When Not Writing

Much of my time not writing or fishing is spent in the climate activist world. locally I organize with an ecosocialist working group that is part of western Montana DSA. I also work with a group which calls itself System Change Not Climate Change. They have been around since 2014 and maintain a great website which can be found here. This is where some of my non-fiction can be found. Unlike most of the editorial committee members, I am not a scholar but I enjoy the process of research and citing sources to reinforce arguments. I'm learning huge amounts and get a lot of confidence from working with this amazing group. I also meet with an international organization called the Global Ecosocialist Network. Again, these are respected scholars and writers from many parts of the world and they are way out of my league in terms of credentials. But I think it is important, and inspiring, to hear perspectives from other countries. Their website can be found here. Living in a very conservative, rural part of the country, a radical can easily feel isolated and alone. These folks keep me feeling as though I am part of something larger.While I don't buy the notion there is an "arc of hicstory that bends towards justice", by surrounding myself with smart, dedicated people, I can still believe radical change is possible.

Life : Powered

This organization, Life: Powered, and its parent org, the Texas Public Policy Foundation are the kind of fossil fuel shills I write about in my novel, Oblivion's Cross (now available on Amazon) In the book I call it F.R.E.E , the Foundation for Research on Energy and the Economy. The idea is, the industry rounds up a bunch of psuedo- intellectual ghouls willing to whore themselves for a cushy job, which is not hard to do. They write position papers and lobby legislatures and write op eds to support the industry which "supports" them financially. Your basic propaganda machine. Much of the novel is centered around James Beam, a founder of FREE, and big-wig ceo hell-bent on accumulating profit and prestige. As I developed this character I was interested in the degree of cynicism vs authentic belief he wrestled with, that is, what is the true nature and role of ideology. Wish I could get as glowing a review in the NY Times as Vauhini Vara got for her debut novel The Immortal King Rao. Good to see anti-capitalist climate fiction making its way into the mainstream. Kim Stanley Robinson has been leading the charge and his novel Ministry For the Future does a good job of making a political point while keeping the reader ( mostly) engaged. There are some places where it lags.

A Liberal's Idea of "Structural"

Again NY Times. In an opinion piece about homelessness, liberal columnist Farhad Manjoo opines about the "structural causes of homelessness" which he defines as "underdevelopment". This is because he doesn't understand the meaning of structure. Or he does but wants to keep his job and so obfuscates instead. As an intelligent person he of course notices there is plenty of development. It is just obscenely unequal, or what a Marxist would call uneven. Farhood does notice that there are untold numbers of people who are working "full time" ( to be considered worthy, you need to work 40 hours a week!) but are still unhoused. His solution is to give to charities, the classic liberal response, especially around the holidays. In this ideological construct "there will always be poor amongst us", just a sad fact of life, and so the fortunate ones give to the less. And then write virtuously about it. Nothing feels better than giving and that's the whole point ,isn't it? Feeling better? The "structure" is actually the way society organizes production and allocation. It is the property relations developed over centuries. NIMBY vs YIMBY is the result of the structure. Local zoning codes and the so-called "politics" around them are the result of the structure. Don't confuse cause and effect. We all know that Farhad goes to plenty of homes where each family member enjoys five or even ten thousand square feet. Where they each have three or four bathrooms. Homes that you could fit hundreds of tents in. But he never writes about that little issue.

Our Fate is in the Hands of Children

Not in a good way. After viewing the Times' DealBook interview of Sam Bankfraud, and following the links to other Silicon gurus, I'm realizing those Tech commanding heights are controlled by children. That is, Gen X ers who never grew up, because they didn't have to. These are Peter Pans in jeans and t shirts hauling in billions with a B and inventing NEW THINGS. For instance, the old altruism wasn't cool so they invented "effective altruism". It's NEW. So it must be better. Crypto itself is NEW and it was supposed to be revolutionary, because, you know, it's a NEW currency. So it would really undermine capitalist inequality and injustice, by eliminating central banks. The libertarian children thought of this. Leaving it to old normies to fix things like climate change or healthcare or housing, these kids want to solve NEW problems like artificial intelligence. I mentioned the constant grousing the NYTimes and other media does about China's Covid restrictions. How the bad government is interfering with the liberty of The People. Sound eerily familiar? Well now that they are easing up on restrictions the Times is worried about vulnerable old people. About a severe outbreak. The real worry, as always, is the global economy.

The Big Lie and Ye

Popourri of devolution in our times: Starting with this nifty bit of reporting from the NY Times: "Venezuela was once among the most affluent countries in Latin America, its economy buoyed by oil. But mismanagement and corruption by leaders claiming socialist ideals plunged the economy into disarray, while Mr. Maduro and his predecessor, Hugo Chávez, gutted its democratic institutions." This did not come from an opinion piece mind you. It is the quintessential piece of ideological propaganda from the "paper of record". Love the bit where Ye and his posse crashed dinner at Mar a Lago. You can't make this stuff up. Kanye asked Trump to be his vice=president. This is the culmination of a process Guy Debord described in 1967 as The Society of the Spectacle. Thesis 111 says it pretty well: The "crumbling of the worldwide alliance founded on beureaucratic mystification". The veil is dropped, the mask removed. Of course Feuerbach saw its outlne much much earlier: But certainly for the present age, which prefers the sign to the thing signified, the copy to the original, fancy to reality, the appearance to the essence, this change, inasmuch as it does away with illusion, is an absolute annihilation, or at least a reckless profanation; for in these days illusion only is sacred, truth profane. Nay, sacredness is held to be enhanced in proportion as truth decreases and illusion increases, so that the highest degree of illusion comes to be the highest degree of sacredness. I also think it is fascinating that when Louisiana resists Covid restrictions liberals call them reactionary hicks. But when Chinese people resist, they become valiant freedom fighters. And now we have an entire conservative cultural movement based on being asleep. They mock awareness and celebrate obtuseness and indifference. "The worst are filled with passionate intensity" as we slouch toward the outer limits of banality.

Crypto Exchange?

I'm trying to understand this whole FTX meltdown, how it can be that people sunk billions into this thing that did what? They trusted some young guru because why? Crypto exists because it can do what? The NY Times warns that "contagion" can spread through the financial markets. Because some casually frumpy, millenial geek charmed people? This is the essence of our age of anxiety. Not only don't I know what a crypto echange does, I don't know what crypto does. I don't understand how a blockchain works or why anyone would sink their hard earned money into NFTs. I assume the exchange made profit by taking a cut on every transaction but why did people use it as a bank? Did it pay high interest? How did the geek earn multiple billions of dollars? If average people can't understand these huge forces operating in our society, affecting our economy and culture, there is going to be anxiety and it will manifest in different ways. Some of the anxiety will be subconscious, a vague disquiet that dark forces are at work manipulating you in unknowable ways. Which they are. But the real force is operating in plain sight. It's not a "new world order". It's the old world order using new technology. The tech industry is booming one minute and laying people off the next. But what do they do? What do they make? What did all those people do that is now suddenly unneeded? How can these people get so insanely rich so fast? What the fuck is happening? Long, long ago I knew two guys, sons of wealthy people, who gambled on everything. Not just cards and sports, but the most obscure events or arguments, these guys would put money on the outcome. They loved and were addicted to gambling. Maybe that's whats happening.

What Climate?

In all the reporting on election results and the issues that influenced voters I have not seen climate change mentioned even once. Perhaps a Democrat candidate mentioned it in a speech or a Republican used it as an example of "wokeness" but it was not a big factor in deciding races. Most voters had little knowledge of the Inflation Reduction Act or know that COP 27 is taking place at this moment. It would seem that the Supreme Court helped the Democrats prevent a Red wave. Inflation, which you might have thought would drag down Dems, wasn't a thing either. It seems to me there is a kind of exhaustion with all the freaks and clowns, a weariness. It turns out entertainment has its limits. You can only hang out at the circus or amusement park so long, right, and then you want to go home and rest. John Kerry and Biden went to Egypt to sell market solutions to African nations drowning in debt. Turn the investors loose with a profit motive and they will innovate solutions to the crisis. Just ask Bill Gates or Bill McKibben. He was on Ezra Klein's podcast for an hour and never said the word capitalism. For him the bogeyman is fossil fuel corporations who are run by unethical, devious, mean people. Bad eggs are dooming the planet. Not that very many people give a shit.

What To Believe?

There is significant disagreement within the left as to where blame for the invasion of Ukraine should lie. A faction insists Putin's prime motive was NATO expansion, another sees the imperative of energy markets and Capital accumulation as central. Could both be correct? Could it have been a convergence of intersecting power plays? Then there is the liberal explanation whereby Putin is driven by mystical imperial designs and historical ethnic grievances. Certainly the NATO explanation is the simplest, perhaps explaining its poularity. To unravel the relations between Gazprom and the Russian state and Europe - not to mention US LNG and Chinese interests- takes an expertise in international relations few possess. I guess I could also throw the US "defense"/ arms industry into the mix because there is plenty of profit to be made there. Does it really even matter in the final analysis? Its all capitalism in crisis, whether it's the breakdown of the regulatory order and alliances or the breakdown of the trading system and financial flows. It is reminicent of the debates following the attacks of 9/ 11. The instinct is to find solidarity with victims and seek perpetrators to blame. Seek the simple answer that supports a logic you already understand. Which can lead to all kinds of bizarre, uncorroborated speculation. The bottom line, as we will witness with the upcoming COP negotiations, is that Capital has no answers to the climate crisis and capitalism can't deliver on its promises of peace or prosperity.

Non Event

Remember when the COP meeting was a big deal? Even prior to the last one in Glasgow there was a big hype about "saving the planet", the true believers all marching and carrying signs demanding this or that from the "negotiators". But judging by the mainstream media, nobody really cares that they are meeting again next week in Egypt. I'm sure Amy Goodman will be covering it. All the emphasis has shifted from negotiators to The Market. It is market forces which will save us, not agreements. Here is some Democrat from Hawaii: “Nobody’s waiting to see whether the announcements at COP come out exactly as the diplomats hope,” Mr. Schatz said. “Everybody is starting to understand that there is an extraordinary amount of money to be made saving the planet, and it’s not a smart bet for the future to bet against what the markets are saying and what the United States has committed to.” The Market has always known that poor people will suffer and the already rich will grow wealthier because capitalism. "Everybody knows" as the song goes. I just heard some NGO climate expert type guy say he at times feels like a "serial masochist" for continually showing up for COPs. Greta Thunberg is doubling down on "blah blah blah" by calling COP "an opportunity for big polluters to greenwash" and blaming the profit system for inaction. The dominant narrative is that we need to rely on gas because of the "intermittancy" of renewables. They want to turn gas into hydrogen using tons of energy, storing the CO2 underground and selling us the electricity for lots of money. Meanwhile Ukraine is demonstrating how one deals with intermittancy. Lots of people around the globe are happy to get any electricity, intermittant or not.

Silicon Valley Ideology Will Ruin Us

The high tech innovators have their own ideas of what "radical solutions" means, when it comes to climate change. A couple of true believers from Miami Dade County are figuring out how to maintain capital accumulation and profit as South Florida gets pounded by hurricanes and the seas continue to rise. According to them, the answers will come from a new "global climate center for climate solutions" being built in New York. This can only happen though, if "it can avoid lengthy permitting processes and resident resistance, which often thwart new ideas, as it experiments with fresh approaches to the climate threat. These so-called sandboxes for innovation are where we can take risks, rapidly learn what options work and commercialize and scale them up." The high techies will save the planet if people and government regulation will just get out of their way. The smart people will go to their incubator and come up with brilliant solutions which they can scale up and "commercialize" and make billions off of. 3D printing sea walls, for instance. Resistance from people trying to protect ecosystems "thwart new ideas". Using crisis to make money is their idea of "radical" but of course it is the oldest play in the book. One of the authors, Galen Treuer, leads climate tech and economic innovation in Miami-Dade County’s Office of Economic Development. So we know what he gets paid to do. Of course this tech management is all dressed up in progressive development speak. We will "create vibrant , connected communities". Not sure who "we " is. It's all about "long-term well-being, which means adapting communities to be resilient, affordable, inclusive and economically viable in deeply rooted ways." These people are deeply rooted in Silicon Valley start-up ideology and have no real answers.

Who's In Charge?

The story is not that Lizz Truss made some bad decisions, the story is that the Market decides who is in and who is out. Not "The People", be they the movement , the mob, the voters or citizens. Or whatever. It is those running the central banks, the big investment firms, you know, Capital. “Markets are calling the shots right now,” Geoffrey Yu, a senior foreign-exchange strategist at Bank of New York Mellon,” told Bloomberg, referring to the mess in Britain. “That’s the bottom line.” Gamblers are in charge. And we all know how stable and rational gamblers are. The tragedy is that people still believe electing new leadership will change something. Some new insanely ambitious and cunning piker will inherit the calamity that is Great Britian. Could be a clown prince like Boris, Berlosconi or Trump, could be a fascist like Bolsanaro or Meloni or Putin. It hardly matters. Managed decline or accelerated decline, there's only a few more bucks to be made before the gamblers have to climb into the bunkers. But they will play till the end.

More Dead Canaries

This from the Times on the crashing snow crab fishery: Miranda Westphal, a biologist with the state’s fish and game department, said on Friday that it was investigating why the crab population was declining. “From 2018 to 2021, we lost about 90 percent of these animals,” Ms. Westphal said. Alaska is the fastest warming state in the United States, according to Climate Central, an independent group of scientists who research and report about changing climate. And rising temperatures in Alaska’s cold waters may be killing the crustaceans. A few more people out of work, another ecosystem collapsing, another day, another dollar. I don't eat crab so without this article I wouldn't even feel the effect but this is how it comes down, a thousand small cuts, an extinction here, an extinction there. And we are only talking about a small degree of warming, a couple of degrees in water temp, thats how fragile the whole thing is. The other thing that isn't able to sink in, that people seem unable to fuly comprehend, is that this is not a strictly linear process. As I've said over and over and over to no avail, there are tipping points. Points where runaway feed back loops become self-generating and the effects cascade. You don't want to get there.

Atavism, Fascism, Chauvinism and Stress

Most commentary describes the rise of the far-right with its blood and soil ideology on downward mobility and declining living standards. From where I watch the world, I'm not so sure about this analysis. I see plenty of right wing extremism coinciding with increased wealth and social status. Where I live, there is lots of new money circulating amongst the white working class along with increasineg expressions of nationalism, authoritarianism, other manifestations of neofascism. Poor people are much less visible but I just don't see the same types of bumper stickers or Trump flags on the old makes and models. Of course poor people tend to be more guarded, less apt to display their politics for fear of retribution in some form. Poor people don't need more enemies. But I also think they see through the ridiculousness of billionaires like Trump claiming to represent their interests. The guys with the seventy thousand dollar pick-ups, new transplants from San Bernadino and Fresno who made a killing on property, they now distinguish themselves as "Ultramaga", not to be confused with regular knuckleheads. I saw a sign on a truck yesterday that said: "Donald Trump: Father of the New Revolution". Trump is the Big Daddy who can say the things they only think. To the degree we can call it thinking. The point is, these guys want to be out on the bleeding edge, but don't have any understanding of political economy. They love their country but fear their government. They drive around with big flags on their trucks, burning gas.

More Groundhogs

Talk about boring, this Lizz gal, the new Prime Minister, is taking it to a new level, apparently an attempt to swing away from the wacky Boris Johnson show, a little less Monty Python, a little more Margaret Thatcher. The moment the Queen was in the ground she busts out this amazingly unique and creative solution to England's economic woes. Ready for this? Cut taxes and regulations! Talk about phoning it in. Capitalism can't even pretend to try anymore. With interest rates surging she wants to take on massive amounts of new debt, praying the Job Creators will jump into action with this largess. Where have I heard this before? This is what "progressives" and social democrats seem to have so much trouble understanding. When workers start making gains, Capital has tools to put them back in their place. And despite a few Starbucks, Capital is not worried about widespread unrest. The white working class is too busy fretting over guns and Muslims. RIP Pharoah Sanders. His music was often difficult, reflecting difficult times. Most people, myself included, want music to soothe the ache, not intensify it. But Pharoah played the truth. As Washington put it, like a chicken and gravy picnik in outer space. Anyway, tough times. Defeat of the Chilean constitution, yet another student uprising in Iran, the far right winning today in Italy (my prediction), and the stock market tanking prior to the US elections. Expect nothing and you won't be dissapointed. The death spiral spins in fits and starts but always in the same direction.

From William F Buckley to Herschel Walker

To stay with the theme of modern conservatism, I read in the WaPo that Herschel Walker has taken a de-fault position in his upcoming debate with Warnock. Using his broad appeal to the "stupid" constituency, he has claimed outfront that he is "just a country boy", or as it's put in the popular song from the 80s, a Simple Kind of Man. In other words he has no knowledge or reasoning ability or discernment skills. What he has that qualifies him to be a Senator is "common sense". About "country" stuff. One imagines William F Buckley preparing for a debate with Gore Vidal by saying "I'm just a dumb shit up against a guy in a fancy suit." The problem isn't that Walker was a football player rqather than a lawyer, it's that like conservatives in general, but especially the new MAGA variety, thay have zero interest in learning anything. They lack even the little bit of imagination it would take to wonder if they have a coherent world view. Trump spoke to a crowd of Ohio MAGAs and as they played the Q Anon theme song the crowd held up the finger for "one". An injury to one is an injury to... oh no, that's a different "one". Rather than take one second to try to understand a critique of capitalism, a logical, historical straightforward narrative about hierarchy and power, these country folk prefer a convoluted, inchoate drama about sex rings and conspiricy plots. Buckley is rolling in his grave. The other interesting point is that Trump's theme was the Darkness that has descended all around us, crime, inflation, decay. He was a "nattering nabob of negativity" to quote the great Spiro Agnew. It is too late then to Keep America Great. The few black people in the crowd cannot understand this as coded language. As Trump would say: sad.

Trucks, Physique and Patriotism

Went to the health club and noticed all the huge, beefed up pick-up trucks in the parking lot, many adorned with Patriotic insignia. In the locker room were guys wearing American flag t shirts and other USA gear. Then I noticed all the massive, beefed-up guys (and a few gals) in the gym, working out. This leads to my amatuer sociological analysis, that these 20 somethings are people who went into the military, probably apolitical, were indoctrinated in Americanism, and now identify with large, powerful vehicles and bodies. They were able to buy these expensive gas hogs with the money they made in Iraq or Afghanistan or serving on any of the 700 plus bases the US has around the world. The other notable sighting was a young gal in pink tights showing off her huge butt. According to my wife, she is a butt specialist, advertises classes on facebook for increasing the size of your butt. It's a thing.I don't do facebook and miss so much. All of this only makes sense in a country that is experiencing a record heat wave (116 degrees in Sacramento) while passing legislation to make the permitting of fossil fuel infrastructure EASIER. The death drive takes many forms.

World Without Meat

As the earth's ecosystems become more and more stressed, concerned socialists increasingly turn to meat production as an easy target upon which to set their sights. This fix has the advantage of sounding both morally righteous and anti-megacorporation. if only those privileged First World steak eaters would give up their luxury food, we could save the planet AND reconnect with our animal cousins. With Mother Nature. We could be better, healthier people. And stop Con-Agra. I just ran across this argument in the book Half Earth Socialism, which draws on E.O.Wilson's idea of setting aside massive amounts of land for the purpose of conservation and re-wilding. The authors mean well, their critique of capitalism is good, but their veganism is fetishized and their analysis of animal agriculture extremely flawed. Whose earth gets set aside? Whose herds get taken away? By whom? Of course industrial meat production is bad. That's a no brainer.But you don't jump from there to no meat production period. Baby with bathwater. You don't jump from jungle slash and burn to all grazing is bad. Grazing creates critical ecosystems. And huge amounts of protean. As for living morally, in a balance with nature. Did/Do indigenous subsistence hunters live in a balance throughout pre-history? Were/Are they connected to nature? Just wondering if they were/are as "connected" as modern vegans.

Compromising Our Way to Extinction

California just passed some major climate legislation, promising big reductions in emissions. But it also relys on nuclear energy, leaving Diablo Canyon open to make up the short-fall. It was a compromise made for "political expediency", much like the expansion of oil and gas drilling was a necessary compromise in the Federal Investment Act. Pragmatism, realism, compromise. As the crises intensify there will be more impetus to "get something done". We will hear more and more talk of "trade-offs". But there won't be any trade-offs when it comes to GDP growth, to profit taking or continued accumulation.

Reaction and Reform

When Biden says "the answer is to spend more on policing" he emphasizes what we already know. Reforming "democratic" capitalism is a fool's errand. A kinder capitalism with fewer cops is as big a fantasy as a more sustainable capitalism through cap and trade. Or solving homelessness with affordable housing. In each case the reformists resist anti-capitalist messaging in order to appease moderates, in order to avoid a reactionary backlash. They insist on incremental adjustments and tiny tweaks. And in each case reformists end up with nothing. Reactionaries have no such qualms about wanting what they desire. Burn books, target minorities, deny climate change, whatever. Being anti-woke-anti- socialism energizes and invigorates the left-behind masses. Radical right-wing goals builds inspired cadres, even if they are fighting against their own self interest. At least they are fighting. Hunting down Nancy Pelosi and Mike Pence in the Capitol is totally insane, like ISIS building a new Caliphate, but you have to give them credit for trying. And lots of people do. We ask people to sign a petition or write your Representative. Yawn.

Big Jon

Our Senator can't be considered a DINO because this is what Dems do. Here is his latest message about the Investment Act. " We need to stop relying on our adversaries like Russia and China to power our country. We need to unleash energy production here at home, and that means our entire energy portfolio. This bill expands offshore and onshore oil and gas leasing while investing in renewable energy production to ensure we're powering our economy and creating jobs responsibly in the face of a worsening climate" Did you even know China was our "adversary" (not enemy, yet)? Think of all the new weapon systems Jon can vote for so we can defeat China. But his main point is that with a "worsening climate" we will expand fossil fuel use for energy security. Is he a moron or scumbag or both? Cynical, craven or just stupid? Just to double down on his pandering idiocy he wants to stress that : "This bill is not the Green New Deal and won't hurt Montana's oil and gas industry. I oppose the Green New Deal, full stop. This is a compromise bill that will increase domestic energy production across all industries." Moron scumbag full stop. But I will be pressured into voting for him as the lesser of two evils. Democratic capitalism on full display. Jon is actually more evil than Manchin or Sinema in his slimy having it both ways.

Recuperation

The Situaionists used the word recuperation to describe the ability of Capital to incorporate radical dissent into the matrix, thereby neutralizing and castrating any revolutionary potential. We in the so-called "climate movement" are seeing this cooptation on a new, extremely sophisticated level. Despite all the well articulated warnings about Green Capitalism, it was pretty much inevitable that it would become the dominant "solution" to the ecological crisis. It helped that the Left misunderstood electoral success as actual power, but basically there is just too much invested in the current order, both financially and pschologically, to allow radical change. So it is Markets and the miraculous "invisible hand" that will unleash the animal spirits to bring us through the manifold crises. Private investment will spur innovation and new technologies, while at the same time creating huge profit margins to lift all boats. In other words, the exact same theory that brought the crises into being will solve them. This is classic recuperation, the shift from denying the problem to suddenly owning the solution in such a way that everyone falls in line. The Left will tinker around the edges with "justice for lithium miners" or better EV charging stations. All that rhetoric about system change will be transferred into better enforcement by the IRS. Yeah, lookout rich folk, we're going to tax you. Scared yet?

Movement Update

Geez, maybe I whined too soon about the "movement". Turns out 350.org is organizing a protest at Jackson Lake Lodge where activists will confront Bankers from the Federal Reserve. Apperantly the Bankers have an annual retreat at a fancy resort and the protestors will demand they stop investing in fossil fuels and switch to renewable energy. Only problem? This is to be a law abiding protest. The activists will wave signs at the bankers and shout slogans, there are no plans for any arrests. More like a camping trip with some chanting thrown in. So I guess I was correct about the state of "the movement". Same old tactics with the exact same result. People will temporarily feel better, like they are doing something. Having risked nothing, they will go back to their lives and nothing will happen. Someone will start planningt the next protest. If you are going to make demands, you need to have an "or else". These are big dogs, they don't scare easily. One inteesting change is 350 is going to reimburse protestors for their travel expenses. They must be swimming in money, something that could be used for a bail fund. But if we have come to the point of having to pay activists to show up...hourly wage? Stipend? Sure, I'll show up.

Big Black Trucks

Where I live it is extremely easy to identify cult members because they are all driving these incredibly huge, shiny, brand-new big black pick-up trucks. One ton duallies with tinted windows are at the top of the order but they are all massive things and they are truly everywhere, not driven by farmers or ranchers, but by the new "bad-ass redneck" types, with Trump stickers and weapon decals, etc.. These things cost seventy thousand dollars or more which gives you an indication of what our local economy is like. Trump actually made Montana great again. The billionaires who got the tax breaks all moved here and bought ranches which the local tradesmen are fixing up for bank. Plus the Covid stimulus money. What do you do with all this fortune? Big Black Truck. If it takes a couple hundred to fill the thing up, whatever, more where that came from from. Co2 emmissions? Yeah, fuck that. The cult is focused on horsepower and looking good, way up there in the cab of a diesel Ford F350. They are incredibly happy, successful consumers, this working class, and they will not go gently into the night.

State of the Movement

An online conference coming up on the 1st of Sept. will feature Bill McKibben discussing "the state of the movement". If we assume they are talking about the climate movement you would have to ask: what movement? If we judge the strength of "the movement" by the latest "Inflation Reduction Act" (they couldn't even put climate in the title!) you would have to admit sclerotic decrepitude. It was all backroom dealing, no street action whatsoever. The rose colored glasses crowd praises "the movement" for having got anything at all, but clearly Green Capitalism is the big winner and will lead us to the precipice. So how will McKibben spin it? How about: don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good? Yeah. How about: This unleashes the power of private investment to create innovative new technologies? Yeah. How about: this is just the beginning, now we really have to push! Yeah. Bill, Greta, AOC, Blockadia; the silence is deafening. The quick retort is Covid, but that doesn't really satisfy. Did the Green New Deal include billions for carbon capture and sequestration, new oil and gas leases, new gas pipelines? We are supposed to look at the bright side: electric cars for the masses, fire-resistant forests (?) more solar panels, etc.. but it is hard not to be cynical, given the hard numbers.

Thrilled To Get Crumbs

Reading all the commentary about the Investment Act, one can't help notice the craven state of the Big Enviros. They were all so prepared to accept nothing that the meager pittance they did recieve is celebrated. Their expectatations that capitalist "democracy" will provide anything have been reduced to this pathetic extent- still they refuse to question the system itself. Like a Dickens orphan it is all "thankyou sir for this bit of gruel." Yes it is all "carrots and no sticks", in other words corporate welfare intended to spur private investment, but nothing can be mandated anymore. Green capitalism is the only possibility. No profit, no deal. This follows the basic trend of what citizens in general now expect from government. Nothing. When told that people in other countries are provided with vastly greater benefits they shrug, mutter something about the nanny state and go back to work. There is money in the bill to help farmers be better stewards and money to make forests more fire resistant. Unfortunately both those horses left the barn a long, long time ago. Farmers have been on welfare for decades but still can't compete without chemicals. Fire is a natural part of the ecosystem and forests need to burn, but we have let things get so bad the fires become catastrophic. To say this is a historic bill is simply to admit insane negligence. Best to watch the parts per million in the atmoshere before you celebrate.

Innovation Will Save Us

Bill Gates is giddy that the Investment Bill is being passed. With some of the billions goint to innovators, unimagined new technologies will be developed that will pull human society back from the brink in the nick of time. Bill is that true believer to his very core. He knows deep down that the Arc of Technology is long but it bends toward progress. One has to live in a very insulated, rarified space to be so optimistic, to have such rose colored glasses. The Investment Bill demonstrates to me exactly how low the bar has been set in this age of crisis, that we think some solar energy is going to preserve order. We are at 422 ppm at Manau Loa. If the awesome power of capitalist innovation was going to save us, wouldn't it have kicked in a little sooner? Does the grotesque sausage making of Washington DC, Manchin and Sinema and the Republican Party, not demonstrate something about Capitalist "Democracy"? But no, for the Bill Gates' of the world, young innovators sitting in incubators drinking energy drinks can accomplish miracles. This is America. With the passage of the Bill we are Great Again!

Salvage?

I know people like David Wallace Wells means well, but the glass-half-full take on the Investment Bill is tragic in its own way. When you realize we went from Bernie's 19 trillion to Joe's 350 billion, it is difficult to think of it as a "win" for the climate. And that is if you can ignore all the horrible "compromises" that had to be accepted, the drilling and mangling. Green growth is the real "green dream", but it is impolite to nay say. The Dems had to salvage something. Even if it's pathetic.Inflation, recession, pollution, misery- these are just the necessary aspects of capitalism we are to accept as "natural", inevitable, cyclical. Accepting the consequences of climate change plus capitalism will not be so easy. The shrinking Colorado may be the best illustration of how Capital finally finds the barrier it cannot transcend. Mega droughts have ended prior societies (or "civilizations") but this time around the scramble for resources will be epic. At some point the developers will have to stop pretending, the government agencies will have to stop pretending, the humans will have to face reality. No more water. The indigenous people could augment this awakening if they had the will, the political organization, the desire for a little revenge. They have treaty rights to lots of that water. That is a power they could use to preserve Mother earth. But it would involve a terrific, bloody fight. BTW, John Tester got his Burn Pit Bill passed at long last. We'll see how he votes on the Republican amendments to the Investment Bill.

No Joe Can Save Us

Picking back up on "politics", much angst surrounding Manchin's venal game, but the whole drama is just a diversion to keep Americans from noticing a disturbing little trend: democratic capitalism doesn't work. The angst should be flowing from the fact nothing can stop Capital from destroying earth's life support system. Or that millions are being sacrificed, doomed to a very unpleasant fate while others sip champagne and smoke fat cigars. Or the fact that Margaret Thatcher's little dictum is finally coming true: "there is no such thing as society". But Manchin was never going to save. Nor was the other Joe or David Brook's hypothetical perfect politician (one who embraces social conservatism and economic populism). Or any other freak who believes Capital can be coerced into a managed decline, or a "soft landing". Joe Sixpack isn't going to be much help either. The "working class", at least as it is defined by pollsters, is solidly in the resentment camp, searching for scapegoats to blame for the increasing chaos. Most angsty will be those idealistic young graduates with Environmental Studies degrees who were hoping to work for some climate non-profit funded by Build Back Better. They were all in for Bernie's "political revolution" but they thought the revolutionaries would come from the Left. Oops. Will they re-think their faith or double-down by occupying Nancy Pelosies office again? The increasingly pathetic 350.org is so outraged they are asking people to sign yet another worthless petition- this time DEMANDING that Shcumer remove Manchin from his chairman position. Or else! Yeah! Of course Trump or DiSantis or Clarence Thomas won't save us either. Not that anyone will ask them about wet-bulb temperature, but if they did they would just smile and say "It's the economy, stupid." When really it's the stupidity, economy.

So You Want To Get Elected?

In the latest issue of Democratic Left (DSA newsletter), we socialists are told that "the media makes politics confusing on purpose, but really it's simple: through politics we can weigh in on how to manage our resources." Kind of like how Joe Manchin is "weighing in" on fossil fuels or AIPAC is "weighing in" on funding Israel's military. Simple. The DSA wants "more ordinary people like me or you to get involved in politics." This is what they taught us in "government" class in sixth grade, how the government is a marvelous and unique democracy "of ,by and for the people". Simple. "The world of politics" only "APPEARS daunting, confusing or downright ugly." But if you ask Bernie or AOC you will see it's actually cool. Sure, you'll have to join the Democratic Party in order to get funding, and sure, they have a few rules you'll want to follow. You may meet a lobbyist or two who will have some suggestions on how you should vote. And a few rich people will have some advice. In a democracy there is no taxation without representation and since capital pays a lot of taxes they get a lot of reps. Also, since there are lots and lots of stupid people, they deserve lots of representation as well. All those bigots and gun'loving patriots get to be represented. Welcome to simple politics. Vote for me. My Senator, John Tester, has figured out the best way to keep the job is to represent soldiers and veterans. Just stay vaguely neutral on everything else.

Crisis of Legitimation

Yurgen Habermas wrote a book called The Crisis of Legitimation which answered a lot of questions about liberal governmentality. I found my copy left in a motel room in Jackson Montana. The thesis of the book is that liberal capitalist "democracy" is fragile and rests on a thin veneer of legitimacy. Much like the stock market, the whole ediface requires consumer confidence. To maintain legitimacy with the public, the system must appear to uphold certain norms, certain traditions should be maintained, certain expectaitions met. Hegemony (the abscence of overt coercion) rests on this constructed consensus; shelves must remain stocked, the trains should run on time. In the liberal order citizens expect to exercise certain rights and above all private proprety rights must be sacred. But of course, as times change, norms shift. To the degree that consent is manufactured, that factory has to put in increasing amounts of overtime as the intersecting crises deepen. And while I still believe a point exists at which legitimacy would be thoroughly undermined, I am less and less sure it necessarily leads to revolt. It might just be that the population collectively disassociates from reality and accepts the simulation in the place of the real thing. Or it might be that all resistance is channeled into harmless protest and eventual cynicism. Drinking is a popular option. Beyond maintaining train schedules and protecting property, a legitimate government must protect certain interests,what the constitution refers to as the "general welfare", and safeguard enough "liberty" that enough of the population will grant it the exclusive right to use force. There must be a degree of equality and safety and a political sphere in which decision making takes place in some transperant fashion. The increasingly urgent question is: how far can these norms break down before the legitimacy of power is questioned? We know people have an amazing capacity for prefering illusion over reality. The Left has a relationship to psychoanalysis ,not shared by the Right, because "rational actor" theory fails to explain so much of everyday experience, including a willingness to legitimize irrational systems and oppresive institutions. What we see on the surface is again, a tremendous ability to adapt, to revise norms and consnt to madness.

Surly Slave Master

Well it looks like the gloves are coming off and I am hearing a lot of people say they are pissed. Now. Really pissed. Yeah. For instance, Roe v Wade got folks ( mostly gestators) really pissed. Really. Yes, capitalist "democracy" has been devolving into a dysfunctional, homicidal farce for some time now but hey, at least we still had some "rights". Right? The invasions and inequality and ecological destruction shit was bad but women could get abortions, the slave master at least was kind enough to let people experience a certain degree of autonomy over their body. More or less depending on your resources. And for a long time politicians and courts maintained the illusion of propriety and rational deliberation. It served everyones interests to let us feel like we had a government "of, for and by the people" with all the fancy constitutional decorum, the well-staged theatrical movements and drama. But maintaining the illusion has obviously become more trouble that it was worth and now we can just watch the sausage being made and if we don't like it, too fucking bad. My liberal friends are up in arms of course, ready to go out and turn that anger into action. To vote harder, knock on doors, sign petitions, long for the day Hillary or Mayor Pete can take over and steer the ship of state back to that comforting illusion of rationality and reason. Give us back our rights, please, Master, we'll promise to behave. To work harder. To keep buying. To shut up about fossil fuels. To send weapons wherever they are needed (schools, churches, Ukraine, etc..) Whatever it takes. Just as conservatives long for that mythical time when things made sense, liberals long for the time when black robes made jurors "supreme" and beyond politics.

The EPA

Thom Hartman is terrified the conservative Supreme Court is preparing to overturn environmental law as we know it. I say, good riddance. He writes: "they want to turn regulatory agency rule-making upside down" and then proceeds to explain how good capitalist state regulation is SUPPOSED to work. The true believers in a kinder, more sustainable capitalism (the kind slave master) never lose their faith, even when the EPA and all the regulations and all the well-meaning bureaucrats have not prevented environmental breakdown on a planet-threatening level. If the SCOTUS wants to puncture the illusion, like Trump punctured the illusion of "democracy", Please, let them lift the veil. Here isThom describing the great way things currently work: "The experts’ suggestions are then run past a panel of rule-making bureaucrats and hired-gun rule-making experts for the EPA to decide what the standards should be. They take into consideration the current abilities of industry and the costs versus the benefits of various rules, among other things." In each part of that description you can see exactly why we still have lead pipes for drinking water, still have pesticides and hebicides, are rapidly approaching 425 ppm of CO2 in the atmosphere. What could possibly go wrong as we weigh "costs and benefits"? Costs as seen through the lens of the capitalist market. Costs externalized away. Thom has never recognized this? He goes on to say: "Congress passes laws that empower regulatory agencies to solve problems, the agencies figure out how and put the rules into place, and the solutions get enforced by the agencies." Just like the Magnificent Framers of the Constitution imagined it! It must be nice to live in such a fantasy world. I recall being taught all this pablum in civics class in jr.High, the reverence in the teachers voice for the Divinely inspired wisdom of OUR Fathers. This is a painful period for liberals, learning how the Supremes are actually just a bunch of ideological hacks, how politicians don't actually do politics, how capitalist democracy is just one big "cost- benefit analysis." And the EPA doesn't actually protect the environment. Bummer.

"A People"

Are the Balkans an extreme expression of "identity politics"? Should we be trying to foster "class belonging " among the Serbs, Bosniaks, Croats, transcending their identification as an ethnicity, a religious sect, a nation or a people? Good luck with that project. That was Tito's communist Yugoslavia, a time and space no one seems to want to revitalize. Now we have Bosnians, Russians, the Republic Sripska, Americans, Ukranians all with their insane myths and flags and greivances. The workers in these nations do not feel exploited by their bosses, they feel threatened by The Other. The other worker who is their ancient enemy. Or who is trying to cross THEIR border to take THEIR job. We The People.

Bad Moon Rising

The combination of looming recession, international conflict and a hollowed out politics does not bode well for positive climate action. Instead of consensus around a radical re-ordering of energy and investment in new infrastructure, we will see the forces of reaction cling ever more desperately to an imaginary "way of life" and chauvinist economic nationalism. Post-modernism and socialism will be the perfect scapegoats, thinly veiled references to "the Jew". The combination of inflation and cuts to social services will throw increasing numbers out on to the already teeming streets, make-shift camps and over-whelmed shelters. Still they will wave their flags, support the police, fear the government, flock to churches. The reverbations from the war in Ukraine will multiply. The infatuation with Zelinski and his tight t shirts will wear off as bread lines grow and yet another US failure will embolden China to push buttons. The US electoral freak show will give us the same worn out slogans and rent will consume more and more of the average paycheck. Still the free market will retain its sacred status for the average worker, even as the fires rage and hurricanes swamp cities. As the repo man comes for that brand new eightcylindar pickup truck, you can wave your Gadsen flag. Stop the steal. Harvard trained economists will recognize all this misery as the "business cycle", the thing capitalism does every so often to self correct. These people in their tents are "creative destruction", the necessary destruction of over-capacity, those being foreclosed and evicted are the re-set, and government can't interfere in the perfect mechanism of The Market. So sorry. This too shall pass. The ruling elite know this destruction only lasts so long and so they will hunker down, hang on to their portfolio, maybe buy the dip and come out better than before. History tells us so. Except for this one annoying little glitch around climate pricing. For some wacky reason the perfect market isn't factoring in the ecological destruction of the very basis for all the value, all the surplus, all the wealth waiting at the end of the rainbow. That's a qualitatively different kind of bubble.

Because Capital Doesn't Care

The June 14 NY Times is awash in information about climate chaos but they make the assumption that those with power actually care how many people die. Columnist Paul Krugman took a break from telling us inflation is no biggie, to start worrying about the lack of response to climate chaos. He cites the drying up of Salt Lake and wonders why no one is doing anything about it. Listen Paul: Capital doesn't care. While individual and mostly local capitalists are nervous about the impacts of poisonous dust clouds, decimated bird populations, diminished snowpack etc.., they also realize that putting more water in the lake hurts development and economic growth, that is, affects the essential circuits of Capital. A wicked problem indeed. A little late to feign surprise Paul. Krugman points to the Aral Sea as an example of what is to be avoided but why stop there? There are millions of examples of purposefully destroyed ecosystems and they all have the same root cause. Paul thinks it is up to "policy makers to act." Where is rationality, he wonders? Then there is the report from Southeast Asia on the "fresh urgency" of climate change "worries", that is, farmers dying of heat stroke or committing suicide over personal economic ruin. They all need to understand, Capital doesn't care if they all die. Readers of the Times will care, will fret, will "worry", but will do nothing to stop emissions. Like the Salt Lake "policy makers", they all know the reality. “This is everyday climate change at work: a slow-onset shift in environmental conditions that is destroying lives and livelihoods before our eyes,” write the activists about conditions in India, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Nepal. In his novel Ministry of the Future, author Kim Stanley Robinson imagines a day when wet-bulb temperatures kill tens of millions and THEN "policy makers" snap to attention. A day, an Event, a rupture. Anything but The Long Now we currently endure. Then the Times has pictures of roads in Yellowstone Park washed out by flooding and a piece wondering if "carbon capture can be part of the climate solution". Some gal from the "office of fossil energy and carbon management" says yes. Office of Carbon Management? Really? Do they know that Capital doesn't care? They will do something, "Yes, but not now, not yet" to quote Stuart Hall. We live in what he called "The Great Moving Nowhere Show" because it is all frantic enrgy but never actual movement. Not the Long Arc of History bending toward Justice or anything else. Just "The Long Slow Cancellation of the Future" as Mark Fisher (RIP) put it.

Why We Can't Have Nice Things

In a capitalist "democracy" (although strong arguments are being put forward as to why we should call it "neofuedal 'democracy'") short-term profit accumulation takes precedence over any kind of "general welfare" or public good. In fact, there is no distinction between them. More profit is always good and no law shall be passed that restricts this axiom. Because it would look bad if corporations had their own police and army, they created the state and a veneer of "democratic" goverance, supposedly of, by and for the people. Some rubes actually buy into this farce but most people simply accept it as "better than fascism". No matter how bad their lives get at least they don't live in Ethiopia. Of course "government" and "the state" come in many shapes and sizes, and often at a very local level people try to put environmental or social justice concerns ahead of profit. But power flows from the top so a higher level of capitalist government can be enlisted to "pre-empt" these brave attempts at local autonomy. Rubes who identify as "conservative" can be enlisted to support these restrictions on their own freedom by framing the issue as socialism vs the free market. Because they can't understand the way the tyranny of the capitalist state is exactly the same as the tyranny of the market, the state simply enforcing market dictates, they consume more shit and wave flags. They pass laws enforcing their own slavery. When you are that stupid, you deserve to be in chains. Meanwhile, as the social fabric continues to unravel, we naturally see law and order becoming the simplistic go to for the forces of reaction. The George Floyd Rebellion backlash melds perfectly into growing disgust over massive homeless camps. The answer? more cops. More guns. Bigger fences. Destroy antifa. Who knew?

What If Both Are True?

Conservatives say "guns don't kill people, people kill people." Of course both are true but such a complex thought can't be processed by the American mind. One or the other. Give us two choices, Yay or nay. They also like to say "you can't legislate the evil that lurks in the heart." Which is true enough, but also forces you to accept the insane amount of evil in American hearts compared to the rest of the world. ( but only if logic is part of your thought process). The obvious answer then is to both pray and get a gun. Green Capitlism in action, from the WaPo: NextEra Energy, which operates one of the world’s largest renewable-energy businesses, has played an outsize role in Florida. Its campaign contributions and lobbying prowess have made it a juggernaut in state politics and regulatory matters. “We have 120 years of crazy regulatory practice in electricity and natural gas,” Mr. McCullough said. “There will be a day when someone will ask why they have just an extension cord there instead of the appropriate transmission line, because none of this makes good economics or engineering sense.” Mr. Mc Cullough doesn't understand capitalist economics, where this makes perfect "sense". The company profits rise, end of discussion. Wealth is generated, GDP goes up. Doesn't matter if your product is renewable or dirty energy, you still have to work the system with deals, greasing the wheels. Florida is also on the bleeding edge of what is known as "preemption legislation", that is, if state legislators get wind that a local municipality is considering policy that might hurt corporate profits, they step in with a bill that prevents locals from protecting themselves. As a Florida state rep put it "any socialist policies meant to harm the free market" must be preempted.

Archie Bunker Wasn't Really Funny

The popular sitcom All In The Family tried to portray Archie Bunker as a lovable conservative, a working-class curmudgeon who had a good heart and just valued tradition. But in fact he was a stupid bigoted asshole and the beginning of the end for any kind of principled conservatism. The shows producers were trying to be progressive and understanding of the changes Reaganism was bringing, but mistook tolerance for politics. We can now see the results of this desire for unity. Instead of being another prejudiced dumb bastard, he was "politically incorrect". Aggrieved and full of resentful self pity, the audience was supposed to sympathize with a "regular Joe" in a changing America. We knew he wasn't a "real" racist because he had such a sweet, dumb (but loaded with "common sense") wife who liked her role of wife and mother but wanted to cautiously test the role's feminist boundaries. In this sense I see Archie as a precursor to Tea Party Trumpism with all it's defiant, boastful incoherence.When they say Make America Great Again they mean bring back Archie, exalt Archie as the anti-woke, crass, working stiff. The worker who blamed Outsiders instead of the Boss. Who wanted to fight a culture war instead of class war. Who just wanted to kick back in his easy chair and watch tv and have his wife bring him beers. Democrats blamed Hillary for alienating the Archies by calling them deplorable. But they are deplorable whiners and they were alienated long before Hillary's campaign.Now they have abandoned all pretence of political philosophy and in favor of the blood thirsty howl of the self-righteous mob.

Sleepwalking Over the Cliff

The Right-wing has made "wokeness" the thing that must be avoided at all costs. And along with concern for social justice and the rights of minorities they have now included concern about climate change as a symptom of woke. It is more awesome, more American to be asleep. More manly. States that produce fossil fuels are now protesting that attempts to pull investment from polluting industries is to buy into wokeness culture and since wokeness is a program pushed by liberal, effete intellectuals, it is to succumb to fragility and weakness. In other words, the opposite of hyper-phallic Trumpism. Large investors such as Blackrock who wanted to be responsible, conscious, green capitalists are being told in no uncertain terms that their fiduciary duty is to make money, period. In other words, even the fake simulation of green capitalism was too much wokeness for the conservative "base". We should not kid ourselves. Neither the State nor Capital gives a rats ass if there are no insects, no coral reefs, laborers dying of heat stroke. As long as there are profits and tax revenues on the short-term horizon they are prepared to see forests go up in smoke and bodies pile up. The global head of responsible investment at HSBC lifted the veil when he gave a presentation at the Financial Times Conference titled : "why investors need not worry about climate risk". Of course he was hustled off the stage amidst apologies but he delivered the unvarnished truth; there are immense profits in misery. How strange to live in a time when it is bad to be awake. We are supposed to slumber through the American Dream, which might be what Timothy Morton was getting at with "hyper-reality". When things get too real, we can retreat into fantasy and disavowal. On the "social cost of carbon" battlefront, the Highest and Most Sacred Supreme Court ruled that the Federal government can continue assigning a "cost" to emmissions or “estimates of the monetized damages associated with incremental increases in greenhouse gas emissions.” In the next breath we get: “An accurate social cost is essential for agencies to accurately determine the social benefits of reducing greenhouse gas emissions when conducting cost-benefit analyses of regulatory and other actions,” the order said. The question I've been asking is are we talking "estimates" or "accurate" accounting? It matters if you insist on using markets to regulate behavior.

Revolutionary Subject

In a review of Andreas Malm's Corona, Climate, Chronic Emergency, (Open Democracy Oct.2020) Cihan Tugal asks who Malm is referring to when he uses "we". Who is the subject that will foment radical change, or what Malm calls "war communism"? Tugal criticizes Malm for not including "one mention of organizing or mobilizing the workers of these (fossil fuel) companies to carry out the necessary nationalizations." Those in the climate justice movement are constantly being called on to identify the revolutionary agent or subject that will form a base. It is orthodox socialist/Marxist theory to point to "the working class" and then move on but do these "workers" Tugal and others point to actually interpellate as workers? Are they in any sense a class for themselves, sharing a common understanding or "class belonging"? Does the climate movement wait for this class to rise up and lead and if yes, for how long? Tugal is willing to entertain the possibility "that workers are so complicit in pollutant capitalism that they can't be counted on." But then he asks Malm to name an "effective social replacement...or whatever the social equivalent of workers might be." I would ask: why is it deemed so necessary to name this agent? Any suggestion the reified "working class" won't lead is labelled "petty-borgeoise substitutionism". Hense the dead-lock. Waiting for Godot. Waiting for the "rational" abandoment of fossil fuels and a "Just Transition" led by Capital and it's clients in government. Good luck with that plan. This is the critique of "spontaneity". I would argue the existential nature of the current crises changes the calculus, that you can indeed initiate a rupture using whatever available social agents and the struggle will radicalize them. The process creates the subject when the future is on the line. Tugal goes on to blame "disorganization of the working class" but I would suggest a re-organization does not fit into the timeframe we face for salvaging the biosphere. Lots and lots of workers would join an energized mass movement once things got going. But if Leninism is proletarian leadership of "the people" I would say that in our time, in the current conjuncture, this formula needs to be reversed. If that is substitutionism, so be it.

Voting Our Way To Power?

Results are in. The DSA Green New Deal Committee put up a slate of 11 candidates running for office around the country. So far they are all losing. Some races were close and yes, the campaigns helped build infrastructure and pushed a green message, but none of our people are in power. After lots of organizing effort and resources spent. What are known as "opportunity costs". Things that we could have been working on but weren't. Now DSA Political Committee wants to use abortion politics to mobilize the masses but I fear this means supporting Democrats. Tough to get super inspired. You try to develop a strategic plan and keep clear priorities to work on for the long haul but these Events inevitably pop up, what we call brushfires, and everyone drops what they were doing and rushes to put out the Crisis of the Moment. But women are outraged and leadership thinks that emotion can be mobilized toward some real gains. But how? Putting millions in the streets? A march, a rally, some speeches by Democrats? What crisis will pop up tomorrow? Maybe Capital will start a little war or some Black men will get shot by racist cops. Maybe they will ban books or raise prices. Something for sure. Whack a mole here, whack a mole there. Plenty of moles.

The Money Revolution

A lot of leftists believe the revolution to replace capitalism goes through the currency system. They believe money is at the heart of the contradiction of exchange value, and that eliminating money is the way to a more just and equitable social order. This is revolution without Marx. The cryptocurrency movement taps into this same sentiment and unease with capitalism, but thinks freedom is the thing that money threatens, something that can be rectified through a de-centralized currency system,(no banks or middlemen). Liberation/emancipation is an ethereal economic system based on cyber technology. Unfortunately for many small-investor "revolutionaries", this latest crypto bubble burst gives a great window into how wrong-headed the focus on money is and how a "revolutionary" movement just gets sucked back into the maw of surplus and profit accumulation. In an article (NYTimes 5/18) on the collapse of TerraUSD and Luna we see the all-too-familiar confluence of personality cult, gambling fever, and Capital in search of profit masquerading as revolution. Audre Lorde nailed it when she said "the Master's tools will never tear down the Master's house." Investment and markets will never tear down capitalism no matter how complex the technology or de-centralized the accounting. Marx's simple truth, "M-C-M" is a force that annihilates all your radical intention. It can't be tweaked by libertarians into a force for good. Here is a list of all the abstract value that comprises late capitalism, gleaned just from this one article.Litterally trillions floating around out there in geek world, searching for profit. Lightspeed Venture Partners, Galaxy Digital,Pantera Capital, Tezos (a crypto platform),Scalar Capital, Paxos (blockchain company), Arrington Capital, Coinbase Ventures, Hack VC, GMCC Global, Binance (crypto exchange) Citadel, Trrra Hacker House. Geek world meets Las Vegas. Lots of X and Z. Lots of small investors ruined, committing suicide. No revolution for you, so sorry.

Overshoot Creep

When the climate scientists describe goals such as limiting warming to 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels, which is to be accomplished by "dropping (emissions) 45% below 2010 levels by 2030", we should understand that they are building in a certain amount of what is called "overshoot". This means they know they can't actually hit the 1.5 target but will go beyond it and then hope to bring temperature back down. By normalizing this term "overshoot", they hope to reassure the public that as we approach 1.8 or 2 degrees, all is not lost, that we can flatten the curve and then bend it down through lowered emissions and sequestration. Should we though, be reassured? Given the record, I would suggest not. It is all too easy to imagine governments and capitalists normalizing the term to obfuscate and delay, after all, if we can overshoot and then return, why not overshoot by 2 or 3 or 4 degrees? Sure it dooms millions to misery and death, but that threat has never slowed capital accumulation or inspired mitigation in the past. They can die and eventually we can bring the temperature down. The important thing is that in the meantime, growth can continue apace. After all, overshoot victims will mostly be poor black and brown people in distant lands. The other thing to remember is that these predictions are based on modeling which produces multiple scenarios with varying outcomes. In this instance there are 53 scenarios and 44 of them involve a certain amount of overshoot. And they all incorporate percentages of likelihood, in other words, if we do such and such we have a 65% chance of achieving such and such outcome. A 35% chance of not. Ready to roll the dice? Reassured yet? To my way of thinking, the precautionary principle dictates that rather than overshoot we should be striving for undershoot. When climate scientist Vaclav Smil inists on setting "realistic" goals he is in essence saying we should learn to accept the fact of all this death and misery. Get real people. The ship is simply too big to turn in time. Given current power relations, that is. And it is much easier to accept the consequences of overshoot than to imagine a change in those relations. We also notice that as capitalism demonstrates its inability to slow emissions, there is geoengineering creep. More and more "serious" talk about the inevitability of aerosols being deployed. Slowly get used to it.

Aging Out

Diane Feinstein is symbolic of a system well past its prime and sliding into oblivion. Along with Old Joe Biden and the rest of the senile, sclerotic "leadership" of the world's late great superpower, these oldsters lack the basic life-animating spark to even pretend they are in control of events. Or even aware they are happening. And Liberal "Democratic" Capitalism in its death-throes is not a beast you want octogenarians taking care of. "Caressing the sharks teeth" is one thing, playing with a fatally wounded shark quite another. It should be pretty clear by now that these ancient managers are comfortable with leaving a planet on which millions of mostly poor, brown skinned people are doomed to a terrible death. Doomed thanks to the efforts of these very same managers. They will shake their bald, wrinkly heads in resigned sadness. But their plans just don't include all these surplus humans. And these ancients can rest comfortably in the knowlege that when they pass there will be magnificent state funerals and glowing eulogies praising their selfless works. It won't be easy to ignore the shit show just beyond the palace gates, but if you get the camera angle right you can avoid the stinking, bloated corpses or burning hills or flooded streets. And if you vote for the hillbilly you too can at least rest comfortably with the knowlege you fought back against "the machine", whatever that is. You resisted by following orders. You are a gallant, noble, patriot gravedigger, digging your own grave.

More Wokeness

It occurs to me the weaponized woke slur works so well because it associated with Defund the Police. Everytime I hear someone talk about the Great George Floyd Rebellion I think of all the other great activist victories of the last decade: Standing Rock, Line 3, wet'suweten, Medicare for all, PRO Act, Bernie for Pres, prison abolition, Palestinian state, the list goes on and on. No wonder the right is so scared of activists! How proud especially must be those stalwart ANTIFA folks with their spray paint and hoodies. Byrd -Hegal Reolution Introduced in Senate (06/12/1997) Declares that the United States should not be a signatory to any protocol to, or other agreement regarding, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change of 1992, at negotiations in Kyoto in December 1997 or thereafter which would: (1) mandate new commitments to limit or reduce greenhouse gas emissions for the Annex 1 Parties, unless the protocol or other agreement also mandates new specific scheduled commitments to limit or reduce greenhouse gas emissions for Developing Country Parties within the same compliance period; or (2) result in serious harm to the U.S. economy As George Bush put it, "Our way of life is not negotiable". This is something that should be read out at Earth Day rallies

Woke Green Activists

Montana Senator Steve Daines says to make America energy independent and lower the price at the pump we need to stop listening to "woke green activists" and increase Montana coal, oil and gas production. He's not wrong.If you are more concerned about your fuel bill than you are global heating you want to see local production booming. And remember, most Montanans have massive pick-up trucks that they commute in and spend a hundred dollars a week on gas. Plus oil jobs pay well. So convincing Montanans is easy peasy. There are, however,capitalists with actual power (unlike some moron Senator) and they are getting nervous about climate impacts. They've used goofballs like Steve to defer action for decades but as the cliff aproaches, Capital hopes to shift to marketing "Green Capitalism" and useful idiots like Steve are less useful. Meanwhile, woke green activists are shopping around for induction stoves. And if these subsidies for clean electricity ever make it through the Build Back Better legislation, we can buy heat pumps.(they cost a lot, like two or three species apiece). Some are planning for collapse, so it won't be quite as chaotic. But it isn't clear if they are planning for a three or five or seven degree celsius temperature rise, because that could make a difference. The best plan is to stock up on ammunition so you can take stuff from woke green activists. Senator Steve Daines is only worried about the next election. And none of us should be surprised when far-right populists sweep into office because this is representative capitalist democracy, (no taxation without representation) and if you can fill people's gas tanks for cheap, you get their vote. This aint rocket science or climate science or any fucking antifa, critical race theory, transsexual science bullshit. Elites created the monster, now they are stuck with it

Fully Automated Luxury Communism

One of the debates in ecosocialist forums is around de-growth vs "acceleration" and what metrics to use for defining each. Acceleration might be described as using all the technology and productive capacity possible to provide "the good life". The extreme example is Fully Automated Luxury Communism (FALC) with its emancipatory claims. On the other end of the spectrum we find Deep Greens who insist all growth in production has disatrous impacts for ecosystems and so espouse radical simplicity. The most subjective aspect of this debate is how the terms "good life" and "luxury" are defined. Should we use UN Development goals, caloric intake, life expectancy? How about feelings of community belonging, harmony with nature or meaningful life? Obviously, acceleration is an easier sell to subjects formed by capitalist culture, those programmed to believe more is always better. De-growth has intonations of austerity, something the wealthy have historically imposed on the already disposessed. So we have a struggle over meaning: relinquishment and simplicity can be liberating and morally satisyfing and there is a Protestant tradition of frugality and limits (Thoreau) that can be tapped into. Of conservation. On the other hand, socialism has been associated with productivist, even Promethian ambition, unleashing the human potential to harness nature. De-growth is also associated with a sentimental nostalgia, a desire to Return to a purer state that existed in pre-capitalist, even pre-modern times. Accelerationists want to ride the wave of technological wizardry, propelling us into a glorious future. I'm always looking for a synthesis.

Build Back a little Better

With war and a new COVID strain dominating headlines the climate is put on the back burner, along with a bunch of other "progressive" initiatives the Dems sort of ran on. Sort of promised. To keep Bernie Bros engaged. But shocker, EVENTS happen and rearrange priorities. Who could have possibly guessed they would back it all down? Yes, global heating is an existential threat, yes the public wants to see action but these are perilous times and we need energy security and some economic growth and lower gas prices and you got it, no big changes in profits. Biden may be senile but he still knows all about triangulation. Remember the Green New Deal? How about the PRO Act? How about Medicare for All? All big electoral campaigns pushed by DSA, all buried in the ideological rubble of a world focused on Will Smith and Putin, critical race theory and wokeness. DSA leadership's endless faith in liberal capitalist "democracy" as a way to build power has led to infighting, paralysis and a growing malaise. It doesn't help that there is nothing out there that could be called a "climate movement." As predicted, Bernie's "political revolution" wrecked on the shoals of economic reality. AOC and Greta and COP 26 all got their moment in the sun, but the Green Capitalists have siezed the day and the agenda and private equity and venture capital are coming to the rescue. XR and Standing Rock and Line 3 and 350 can campaign or fundraise or protest or whatever. Alongside the "women's choice" groups. And the "De-fund the Police" groups. The only good news is I'm seeing lots of bumper stickers now decrying the evils of socialism. So at least we are being noticed.