- Jun 28, 2004
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I phrased it awkwardly.
I’d say that centuries of capitalism and the intense globalization it has fostered, have created a dynamic where societies are merging despite the state’s prerogatives.
A very under appreciated aspect of US politics is the conflict between international elites and national/local elites (and vassalage/patronage networks they each bring to the table). The former are largely Democrats and the latter are largely MAGA.
And let’s make no mistake, pretty anyone whose name is in the news a lot is an international elite and the more cynical among them are great at posing as national/local elites (see Musk, Theil, Trump et al.). That dynamic isn’t limited to US politics. The elites in every country are part of the 20-40 million humans who form this global elite (this includes almost every elite from the Russo-Chinese Bloc, including and especially, their idiot fail kids who all go to school in an later become scene kids in major western cities).
IMO nationalism will ultimately lose to capitalism’s works homogenizing power. But it won’t go down without a fight. The next few decades will largely be defined by the fact that the top people in every country are part of an exclusive and affluent global village while minor elites don’t enjoy the same advantages but they tend to have equal or greater power within their respective countries’ political systems. How each side plays it and how they mobilize their allied non elites within a given country, will be decisive as this conflict between national and international elites gets sharper. And it’s truly an open question who will win since thus conflict pits two powerful capitalist tendencies.
On the one hand, capitalism is generally good at quickly unifying all or most elites in the face of any and all popular resentment of the class structure. On the other hand, capitalism won’t be denied, it ultimately gets what it wants and having 200+ nation states with local elites using that state as their piggy bank, that’s not efficient and when something is inefficient (at generating profits), it usually gets replaced by flatter, more global, more capital friendly governing regimes.
National/local elites can throw up all the firewalls and ghoulish politicos they want, history is coming for them, and last 400 years are telling me that it’s smart to bet on capitalism’s irrepressible drive towards homogeneity and globalization.
At this point, that’s my working assumption about NIMBYs. Not all of them are white supremacists, maybe some actually just care about parking or whatever, but by and large, opposition to anything other than SFHs is driven primarily by racism.
In addition to being racist, opposition to high density is outdated. No one is building a 1960’s project tower on your cul du sac. Upzoning and public housing mostly involves a few three story apartments in otherwise SFH neighborhoods. I always find myself arguing that section 8 covers a lot of school teachers and not “hood rats.” But in the eyes of judgemental suburbanites (including and especially every Latina gen X receptionist who is married to a cop or firefighter and owns a home in Oxnard, CA), anyone who can’t buy an $700k ranch house is a “hood rat” and at best needs to sleep 20 miles away from our august town every night and commute in everyday to serve us, you’re good enough to teach our kids but not good enough to live among us.
Sad all around. The horrors persist but so do I.
Welp. Trump will get a TikTok deal and be a hero
Biden really misread the economic situation around TikTok.
I’ve talked to enough content creators and marketers and they all feel this TikTok ban as being the result of an old man who is stuck in the 1960’s making rash decisions based on conedically outdated information. (And all of them understand, the hypothetical, theoretical damage that China could cause with access to US data, they just don’t care because they need to make rent every month. A greedy American landlord being a far bigger threat than some CCP official could ever pose).
I tend to eschew people’s arguments that all older people over a certain age should quit politics. IMO, it’s very case by case, and is highly contextual based on said politician’s specific health circumstances as well as the scope and type of responsibilities they will have. At the same time though, it’s become clear that Biden was simply too out of step with modern realities to be president. Dude was living in the 1960’s and was trying to govern the US in the 2020’s. His mere vague liberal instincts made him categorically better than the Trumpian alternative, but beyond that, dude was a massive liability for liberalism and progressivism.
As it currently stands, TikTok is more economically significant than most American based manufacturing concerns. But if a candy shop in upstate Michigan closed, Biden would be super concerned with that. But an economic engine in the social media space? “Ah, shucks Jack, it’s just a bunch of silly girls dancing, we gotta shut it down, Jack, otherwise Mao will be laughing at us.”
Biden was better than Trump but dude was still 100% a mister Burns president. Too epistemologically behind the pack to be an effective leader.
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