The problem is that in the USA we have Republicans intentionally mismanaging the social security system and then being like “SEE? IT’S BAD!” and way too many people eat that shit up.

Yes, if nothing is changed for decades, the current systems may have issues.

Fortunately, we have decades to come up with some solutions. Which I’m sure we’d all rather be focusing on than talking shit online.

The main disadvantage that I see is the quarter-laundry machines were pretty easy to modify so that you didn’t need to pay them. The whole app thing appears to be a lot more difficult to hack, the coin machines can be disabled with a screwdriver.

…OK but I used to work in a neighborhood where a bunch of people had actual, period exterior gaslights left over from the 19th century. They had been upgraded with digital timers and stuff. Automatic shut-off/restart. That’s ridiculous!

B&H Photo will not process your order on the Jewish day of rest, it’s amazing. https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/httwww.bhphotovideo.com/find/SHcalendar.jsp

Well of course you gotta think, Reddit and Twitter were also probably getting a lot more hits than Low Tech Mag 😅

I believe that quote is actually from Julius Nyerere, who, unlike Chompsky, was never a known Epstein associate.

I think people with mental disorders are more likely to be victimized by Republicans. Republicans aren’t mentally ill, don’t let them off the hook, they’re motivated towards self-interest, and know exactly what they’re doing: being greedy assholes.

What is up with the Reagan apologia? Fuck that guy. Reagan walked so Bush and and Trump could run.

“The death of one man is a tragedy; the death of one million, a statistic.” — J. Stalin

Yes. Thank you.

The treaty was certainly fucked up, and also, the Nazis used that as propaganda to enflame their base with the “stab-in-the-back” myth.

Also, we can keep playing this nationalists game. One could also argue that France had “legitimate reasons” for being so punitive in the treaty, like, for instance, how they didn’t start WWI.

Actually Hitler and Eva Braun got married in the bunker right before they killed themselves. Why do I know this?! Fuck

I think we’ve “been there” since at least the 1930’s in terms of “the majority of people’s lives suck for preventable reasons,” but there’s a lot of propaganda convincing people that their lives are actually awesome.

Your hopes of a good life in your lifetime end with revolution.

I strongly disagree. My life is already pretty fucked up and doesn’t seem like it’ll be getting better without some massive political changes.

Generational warfare is counterproductive. I have much more in common with a working class boomer, than I do with a rich person who is my same age.

My point is that the only reason the USA “wasn’t fascist” in the 19th century was because the term “fascism” hadn’t been invented yet. It’s ahistorical to use that term. However, fascism is very much based on and directly inspired by the colonialist slave society that existed the USA in the early 19th century. Mussolini and other early fascists talked openly & extensively about this. As has been said, Hitler treated other Europeans like Europeans had been treating their colonial subjects.

I wasn’t talking about voting, and I’m certainly not discouraging anyone from voting. I’m not sure why you got that from what I posted. You were saying that the USA wasn’t fascist in the 19th century, and I’m agreeing, but with a big ol’ asterisk.

Universal healthcare is pretty cheap compared to all the money we’ve been hemorrhaging on wars, support to countries like Israel, tax cuts… hell, all of this is small potatoes compared to the economic destruction that’s been done with these tarriffs.

We could have good healthcare for everyone for far less money than has been spent fighting with Iran this year.

Also, the USA can still afford all this and more because we are the richest society in history. Let’s keep some perspective. Even with all the crazy bullshit that’s happened in the last few years, we’ve never actually been lacking for money. It just gets prioritized into stupid shit.

There’s enough money in this country to pay for everything we want, and still have lower taxes than Europe. We just have to stop letting hoarders control the money.

You don’t feel the system that enslaved human beings based on their race “exalts nation and race over the individual?”

I’d say the US wasn’t fascist in that period because fascism is a post-industrial ideology that’s interrelated with corporate mass media. But, when it did come around, fascism was explicitly modeled on the “slavery + colonial genocide” era of the USA’s development. Fascism in the 20th century was the logic of colonialism coming home from the periphery to the imperial core.