I’m usually not the kind of fan who goes ballistic after a loss and pounds the table for a complete rebuild.

But that’s how I felt after the first half. I was almost numb by the end of the game, and couldn’t even watch the last minute or so after Kupp drop-tipped the pass for a Ravens’ interception.

After some time to calm down, reflect, burn off some of the alcohol, do some Zazen . . . I can see much more clearly now:

Tear this #$@&%*! down you #$@&%*! I’m NOT PUTTING UP with this #$@&%*! any #$@&%*! MORE this #$@&%*! YEAR or next #$@&%*! YEAR!!! You #$@&%*! #$@&%*!?#$@&%*!!!

Capitalism actually couldn’t work, at all, without cooperation. Massive cooperation, at all levels — for good and ill. Mostly the latter. That’s the major irony whenever the topic comes up. Every business of any size requires it, and business to business activity requires it, and business to consumer and business to public sector require it. Take away cooperation and the entire system collapses.

I think people in capitalist societies misunderstand its nature to a tremendous degree, and that’s what the powers that be want.

To me, if we really were all selfish and self-absorbed, it couldn’t possibly work, because we’d all act at cross-purposes, on the job, as consumers, as citizens. We’d all demand the highest pay, the top job, the finest goods and services, and we obviously don’t. Most people accept crappy pay, lousy jobs, poor goods and poor services. We adapt and accept massive inequality and injustice. We accept hierarchies where the top acts selfishly, even socipathically, and we’ve been brainwashed into thinking this is normal, because it’s normal for everyone.

If humans were as selfish and aggressive and violent as we’re supposed to be, that wouldn’t happen, and we would have killed each other off tens of thousands of years ago.

Is that snow scene, um, real?

Because of the angles, it’s tough to be sure. But looking at the cars and guestimating the heights . . . that’s either 16-20 feet of snow, or someone bulldozed their way through the world’s biggest vanilla pie.

Quick side-note:

Your commercial reminded me of something I’ve noticed, streaming British TV and movies.

They seem far more comfortable with mixed-race romantic pairings, especially in their Rom-Coms. Doesn’t seem to provoke so much angst, one way or another. And when it happens in the US, it’s generally white female, black male. In Britain, it seems, more often than not, to be white male, black female.

I have no idea what that means, if anything. Someday, it won’t matter an iota. It will just be another day, the sun rises, the sun sets, etc. Just like the subject of the Renault commercial. I think the world will be far better off for that evolution. Love is love is love, etc.

Agamemnon wrote:

I am not too big a fan of Weddle. I don’t think he will be back next year. Just my opinion. I really like Matthews.

The guys on Pardon the Interruption made the comment that former Baltimore players seem to do this, and that they’ve never heard of any grousing about their former team. Their deduction was that the entire franchise was thought to be a good one, from top to bottom.

Ironically, it’s the original Cleveland Browns franchise.

As for Weddle: When you say you don’t like him, do you mean his play on the field? I haven’t focused on safety play this year, so I can’t say one way or another. Definitely agree about Matthews. That was an excellent pickup. He really wants to prove Green Bay wrong, and he has.

I’ve never heard of this ever being a quandary for a player. Though I likely missed it happening over the years. You switch teams. You help them any legal way possible.

It’s probably not a real factor, one way or another. Kinda sorta a “slow newsday” thing.

But on a related issue, having to do with that particular morning show on NFL Network:

I can’t stand their setup and “vibe.” For me, it’s far too frenetic, seeks laughs all too often, wants to entertain us above all else. There’s no seriousness about the game itself when I’ve tuned in to watch it.

Yeah, this is probably when I get an “Ok, Boomer” reaction. But I really miss the days when Frank Gifford used to preview games — before he was on MNF — and the games themselves were narrated by people who thought they mattered, a lot. Summerall, Brookshiser (sp?) come to mind. Some of the folks on the old AFL games too, which escape me at the moment.

As a youngin, the dramatic aspect of NFL football was heightened by the TV coverage, by the way those games were covered. The NFL Network’s morning show deflates that drama for me. It’s more about the TV personalities themselves than the games.

Oh, well.

When you get the time, would enjoy reading your response to my follow-up post in the Obama thread. I think it’s a clarification worth pursuing.

Hope all is well.

Would appreciate your thoughts on the following:

The best leftist critiques, in my view, are about power dynamics. No one analyzes the effects of power imbalances and “systems” more accurately.

When Obama and the Dems won the White House, and held Congress for the first two years, it wouldn’t have made any sense at all if leftists had concentrated on Republicans. The Dems were in power. Focus on them. Not to the exclusion of the GOP, of course. It’s a duopoly. But the main focus should have been the party that held the Executive and Congress, named judges, etc. etc. Once the GOP controlled Congress, the focus should have reflected that change too.

Once Trump won the White House, however, leftist focus should have shifted again. The GOP already had Congress, and now they controlled all three branches. But for some leftists, the Dems were still the main object of focus. It was as if Clinton had won, and not Trump. I think this was primarily an overreaction to Russiagate, but there must have been all kinds of other reasons. Regardless, the absence of a shift wasn’t logical, and I think it went against — and still goes against — traditional (and effective) leftist critique.

wv wrote:

PS — Just want to add one more thing. I will say this about Hedges/Dore — They talk endlessly about supporting Leftist Policies. They talk endlessly about the evils of Corporate-Capitalist Imperialism, and other mainstream corporate-capitalist atrocities. And they talk a lot about various nefarious GOP players, including the old ones like Bush, Reagan, etc.

But. I will grant you they do not expressly pick on Trump that much. And sometimes they defend him in a way. By that I mean they dont USE THE DEMOCRAT PLAYBOOK for attacking Trump. They never go along with the DEMOCRAT version of “whats wrong with Trump.” And oftentimes they dispute the DEMOCRAT reasoning about “whats wrong with Trump.” The do ‘that’ a LOT.

Now one could interpret ‘that’ dynamic as being ‘pro Trump.’ But one would have to totally ignore the endless anti-righwing diatribes they have recorded in order to come the conclusion they were pro-trump. You’d also have to ignore the endless support they have recorded for LEFTIST (not Democrat) policies.

Having said all that, maybe you are right in this sense — Maybe they should do some particular shows detailing a LEFTIST critique of what is wrong with Trump.
Maybe they should do some of that. Its a fair criticism.

I think i know why they dont, but maybe they should.

w
v

WV,

I’m not asking them to use Democratic party talking points or playbook to attack Trump. I’m just saying they need to tell the truth about him and those in power, and stop being afraid of appearing to support the Dems in the process. Tell the truth. If people misunderstand that, tough.

Also, it’s not enough to say they’re leftists. So am I. And, again, I’d bet I’m further to the left than they are, or Greenwald, or Mate. We leftists disagree about stuff . . . as you know. There really isn’t leftist orthodoxy on this subject, obviously, and I’m not asking for that.

I’m saying that if the issue is the duopoly, and the system, and the concentration of wealth and power, inequality, etc. etc. . . . Trump is huge part of that ongoing problem. He and the GOP are a major part of all that. And prior to the 2018 election, Trump and the GOP held all branches of government. But it seemed that “Russiagate” just screwed with their critical abilities, so they wrote, at times, as if the Dems held all the power, and not Trump and the GOP. That the latter were “victims” of deep, dark powers that leftists should focus on above all else.

That aided and abetted Trump and the GOP, and it was hopelessly one-sided as critique.

In my view, it’s not even left of center to have a critique of the system and not include Trump and the GOP, much less “leftist.”

(Will try to flesh this out later. Not having the best of days. But, please, add more of your own thoughts. Would rather read your own than thoughts from those videos, frankly.)

Quick clarification:

My concern, of course, isn’t in being misunderstood about support for either party. I can’t stand either one. The point for me is that if that’s the supposed rationale for not critiquing one or the other, there’s a logical flip side to it. The absence of critiques of the GOP helps the GOP.

Our system is a monopoly political system, in effect, as every leftist knows. It’s anti-democratic because of that monopoly, and the capitalist system which controls it. So we have an either/or choice, essentially. We should be able to choose among dozens of parties and individuals that cover the entire gamut of American life. But since it’s either the Blue team or the Red team taking power after each election, or splitting some of that power between them, I, personally, don’t want to help the far worse option in any way, shape or form.

Again, one of many leftist dilemmas . . .

I like Reed too.

But his appearance, and its content, has me thinking about another dynamic that I don’t think existed in the media ecosystem prior to Trump. I might be wrong about that, but I’ve been paying close attention to media stuff for a while now. I’m pretty sure I’m right about this.

The Hill is a conservative media outlet. Its ownership is conservative, and most of its columnists are. It had John Solomon aboard until recently, a far-right crank, whose conspiracy theories about Ukraine were finally even too much for The Hill.

Notice no one said a word about the GOP and their doings. This was all just (valid, correct, self-evident) critique about the Dems, which actually helps the GOP, due to the nature of our moronic system. A conservative media outlet welcomes even leftists on board to go after the Dems . . . who deserve the bashing, of course. But they’re not doing this out of the goodness of their hearts. It’s calculated to help the GOP.

On MSNBC, they have a slight modification of this. They, too, are owned by conservatives (Comcast), but they initially thought they’d be the “liberal” network and hired a coupla. Now, they mostly have Republican talking heads on who can’t stand Trump. They go after the GOP, almost exclusively, at least until the talk turns to things like M4A or “free” college, etc. etc. Then they revert back to their GOP talking points and bash the Dems for “going too far to the left.”

On CNN, if you pay attention, you’ll see that most of the talking heads and guests are former staff for various Republicans too. Cruz, Rand Paul, etc. They don’t like Trump, so they’re welcome on this or that panel. There are always more former Republican staffers than former Dem staffers, and it’s not close.

But if Trump isn’t the the subject, they’re going to spin for conservative ideology, on both CNN and MSNBC, more often than not.

Obviously, the deck has always been stacked against our side. But it’s also stacked against “progressive Dems.” I mean, the real kind. Not centrists who call themselves progressives. This actually helps the GOP.

Quite the dilemma for leftists, isn’t it?

W,

This might make you feel a little less worried:

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/70-americans-trumps-actions-tied-ukraine-wrong-poll/story?id=67088534

And it came out before today’s testimony by Sondlund, which may well be a game-changer . . . Though we’ve heard that one before.

An overwhelming 70% of Americans think President Donald Trump’s request to a foreign leader to investigate his political rival, which sits at the heart of the House of Representatives’ impeachment inquiry, was wrong, a new ABC News/Ipsos poll finds.

The poll also finds that 51% think Trump should be impeached and removed from office. The “just impeach” percentage is 57%.

An NPR poll on the same day had similar numbers.

nittany ram wrote:

I think the Scandinavian countries are capitalist with strong social safety nets.

There you go, ruining yet another thread with your concise, direct, to the point posts!!

;>)

WV,

If you’re looking for a book on the topic, though it’s indirectly about it, not directly, I’d highly recommend Tony Judt’s Ill Fares the Land. It’s short, so I think it would fit in with your workload schedule pretty well.

Ill Fares the Land

He was once further to the left, and that shows in some of his comments. But he’s basically making the case for social democracy, rather than socialism, and saying why.

I want full-on socialism, not social democracy. But what he proposes would be a big improvement on our current situation.

Martin Hagglund, in his brilliant This Life (which I’ve mentioned before), makes a very strong case for full-on socialism, which he calls “democratic socialism” — philosophically, pragmatically, effects-wise, etc. But his view is that while social democracy is an improvement over the neoliberal project, keeping capitalism in place sets up yet another contradiction that can’t be resolved. Capitalism needs endless capital accumulation. Social democracy reduces that, inadvertently adding to cyclical downturns and other problems. The answer for him — and for me — is to dump the current economic system which has so many of these natural issues of compatibility and conflict with political democracy.

It can’t be tamed, or reformed, or contained. It has to be replaced.

wv wrote:

Billy_T wrote:

That’s truly admirable. You walk the walk. Major kudos, WV.

====================

Thanks BT, but there’s no honor in it, trust me. I think I was always a bit of an oddball. Never-fit-in. Outsider. Alienated. Nerdy. You know the type.
I could never have worked in respectable corporate situation. I dont think it was a ‘choice.’ I just kinda organically ended up where i fit in, with the riff-raff.

If I’d had more ambition, i coulda been the Joker.

w
v

:>)

The Joker!!

I think we share a lot of that. I never thought I fit in, either. Well, at times, I would find a “tribe” of sorts, and that would muffle that feeling a bit. High School and University, especially. But my “difference” was mainly due to being an artist, a writer, focused on those things, rather than making money, obtaining status, living in the “right” neighborhood, etc. I didn’t care about those things back then, and still don’t, and a lot of people in the DC area did, including young, single women.

Ironically, I became somewhat alienated from my tribes in the Art and English departments too, over time. They were a world apart, and I became a world apart from that world apart, with a few individual exceptions, luckily.

I went back to school three times, and the basic pattern remained fairly constant. Those tribes shrunk down to just a few truly simpatico people.

But, looking back, I think I would have done many things differently, and I have my regrets, which is another form of alienation for me. Most people I talk with about “the past” say they have none. I can’t even imagine feeling that way about one’s life-history.