BRUCE LERRO—For the most part, the use of electronic media, especially television, had a debilitating impact on political rhetoric. The number of outdoor speeches declined as the politician was followed by television cameras inside the studios. The public now had to make much less effort to hear a speech as they could now watch it on television. For various reasons, over the years the attention span of the public got shorter and shorter in part because there was a lot to see on television and also because the pace of life quickened.
ANTI-COMMUNISM
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This better not be right: U.S. Government is set to win back control over Venezuela on July 28th.
by eric zuesse18 minutes readERIC ZUESSE—“Chavismo” (named after Venezuela’s former President Hugo Chavez) which Maduro represents, and which had been Venezuela’s Marxist (communist) independent Venezuela, will become past history, when President González will start his (six-year) term on 10 January 2025.
The reason why a vast majority of Venezuelans will be voting for González is that this will be the only way they can get the U.S. Government’s virtual blockade of sanctions against their country lifted so that maybe the enormous mass poverty that those sanctions imposed upon them will likewise end. However, that favorable outcome for the poor of Venezuela won’t happen, and here is why:
González is secretly committed to privatizing Venezuela’s gas, oil, and other resources, as well as a “broad program of privatization of companies and public assets,” including the currently entirely free-to-the-public educational system and pension system, all of the Government’s assets to be auctioned off to investors from throughout the world so as to produce profits from the poor to increase the wealth of investors throughout the world, and, so to increase yet further the economic-inequality indexes throughout the world.
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• “TOTALITARIAN” ANTI-COMMUNISM: LOADED LANGUAGE STRAIGHT OUT OF CIA, NEO-CON PLAYBOOK
by Bruce Lerro51 minutes readBRUCE LERRO—Using loaded language in politics supports narrowing the thinking process to heroes and villains, gods and devils, dictators or democrats. Working-class people do not initiate what these words mean, or in what contexts they are used. However, working class people circulate these words unconsciously when they talk about politics to others. Working-class people also internalize these words and this narrows the span of how they think about political processes. The purpose of this article and the next one is to challenge you to try purging from your vocabulary the words totalitarian dictatorship or democracy. Chances are very good that the Yankee anti-communist campaign is playing you.
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SPENGLER—Fertility doesn’t explain everything; both Russia and Ukraine had very low fertility when the 2015 Gallup Survey was taken, but relatively high willingness to fight.
The Ukraine war engages a few hundred thousand combat troops on the same land where millions fought during World War II. When the Soviets recaptured Kharkov in 1943, they threw 1.2 million men at the city and lost 200,000 of them. Russia has perhaps a hundredth of that number around the city today.
For all the demands on America’s NATO allies to bulk up their armies, the opposite is happening. Japan and Germany, the American allies with economies big enough to make a difference in defense spending, are quietly abandoning their commitments to higher defense outlays.
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EDITOR—The panel discusses the delicate situation engulfing the EU and the United States, where the anti-immigrant issue has gathered considerable momentum, presenting difficult problems (and opportunities) for the reigning oligarchy. It’s noteworthy, says Dust James, that in both the US (capital/imperial core) and Europe (the periphery, where a “labor aristocracy” developed) the capitalists are drifting toward fascism. In America, where the economy continues to worsen for the working class, and the immigration issue (exploited mercilessly by Trump), adds fuel to the flames, such situation could easily drive some sort of fascistic movement forward, even if Trump himself may not be fully aware (or concerned) about the chaotic consequences of his careless opportunism. Mass immigration is an issue with no easy answers, notes Billy Bob; socialists could arguably defend or oppose either side of the equation. There is no doubt, however, that lowly paid Americans—including many Latinos—are fiercely hostile to “illegal immigration”, since any mass influx of undocumented workers will inexorably depress wages.