a simple name. The historian Gary Gerstle has called it the end of the neoliberal order….
The philosophy didn’t originate with Biden, but he meaningfully shifted the country toward it, first as a candidate in 2020 and then as president. He moved the Democratic Party away from decades of support for trade liberalization and imposed tariffs on China. He pursued an industrial policy to build up sectors important to national security (like semiconductors) or future prosperity (like clean energy). And his administration was more aggressive about restraining corporate power than any in decades, blocking mergers, cracking down on ‘junk fees’ and regulating drug prices….
Trump will surely undo major parts of the Biden agenda, especially on climate change and some aspects of corporate regulation. In other ways, though, Trump is part of the shift away from neoliberalism. He romped through the 2016 Republican primaries partly because he was more hostile to trade, China and cuts to Medicare and Social Security than other Republican politicians. Some of Trump’s second-term nominees, including for labor secretary and head of the Justice Department’s antitrust division, are hardly small-government neoliberals. Neither is Vice President-elect JD Vance.”
Wall Street could get a boost from $1 trillion in buybacks, Goldman says
[Reuters, via Naked Capitalism 01-18-2025]
Goldman estimates that companies could spend some $1.07 trillion on buying back their own stock this year
The Competency Crisis Is Not About DEI
Ian Welsh, January 15, 2025
That DEI (women and brown people) are responsible is a constant right wing cry.
The competency crisis is a result of an economy where making money without making a product is easier than making something. We prioritized financial profits—multi generational rises in asset prices that were faster than inflation. Housing went up. Stocks went up. Private equity earned money buy buying companies, larding them up with debt, and running them into the ground. Profits were juiced by moving production offshore and engaging in regulatory and labor arbitrage.
The best profit came from playing financial games and rentierism. You didn’t have to make anything or delivery anything, you just had to find a way to squeeze money out of something by making it go up faster than inflation, or by destroying something which was already built, taking all the future value now and giving it to yourself….
Everyone wanted to make money without having to create to get it. Mostly they either wanted to get unearned money from appreciation, to destroy what others had built, or to capture a market in an oligopoly or monopoly so they could juice prices.
Meanwhile, the manufacturing floor moved to China and elsewhere. The people who knew how to make things retired, moved to other jobs, retired and eventually died.
We can’t build most things because we haven’t prioritized building things, or getting better at building things since the 70s. The eighties are where predatory capitalism took hold, and since then the whole game has been rentierism, unearned gains, predation and arbitrage….
Global power shift
Lee Slusher [via Naked Capitalism 01-15-2025]
Britain’s post-imperial delusion
[Unherd, via Naked Capitalism 01-15-2025]
Gaza / Palestine / Israel
Trump’s Mideast Envoy Forced Netanyahu to Accept a Gaza Plan He Repeatedly Rejected
[Haaretz, via Naked Capitalism 01-14-2025]
Trump’s Action Demonstrates Biden’s Failure In Stopping The Genocide
[Moon of Alabama, via Naked Capitalism 01-16-2025]
Oligarchy
Biden’s Farewell Warning About The Master Plan
David Sirota, January 19, 2025 [The Lever]
A president who has both warned of corruption and courted oligarchs sounds a final alarm on his way out of the swamp…. as irritating as Biden’s hypocrisy is, his statement is undeniably accurate. In light of that, as we approach this week’s two big political events — the Trump inauguration-turned-billionaire gala and the 15th anniversary of the Citizens United decision that opened the door to unlimited corporate political spending — perhaps Biden’s last Oval Office speech can be seen as two things at once: an absurd contradiction but also a desperate call coming from inside the house.
[Brasil de Fato, via Naked Capitalism 01-14-2025]
The carnage of mainstream neoliberal economics
The story of how two Beverly Hills farmers privatized water in California
Yasha Levine [weaponized immigrant, via Naked Capitalism 01-15-2025]
The pistachio billionaires who guzzle more water than all of fire-ravaged
[Los Angeles Daily Mail, via Naked Capitalism 01-16-2025]
[Lambert Strether: “With shoutout to Yasha Levine!”]
Speculation: Euthanasia Will Become Coercive
Lyman Stone [via Naked Capitalism 01-16-2025]
Credit Card Default Wave Hits U.S. Banks
Doug Casey [via Naked Capitalism 01-15-2025]
They’re not capitalists — they’re predatory criminals
[X-Twitter, via Naked Capitalism 01-13-2025]
Ivor Caplin, the former chair of the Israel lobby group the JLM, which is closely linked to the Israeli embassy, has been caught by paedophile hunters attempting to meet a child. He was chair of the organisation during the campaign to oust Corbyn.
Billionaire Robert Miller accused of being secret pedophile who preyed on girls as young as 11
[Daily Mail, via Naked Capitalism 01-16-2025]
“Robert Miller, 81, allegedly paid minors for sex between 1994 and 2006 and recruited them with the assistance of employees from his company, Future Electronics. This week, Quebec Superior Court Judge Catherine Piché ruled that a class action launched by three of Miller’s alleged victims could proceed. ‘These extremely serious acts allegedly took place over several years, when they were between the ages of 11 and 17,’ she wrote in her decision, according to CBA. ‘The court should not, at this stage, consider the merits of the dispute and it should take the facts as proven, unless they appear improbable or manifestly inaccurate.’ The class action has been launched by three women who allege they were victims of Miller, and also targets Future Electronics. If the class action is successful, Miller could be ordered to hand over up to $150million in damages. Lawyer for the plaintiffs Jeff Orenstein told the court he’d been approached by 51 alleged victims.”
Health care crisis
2 Ways To Deal With Healthcare: Democratic Socialist Bernie Sanders & Kansas Crackpot Roger Marshall
Howie Klein, January 13, 2025 [downwithtyranny.com]
...Roger Marshall, a very extreme Republican— and an obstetrician— is also a member of the HELP Committee. He has a very different way at looking at health than Bernie does, basically, blame the victims and kick them while they’re down. He has long worked to repeal ObamaCare, claiming that some people “just don't want health care.” Yesterday, Peter Wade reported that as Marshall and other Republicans line up to slash healthcare the Kansas senator claims that “Americans who are sick and dying should mostly blame themselves for their health condition. ‘Look, about 70 percent of your health outcomes are determined by you,” Marshall said Sunday on Fox News’ Sunday Morning Futures. ‘It’s determined by what you eat and what you’re surrounded by. By the time you come to my office as a doctor, I can impact maybe 10 or 20 percent of your health outcomes.’….
[Rolling Stone:] ”This narrative that Americans are responsible for their own health outcomes through the choices they make at the grocery store helps justify the forthcoming gutting of health care protections and access. And it conveniently ignores other systemic social determinants of health such as poverty, racism, and economic instability.”
America’s Coming Public Health Crisis
Melody Schreiber, January 15, 2025 [The New Republic]
Efforts to stop the spread of infectious disease have always suffered from a cycle of panic and neglect. Vaccine skepticism in the new administration brings even greater challenges.
[TW: I want to get this on the record.]
Drug Commercials Aren’t Just Annoying — They’re Costing You Money
Helen Santoro, January 13, 2025 [The Lever]
Information age dystopia / surveillance state
Whatever the Spook State Wants… Tulsi Gabbard is the latest to go into a room and come out reformed
Thomas Neuburger, January 15, 2025 [God’s Spies]
Collapse of independent news media
Washington Post traffic craters, loses $100M amid identity crisis as talent, readers flee: reports
[New York Post, via Naked Capitalism Water Cooler 01-14-2024]
“The Washington Post’s readership reportedly cratered during Joe Biden’s presidency — and the Jeff Bezos-owned broadsheet lost $100 million last year alone — as the embattled paper continues to suffer an exodus of top talent. The left-leaning [sic] publication drew about 2.5 million to 3 million daily users to its site last summer, a fraction of the 22.5 million daily visitors at its peak when Biden took office in January 2021, according to internal data shared with Semafor. The plummeting site traffic led the business to lose around $100 million on weak subscription and ad revenue in 2024, the Wall Street Journal reported.”
Climate and environmental crises
I Was There. I Know What Caused the Los Angeles Firestorms.
Philvarn, January 15, 2025 [DailyKos]
Democrats' political malpractice
Kamala Harris Paid the Price for Not Breaking With Biden on Gaza, New Poll Shows
Ryan Grim, January 15, 2025 [Dropsite]
Letters From the February 2025 Issue
[The Nation, January 14, 2025]
Weber and Mystal argue whether it’s voters’ greed or bigotry that is to blame for electing Trump. Apparently inside the blue identity bubble you are not allowed to admit: (1) that we are an oligarchy and not a democracy anymore; (2) that Democrats have become the champions of the Forever Wars; (3) that the Biden-Harris administration is—even now—engaged in an ethnic cleansing that has ended thousands of innocent lives, destroyed America’s standing in the world, threatened international and domestic law, and showered our country in shame; (4) that donors control the Democratic Party and the wants, needs, and fears of ordinary voters have no weight inside the party at all anymore.
I get that you are not allowed to admit these things that virtually every American already knows, but in case there are any people still aligned with the war party who have the moral fortitude to look in the mirror and stand up for something real, here is the reason you lost: You are okay with slaughtering children.
[Informed Comment, via Naked Capitalism 01-14-2025]
Letters From the February 2025 Issue
[The Nation, January 14, 2025]
In “What Was the Biggest Factor in Kamala Harris’s Defeat?” [January 2025], Isabella M. Weber and Elie Mystal debate whether it was the cost-of-living crisis or bigotry that was more decisive. Neither factor demolished Harris’s candidacy; it was “status-quoism” and its heresies, hypocrisies, and hubris that upended otherwise functional democratic governance. Jeet Heer’s penetrating analysis in the same issue [“All-System Fail”] cannot be overstated: “Democrats lost because they allowed Trump to be the only voice of antiestablishment rage.”
The Democrat Who Defied The Trump Wave
Amos Barshad, January 16, 2025 [The Lever]
Chris Deluzio keeps winning a Republican district in the nation’s most pivotal swing state — could he point the way forward for his floundering party?
(anti)Republican Drive to Civil War
DOGE Nation: How Musk's Tech Bros Plan To Hijack And Dismantle American Democracy
Howie Klein, January 12, 2025 [downwithtyranny.com]
[TW: How do (anti)Republicans square DOGE with the Congressional authority or oeversight, with their enthusiasm for the killing of the Chevron doctrine? ]
The Dark Money Plan To Spend Your Tax Dollars On Bitcoin
Freddy Brewster, January 17, 2025 [The Lever]
Right-wing fossil fuel operatives are pushing Trump and state governments to buy billions of a volatile cryptocurrency, jeopardizing taxpayer dollars and the environment alike.
The Embarrassing Riffraff Of Evangelical Christianity Sees Señor T As God’s Wrecking Ball
Howie Klein, January 11, 2025 [downwithtyranny.com]
[ProPublica, via Naked Capitalism 01-14-2025]
The Shadowy Millions Behind San Francisco’s “Moderate” Politics
Laura Jedeed, January 6, 2025 [The New Republic]
The city is the epicenter of an anti-progressive movement—financed by the ultrawealthy—that aims to blur political lines and centralize power for the long term. For some, their ambitions don’t stop there….
...the anti-progressive groups have pushed a “normal versus bizarro” framework that has proved useful in painting progressives not as fellow residents with different ideas, but as dangerous wackos outside the bounds of acceptability. It’s the kind of thing that short-circuits discussion, a good-versus-evil battle that feels all too familiar in American politics writ large. “If you call yourself progressive, it’s almost a dirty word. You’re putting yourself in a category which is politically outside, because it’s been dehumanized,” Jeff Olsen, an IT security expert and native San Franciscan, told me over coffee. “That was not the case eight years ago, or five years ago.”….
The anti-progressive movement has exploited wedge issues and fostered a climate of distrust, and one of the most prominent of the “moderate” groups, TogetherSF, makes this strategy explicit—at least behind closed doors. Internal documents leaked to local progressive watchdog organization Phoenix Project, and reported by Mission Local, lay out a four-part plan for “growing an engaged (and enraged) community.” ….
“At first, when we were talking about it, it sounded very conspiratorial,” Phoenix Project executive director Jeremy Mack told me. “But then, as you start showing the money … it became a very clear line of: Oh, this is all coming from these like two dozen billionaires.”
I wrote about those plutocrats in November for The New Republic: the interlocking donations, the massive amounts of dark money, and the donors with a history of supporting Republican candidates and causes. At least one of them supported Trump in past elections, but many more are Never-Trump Republicans—which may explain why they’ve successfully passed themselves off as moderates. If arch-neocon and warmonger Dick Cheney has a seat on Team Blue, why not William Oberndorf, the billionaire behind Neighbors for a Better San Francisco who also chairs Betsy DeVos’s school choice advocacy organization and donated $2.5 million to Mitch McConnell’s Senate Leadership Fund? Why not John Kilroy Jr., the real estate magnate who gave $1 million to Neighbors for a Better San Francisco (and also sat on the board of California’s largest Republican PAC), or William F. Duhamel, who donated to the National Republican Senatorial Committee in 2023?
Civic republicanism
Can a Society Endeavor To Protect Itself From The Deprecations Of The Oligarchs And Plutocrats?
Howie Klein, January 05, 2025 [downwithtyranny.com]
Dutch War Archive Online! Or Better Not? Who Betrayed Who?
Toon Janssen, January 11, 2025 [downwithtyranny.com]
If anyone thinks that during the Second World War everyone in the Netherlands was against the German occupier, then that person is very much wrong. It is generally believed that only between 30,000 and 45,000 people were part of coordinated resistance, divided over multiple operating cells. According to sources, that is only half a percent of an average 9 million population over 5 years of war. Among them were many communists, artists and Jews. Many of them did not live to tell, because they were executed by Nazis. The number of individually operating participants in resistance, including people in hiding and their helpers was bigger however, an estimated 350,000. People also showed their dissatisfaction by striking, by using false distribution coupons or doing courier work, to mention some minor jobs. The vast majority of the population however, demonstrated a sense of powerlessness and resignation, embedded in a mentality of loyalty and adaptation to the oppressor. The Nazis characterized Dutchmen as Germanic peers and prepared them for national socialist ideology and inclusion into a Greater-German Empire….
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