You realize the both sides thing comes from the idea that one side is actually different? I hate these internet cliches because smugly incorrect people will grandstand with them. Whataboutism too. You know the democratic party also gets aipac money right? Democratic Party politicians and democrat media are equally (if not more due to their neoliberal globalist stance) compromised by Israel. Get a spine, if you can’t even break the party line to whisper a mild critique about the milquetoast “””opposition””” that’s been complicit in a genocide for 3 years I have nothing to say to you. Politics is only a sport for you, then.

I would reccomend Chapter 8 of Killing Hope by William Blum. It’s all very interesting reading but this ads some complexity to the point you bring up. It’s fair to say the Soviets were harsh on the Germans with their reparations, for good reason and to the detriment of realpolitik. However when we see this as an internal failure brought on by essentially internal fuckups, we miss the external and the fact that there’s no distance between the two when you’ve been under siege since 1917. The other chapters of this book explain what happened to the other underdogs when they couldn’t keep things in perfect order.

I haven’t read the collected works of Xi Jinping cover to cover but it feels like a different voice. I mean arguably a lot of things published under his name are a collaborative work by the CPC central committee anyways, but just, feels a bit different.

Yeah Xi’s speech was very obviously ghostwriter/AI, and the bit about making China and America both great again was a bit on the nose. Trumps latest truths are pure ai no sauce, Chinese are gonna do the same reciprocally. It’s clear Xi is just indulging our dear leader as a matter of decorum.

On a side note wrt to bibliographies and the Frankfurt school Western Marxism by Gabriel Rockhill is a great book. Essentially an analysis of intellectual commodity production, ‘left wing’ academia, and the lessons of the past available when theory isn’t reified.

I’ll be honest and say fantasies of a second civil war are trite. Right wingers will make one up about big government overreach (aka international capitalists removing the protectionist frameworks keeping crybabies like US ranchers and carmakers afloat) where the conclusion is getting back to what the founding fathers desired. Cosmopolitan types will make one about “””polarization””” and oh have you no decency??? where in the end everyone becomes a perfect, compliant neoliberal subject.

Whatever the case, it’s pure american exceptionalist drivel. Both are adamantly for the document that says slaves are worth 3/5 of a person. There is no serious willingness or dare I say ability to contend with what actual war looks like. These fantasies always stand counterpoint to the reality where as it turns out we aren’t having a setpiece war. Ever. It’s all cultural animosity. Economically, in the real world, everything is in lockstep. So a film about a scary future we can look at then turn off, it reassures us of the greatness of the US, in weal or woe, a place outside of history, above history.

Germany moment

Isn’t the biggest thing he’s known for is supporting humanitarian stuff in Palestine? I know ‘campist’ used to mean anyone who condemned imperialism, NATO anarchism, and seriously analyzed the forces at play (finding that the primary contradiction, the thing we need to break to lay the foundation for anything else, is imperialism). But now it just means thinking third worlders are human? Bar was low but Jesus.

I should clarify, it’s more of a justification for tracking features and market protectionism (like allowing only 4 brands of printer) than an actual issue.

China survived the color revolution attempt in 89. Here on the western left we only accept martyrs and losers.

Aren’t printers pretty restricted due to needing to have surveillance and anti-counterfeit features? Is this legal at scale?