Medicare For All

Having turned 65 last September I can now laze around enjoying my first entitlement from Big Government, Medicare. It definitely has sapped most of the initiative the Free Enterprise system had previously installed and I can't wait to get my social security check this coming birthday so I can stop innovating altogether. I can be a walking moral hazard, waiting for others to do things for me as I sloth around.

But seriously, for the Democratic Socialists to place Medicare for All as their priority policy position seems like an attempt to make "democratic" capitalism more bearable, rather than less. The assumption is that the masses will see that making health insurance a public provision will cause them to question other for-profit sectors, leading them to question the profit motive altogether. Then we can have some form of democratic socialism. But is there any evidence to support this hypothesis? Have social democracies in other parts of the world advanced to true worker ownership of the means of production?

I think such social provision has allowed capital to expand into new sectors and gain increased legitimacy in the mind of workers. Along with the Google-ization of the workplace (relaxed atmosphere, good wages, worker buy-in, etc) this is capital's revolutionary ability to morph and insinuate itself into every cultural and psychological niche.

So if your day is starting to go a little too well you can check out the article on global coal development and then read some of the comments people have posted. The extent to which people can pull the wool over their own eyes is truly remarkable. And along with the ideological rubble there is the total lack of agency; everyone looking to someone else to solve the problem or encouraging us to vote for the right candidate. I'm sure the folks at the Aspen Institute have a plan.

Storm of Progress

I woke the other morning from a vague vision/ dreamscape of Paul Klee's Angelus Novus and Walter Benjamin's prophetic take from his Thesis on the Philosophy of History. Weird, right? I hadn't read the thing in years and then barely understood the basic premise. But then I realized I had been reading about the California fires and wondered if my subconscious was trying to work something out. Benjamin writes:

"a storm is blowing in from Paradise, it has caught in his (Klee;s Angel) wings with such a violence that the angel can no longer close them."

This is the storm of progress and now a whole town and dozens, perhaps hundreds of corpses turned to ash, are part of the "wreckage" piling up at the angel's feet. The wind is that generated by a fire storm so fierce everyone remains stunned just trying to imagine it. We are in what the prophetic thinker called "a moment of danger", a place where "the state of emergency is not the exception but the rule." These fires and floods will be a first world problem but it is unlikely to lead to the kind of food riots we will see in poorer parts of the world. I agree with Benjamin's prescription that "it is our task to bring about a real state of emergency", one which threatens the ruling order.

I really have trouble, therefore, with this emphasis climate groups place on the fossil fuel industry. Framing the conflict as one between them and their customers is a way not to have to confront the actual system of production and its perverse logics, logics which go way beyond a particular economic sector. Are we to believe that it was only Exxon scientists who made the connection between emissions and global warming? That's absurd on its face. Do we expect the corporations to do anything but dissemble and lobby and produce slick campaigns and front groups?


Then there are the true believers who still think the system can deliver justice:
"The central demand of Tuesday's "Green New Deal Day of Action" is for Democratic lawmakers to champion Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's (D-N.Y.) proposed Green New Deal select committee and "create a climate plan in line with what science and justice demand."
So far they have nine congresspeople out of how many? 535? How much time will they put into this?

Going Nowhere Fast

The oil industry is in a state of incredible volatility right now with last month's high price of crude suddenly crashing. Record amounts are being produced by the 'majors' USA, Saudi Arabia and Russia with other OPEC partners also going great guns. What's goin on? Geo-political intrigue? Drunken speculators, total chaos, a sign of America's new-found greatness? Who the fuck knows. I thought we were supposed to be running out of oil but they are pumping it as fast as they can. Whatever.

Speaking of crude, Bill McKibben ( can't help it, more Bill Bashing) has a piece in the NY Review of Books where he re-states the standard, worn-out claim that the climate crisis can be traced back to "the power of the fossil fuel industry". And then he ironically goes on to say "we need a major shift in our thinking". This is his idea of a "major shift": turn to "civil society" to "pressure" the policy makers. Whoa! So outside of the box! And so "in an era when politics seems at least temporarily broken" he imagines a "Green New Deal". I suspect this looks a lot like Norway with solar panels, a return to Keynesian "common sense" and a touch of RE-distribution.

But let's not get too nostalgic for a past that never was; the New Deal didn't end the depression (that took war) and it depended on a top-down command and control process, your basic Leviathan, with minimal popular participation. It also saved capitalism from some revolutionary forces which were building real steam. It was "social containment to avoid 'a world transformed'". Which fits into Mc Kibben's agenda as well.

Liberals continue to believe "policy makers", to "provide incentives", thereby managing a transition without a lot of upheaval and turmoil. That ain't how it works. It's a con that they get taken on over and over due to willful blindness and a lack of imagination and desire. Remember: don't be afraid to want what you truly desire.

Arm the Jews

Special Arm the Jews sale; buy any three weapons and we will donate one AR 15 to any synagogue of your choice! Comes fully loaded with extra clips and instruction manual! Better Armed than Harmed!

What we really need in times like these is for Jon Stewart and perhaps Michelle Obama to hold a Return to Sanity Rally. They could plead for some civility and decorum, for rational debate and respect for opposing opinions. Mixed with a little ironic detachment and a smirk or two, of course. Because the thing is, the Republican base understands it is just entertainment, a crazy reality show you get to participate in. The Dems still believe "politics" are some solemn, sacred ritual full of profound meaning. Chris Hedges kind of gets it:

"The efforts by the Democratic Party and much of the press, including CNN and The New York Times, to discredit Trump, as if our problems are embodied in him, are futile. The smug, self-righteousness of this crusade against Trump only contributes to the national reality television show that has replaced journalism and politics."

Hedges tries to explain this in terms of "the cult" but I believe it might be more productive to think of this appeal in terms of joissance. Of course it is horribly tragic that Trump's fans can't see the degradation at the root of their pleasure, that they can't imagine anything beyond spectating. But at least they don't pray for "sanity" to be restored.

And here I am imagining Alex Jones interviewing Steve Bannon and the minister of the Westboro Baptist Church on the subject of the recent Brazilian elections. And wondering how how the #Me too movement might explain all the women supporters of the chauvinist victor, or Trumps adoring female fans.