A tour de force analysis, a century's developments summed up in a logical progression. This sort of mind-expanding articles is what I came here to read; and Crooke's contribution merges seamlessly into that narrative.
There is just one minor thing; you doubt the intentionality of the Yellen bomb on the ground that it would "explode for Harris as well" had she won. But the Cabal hardly has any obligations towards its stooges, neither Trump nor Harris. The bomb was intended to bring about economic collapse, with a new, dystopian world order rising from the ashes. The best summary of that plan was given in "The Great Taking" by David Rogers Webb: https://thegreattaking.com/read-online-or-download , see also https://parallelsystems.substack.com/p/the-worst-crash-since-1929-is-happening
But the failure in bringing to heel Russia and China in time for the necessarily global takeover is forcing the vampire masters to delay the prepared collapse, until the RoW can be brought in line. Hence the embracing of Trump and his drastic reforms. Trump is a tool of the Cabal, meant to keep the Golem on its feet for a little while longer, by drastic measures.
And now to quote some humor from the article:
"despite the plain outspoken disdain for Europe expressed by American officials"
LOL, what a way to reference the immortal words of Victoria "Fuck the EU" Nuland.
"Biden who was declared the 2020 election winner"
You have a way with words Karl, got to hand you that. One extra word, loaded with so much meaning.
You've got it the wrong way around RalfB. The economic collapse is being orchestrated by the old powers trying to cling on to power, not by a new cabal.
The US 'deep state' (US based interests in oil, animal ag, pharma, banking, tech and arms) already control and suppress the world. The fact that Russia, and especially China, crawled out from under them has driven them to madness. They hope to cut themselves off economically (at whatever cost to America people), cut China and her trade off at choke points such as the Arctic and Panama and watch the instability ensue.
They will be assisted by the climate crisis (which they've got everyone dismissing as a ploy by a 'cabal') which will, luckily for the US based elites, quickly affect the Global South's ability to grow food. Everything the US does, from drill baby drill, to bombs, war and blowing up pipelines accelerates the coming crisis.
What "new" Cabal? It's been around for ~500 years at least. And it's not trying to "cling" to power, or "cut themselves off", it's on the verge of taking over the world in perpetuity. Which hopefully it will fail at, but it's a close run thing. To educate yourself quickly, browse this substack, it has massive historical and current info: https://cynthiachung.substack.com/
Now that is a good manifesto comrade. Thank you. Tax extreme wealth is a fine start. The People's Party has to start now as there are some difficult hurdles in election rigging law that necessitate a few cycles to be overcome. The usa election laws and administrative obstacles are horrendous and obstructive in the extreme. Good luck. Now to goto the links.
Putin/Russia having kept his/their Agreement with President Trump regarding a 30 day moratorium on Energy utility strikes into Ukraine, this despite NATO-Ukraine breaking the truce have instead concentrated their attacks on Command Centres, meeting places of NATO & Ukrainian Commanders and Generals, the SBU, GUR and Military Headquarters in Odessa, Kherson, Kiev, Sumy and Others.
As a result, on April the 13th, everything was destroyed. The military conspiracy system has lost its apex, the centre for analysis and decision making. The blow turned out to be disarming . London, Paris and Berlin dropped their 'cunning plans' and raised the white flag, calling for a ceasefire. Unbelievably hinged really, like close your eyes and count to 5000, that's not in the Queensbury Rules and lamentable coming from the war-crazed Coalition of the Closet Nazis.
In one strike according to Comrade Sergei Lebedev, coordinator of the Mykolaiv Underground, it became known that there were a lot of foreigners among the high-ranking bodies that were taken to the secret morgue. They all wore the chevrons of Britain and Denmark.
The victims of the dagger strikes were the highest ranks of the generals of the joint-Coalition Forces, who online and not only manually, controlled the invasion of UAF into the border regions of Russia.
After the arrival of the Iskanders , ambulances with special numbers rushed through Sumy. The SBU cordoned off the areas, even ordinary ambulances weren't allowed through. The wounded were taken by helicopter to hospitals in Kharkiv and Poltava. About 30 'tourists' with large shoulder straps and the same number of officers of the UAF, the SBU and TRO were eliminated in Sumy.
Now there's a man who knows how to enjoy the fruits of his labour.
I wonder how it ends. Amerika's takes down the world or only itself and EU. I do wish that like the drunk running Russia during its fall, he did head fake and named V. Putin to intern and then was elected again saving Russia from being sold out to Amerika.
Unlike the traitor Gorbachev, Yeltsin, for all his shortcomings, realized what was happening to Russia, and was grieved by it; but he simply lacked the intellectual fortitude to know what to do about it. He was overwhelmed by all the West-introduced Talmudist and Mammonist parasites who suddenly rose to power to run, and ruin, Russia. In the end, his promotion of Putin was the best thing he ever did; I simply do not know whether this was in any measure intentional, or a total fluke.
There seems to be a lot of contention to what is the actual problem, even as you set it out in this piece. Until that becomes clearer to more people, there will be more of what we have seen for the last two decades as bumbling along continues and the various vested interests muddy the waters. I'm afraid that it will have to get worse before it gets better and it's not that great now.
Education is the Key as both Wolff, Hudson, myself, and many others have stated for many years now. People don’t need to become experts to be informed; they need to know enough to dismiss the mumbo-jumbo they’re fed. The 19th Century Populists were able to do that with farmers having very rudimentary educations. Only two reasons caused their failure to beat both the Rs & Ds—racism and the lack of 100% female enfranchisement.
I agree. Education is the key, especially critical thinking which is currently lacking, thus allowing bullshit to proliferate relatively unchallenged. Thinking is not an easy skill to master and requires work and attention to detail.
A little bit of civics education would go a long way as well as too many people have hardly a clue about the system under which they live.
None of this is new, as the ancient Greeks talked about these matters almost 2,500 years ago.
When I taught, I sought to get students to think critically and to become civicly literate and was involved in a program that promoted both.
What's very disappointing is after 1500 views only 12 clicked the link to the Wolff/Nima chat that's so vital for gaining a deeper understanding of the essay.
Education, not the cradle to grave crockaganda you find in most outlets.
I can't get my daughter to read but 12 hours straight on her smartphone hasn't made her so smart, despite her mother forking out on private school and tutors.
She's been covering the Soviet Union up to 1945 and I've had to listen to these disinformation tapes she's been given while I'm cooking. Barely recognised anything worthwhile being told.
So a week ago I said you've been listening to that crap for months now. Ok, what nationality was Stalin. The furtive gaze, Russian of course.
To her credit she's promising in math and science which I take full credit for, free of charge. lol
I've succeeded with both my sons, so I feel entitled to give you a piece of parental advice. Discuss these matters with someone at the outer range of her hearing (the young have very keen ears), but trying to give the impression that you do not want her included, that you think these topics are not appropriate for a teen. Stop talking when she walks by, etc. She will learn more by eavesdropping than she would from a boring lecture. ;-)
Edit: Now, of course, my sons have been recognized as "adults" (tee hee) and I talk with them openly. But when they were in the contrary years, I hooked them with the method outlined above.
Well, it was well past midnight for me; I did click, but did not find the fortitude to prop up my eyelids through a one-hour non-trivial discussion, I am not young anymore. From what little I did see, it was worth every minute, so I am going back to it now. :-|
This is the best post I've read in a long time, thank you Karl.
What do we do now? For me, dig into the better practices of my Catholic education: examine my conscious. Do I worship the golden calf? Do I follow the latest flim flam man/woman? Stop being a "fan". Man up and take responsibility. Learn how to engage with reds and blues and learn how to respond and how to form questions that will push them to "examine" their fairy tale constructs.
Regarding the Wolff/Nima chat, I will listen when I'm in the woods on my phone. I can't do youtube on my laptop because I don't have good tech. Nima is impressive, along with Wolff and Hudson.
"The only hope I see to properly manage the Outlaw US Empire’s decline is ..."
Quite a laundry list there, all coming down to one major thing -- a VASTLY expanded government. But we all know that government consists of corrupt politicians and power-hungry senior bureaucrats, plus an army of mindless drones waiting for their pensions.
Just ask yourself -- Where was the Democrat Party when 90,000 US factories & workshops were shut down in the last few decades, most of them being offshored along with their Working Class jobs? (The 90,000 figure came from a Union official -- Where were the Unions while this was happening?). We know where the Democrat Party was -- opening the border to illegal aliens and opening female restrooms to "transgendered" males.
Unfortunately, the US (and most of the West) will have to hit rock bottom before there can be a drastic re-ordering of society. Probably a lot of ropes & lampposts will be involved. There will be a bright future after that ... eventually. We won't ever see it. History tells us it will take generations to get back to something better.
The Ds stared it all with Carter and exacerbated the situation with Volker, which brought Reagan/Bush. oddly enough GHW Bush warned America about the “Voodoo Economics” those who employed Reagan had planned. Some Ds went along while some remained honorable and fought. Then Clinton was installed, the towers wired, the USSC Coup of 2000 gave GW Bush the keys, and he was followed by the massively corrupt Obama/Biden crew. Wolff spelled it all out two months ago as a predictable Capitalist outcome—the System more than anything else is the primary enemy and cause, while Hudson shows how Neoliberalism will end up eating itself in “Killing the Host.”
The cycles of boom and bust occur each time at magnified intensity, to the point where we are now. The instabilities in the financial system are never adequately addressed and the oligarchs are too corrupt to allow correction, so the system is bound to collapse. What will replace it, other than dystopia and chaos, is anybody's guess.
The panopticon these clowns want relies on industrial capacity and energy, something that the EU will find in short supply. And likely the US as that TSMC facility in Arizona is an exercise in marginal production. The unwinding tech bubble will make cloud computing a luxury item.
Dystopia yes, but not chaos, except transitionally. A malignant (New World) order, what Orwell predicted when he spoke about a boot standing forever on the human face.
Yes, I agree that one of the options might be to form (perhaps) people’s party. But you still have a problem with ideas — to do WHAT? As you also acknowledged, what is needed is: “people with vision will be needed to put forward the social-political-economic agenda required to take advantage of the opportunity.” And that seems to be missing…everywhere. Thank you, Karl.
Yes, NATIONALIZE banking, energy, land, resources. Develop self-sustaining nationalist economies. Redistribution of the wealth. Enough with oligarchs, aristocracies and neolibrial RENT TINA ideology.
Yes, I viewed that yesterday. The last few minutes are the most relevant, although the history that precedes it is also worth of knowing: The how did we get here and when did the ladder get removed.
Excellent read. I would like to respectfully point out a likely typo: "We’ve seen how Team Obama/Biden and now Team Trump have completely mismanaged the Outlaw US Empire’s decline that began with the Great banking Fraud of 2008-9 when Obama filed to enforce the law and allowed the basis of the Neoliberal Structure to remain in place." I think you mean "...Obama failed to enforce the law..."
Yes, I earn my bowl of rice as a poofreader. How did you guess?
Unfortunately there is simply no moral foundation in America to support an economic model where the primary goal is to increase the economic well-being of workers. That is the China model, steeped in Taoist and Confucianist morality and responsibility underlying an explicitly economic, not political, revolution. This can be seen in Deng Xiaoping's Southern Tour where his motto "Development is the only iron law" was a direct appeal to making worker-first economic change primary to political change, the opposite of a Gorbachev strategy that sought to drive economic change through political change. Which approach survived and thrived?
So to fantasize about a political revolution in America where the two political parties are replaced with another political party really misses the point of understanding what underlying values would drive worker-first economic success. Fascist empire Christian values? Nationalist Judaist values? The "invisible hand" of profit driven oligarchy values? Some chimera of Constitutional values that quickly fail when confronted by dictatorial regimes built upon executive orders?
Putin when he speaks of the new world order for Russia isn't referring to a centralized system or economic values that run roughshod over the primacy of the worker. Russia is not a nation, but like China is a civilization. He's looking to the China model, a Russian future underpinned by centuries old Orthodox Christian values, which unlike fascist America Christianity is binds together the Russian people with worker-first values that survived even Tsarist and Soviet structures that sought to pry Orthodoxy from the Russian people. But in the end Orthodoxy was all that survived as a foundation for modern moral worker-first growth and development when the USSR dissolved. This melding of Russian civilization morality and values and current economic goals and structures to benefit workers first is evident in Putin's meetings, speeches and proclamation with Patriarch Kirill over the last two decades.
It is the top-down goals and structures of the American economy that must be unseated, destroyed, and replaced by worker-first, decentralized economic goals and structures that infirm political reformation. You can see that in China and you can see that emerging in Russia even in its constitutional reforms of 2020 that furthered decentralization.
Neither Trump not any other American yet revealed represents the caliber and quality of leadership required for success in the new world. The American economic system must first collapse and end, as had China's end Russia's before it. America did well as a post-WWII economic monopoly on world power. It has failed in creating a moral worker-first economic model that is sustainable without brute force, because its intent was control and dominance and not development. And so it will be replaced chaotically as all such systems are.
I agree with the points you make. Altering the basic philosophy in America is clearly the fundamental challenge but lacks any sort of broad historical basis, although a few narrow ones do exist. And the manner in which US History’s been bent makes the task even harder.
Brilliant. You, Richard and Alastair. I liked the manifesto in particular:
"The only hope I see to properly manage the Outlaw US Empire’s decline is to completely disown the Neoliberals that is to nationalize their monies, to let the Billionaires keep one billion and forfeit the rest, while raising capital gains to 60% and inheritances over 100 million to 100%. That leaves those entities with plenty of capital compared to the bottom 90%. The other major move would be to nationalize the stock and bond markets and abolish the Federal Reserve also via nationalization. New regulations on the remaining banking system would be imposed and the Tobin Yax applied to currency speculation. The other major move would be the provision of national health insurance. Another move would be some measure to deflate the housing market to make it affordable once again. The aim of all the above is to lower the wage costs paid to make American industry competitive once its reestablished—for it will do no good to finance a massive plan to build factories unless the employed labor will allow those new enterprises to be competitive globally. Of course, none of that is wanted by Neoliberals who want the exact opposite—they dream of collecting rents from everyone."
so I felt the need to set it out once more.
When Michael Hudson was asked how to fix things, in a conversation with Glenn Deisen and Alexander Mercouris, he pretty much said the same thing. Leaving both somewhat speechless. Mr Wolff said much the same in his chat with Nima.
It seems to me that Richard attracts some negativity because of entrenched prejudices around the dangerous words 'socialism' and 'marxists/marxism' that seem to arise automatically. Much like the reaction to spilling salt and then throwing more salt over one's shoulder to thwart the 'devil'.
Anyway enjoy your Easter.
PS thanks for the AURELIAN (Another Country) substack; I've bookmarked it.
As I replied on this thread, the enemy Creditor Class has cloaked itself very well making its existence hard to see—and if you can’t see the enemy, you can’t defeat it. Hudson is one of the few economists that deals with economic rents, their origin and evolution over time. The Class War has existed for thousands of years but many only understand it as a Marxist creation and thus Communism is the only solution, which of course is incorrect but propagandized as such. Few look at other ways to structure political-economies yet that’s the way to eliminate the Class War—nationalize all means of harvesting economic rents thus making the process of becoming rich productive for society and the entrepreneur—Win-Win.
I suppose the 'issue' from a humanistic perspective is how do we develope structures and values etc wherebye the production process produces neither an under-class nor an over-class.
In terms of what has developed I often wonder if it is possible to convert worker's surplus value into a financial instrument while establishing principles of a 'fair profit' level for entrepreneurs before they sell the whole production process to the work-force who then operate the enterprise as a cooperative? I do not have the expertise to develope such an idea. Just a thought.
The idea is sound but IMO it would take a cultural revolution to make it work as the society would need to know and be convinced of the value and superiority of sharing.
Well, as I've said elsewhere, I heartily approve of Cultural Revolutions. China appears to have benefitted greatly despite the price. It's certainly preferable to plain Genocide, if one wants to compare such events.
A tour de force analysis, a century's developments summed up in a logical progression. This sort of mind-expanding articles is what I came here to read; and Crooke's contribution merges seamlessly into that narrative.
There is just one minor thing; you doubt the intentionality of the Yellen bomb on the ground that it would "explode for Harris as well" had she won. But the Cabal hardly has any obligations towards its stooges, neither Trump nor Harris. The bomb was intended to bring about economic collapse, with a new, dystopian world order rising from the ashes. The best summary of that plan was given in "The Great Taking" by David Rogers Webb: https://thegreattaking.com/read-online-or-download , see also https://parallelsystems.substack.com/p/the-worst-crash-since-1929-is-happening
But the failure in bringing to heel Russia and China in time for the necessarily global takeover is forcing the vampire masters to delay the prepared collapse, until the RoW can be brought in line. Hence the embracing of Trump and his drastic reforms. Trump is a tool of the Cabal, meant to keep the Golem on its feet for a little while longer, by drastic measures.
And now to quote some humor from the article:
"despite the plain outspoken disdain for Europe expressed by American officials"
LOL, what a way to reference the immortal words of Victoria "Fuck the EU" Nuland.
"Biden who was declared the 2020 election winner"
You have a way with words Karl, got to hand you that. One extra word, loaded with so much meaning.
You've got it the wrong way around RalfB. The economic collapse is being orchestrated by the old powers trying to cling on to power, not by a new cabal.
The US 'deep state' (US based interests in oil, animal ag, pharma, banking, tech and arms) already control and suppress the world. The fact that Russia, and especially China, crawled out from under them has driven them to madness. They hope to cut themselves off economically (at whatever cost to America people), cut China and her trade off at choke points such as the Arctic and Panama and watch the instability ensue.
They will be assisted by the climate crisis (which they've got everyone dismissing as a ploy by a 'cabal') which will, luckily for the US based elites, quickly affect the Global South's ability to grow food. Everything the US does, from drill baby drill, to bombs, war and blowing up pipelines accelerates the coming crisis.
What "new" Cabal? It's been around for ~500 years at least. And it's not trying to "cling" to power, or "cut themselves off", it's on the verge of taking over the world in perpetuity. Which hopefully it will fail at, but it's a close run thing. To educate yourself quickly, browse this substack, it has massive historical and current info: https://cynthiachung.substack.com/
Now that is a good manifesto comrade. Thank you. Tax extreme wealth is a fine start. The People's Party has to start now as there are some difficult hurdles in election rigging law that necessitate a few cycles to be overcome. The usa election laws and administrative obstacles are horrendous and obstructive in the extreme. Good luck. Now to goto the links.
Putin/Russia having kept his/their Agreement with President Trump regarding a 30 day moratorium on Energy utility strikes into Ukraine, this despite NATO-Ukraine breaking the truce have instead concentrated their attacks on Command Centres, meeting places of NATO & Ukrainian Commanders and Generals, the SBU, GUR and Military Headquarters in Odessa, Kherson, Kiev, Sumy and Others.
As a result, on April the 13th, everything was destroyed. The military conspiracy system has lost its apex, the centre for analysis and decision making. The blow turned out to be disarming . London, Paris and Berlin dropped their 'cunning plans' and raised the white flag, calling for a ceasefire. Unbelievably hinged really, like close your eyes and count to 5000, that's not in the Queensbury Rules and lamentable coming from the war-crazed Coalition of the Closet Nazis.
In one strike according to Comrade Sergei Lebedev, coordinator of the Mykolaiv Underground, it became known that there were a lot of foreigners among the high-ranking bodies that were taken to the secret morgue. They all wore the chevrons of Britain and Denmark.
The victims of the dagger strikes were the highest ranks of the generals of the joint-Coalition Forces, who online and not only manually, controlled the invasion of UAF into the border regions of Russia.
After the arrival of the Iskanders , ambulances with special numbers rushed through Sumy. The SBU cordoned off the areas, even ordinary ambulances weren't allowed through. The wounded were taken by helicopter to hospitals in Kharkiv and Poltava. About 30 'tourists' with large shoulder straps and the same number of officers of the UAF, the SBU and TRO were eliminated in Sumy.
Now there's a man who knows how to enjoy the fruits of his labour.
I wonder how it ends. Amerika's takes down the world or only itself and EU. I do wish that like the drunk running Russia during its fall, he did head fake and named V. Putin to intern and then was elected again saving Russia from being sold out to Amerika.
Thanks KS
Unlike the traitor Gorbachev, Yeltsin, for all his shortcomings, realized what was happening to Russia, and was grieved by it; but he simply lacked the intellectual fortitude to know what to do about it. He was overwhelmed by all the West-introduced Talmudist and Mammonist parasites who suddenly rose to power to run, and ruin, Russia. In the end, his promotion of Putin was the best thing he ever did; I simply do not know whether this was in any measure intentional, or a total fluke.
Gorbachev didn’t kill the USSR; the Soviet SSRs—the “Republics”—did.
One thing is the transparency of Trump’s moves people to speaking out which reveals everyone’s play book in plainly.
A Historians dream come true.
I’d say the leaders have no idea of what or how the American Dream was created as it’s beyond their mental capacity to adapt it for modern times.
Living in the winds of fate is their consciousness .
You’d think the first move would be to sacrifice the Forever War theme being touted as a prosperity move?
Fate awaits.
Well Rubio cut $4 billion from the war-chest sacking Booz Allen Hamilton from trough.
Hadn't heard much about Booz over the last decade, a part of the MIC cyber experts. Maybe lost their mojo.
Very good Karl, with much to consider.
There seems to be a lot of contention to what is the actual problem, even as you set it out in this piece. Until that becomes clearer to more people, there will be more of what we have seen for the last two decades as bumbling along continues and the various vested interests muddy the waters. I'm afraid that it will have to get worse before it gets better and it's not that great now.
Education is the Key as both Wolff, Hudson, myself, and many others have stated for many years now. People don’t need to become experts to be informed; they need to know enough to dismiss the mumbo-jumbo they’re fed. The 19th Century Populists were able to do that with farmers having very rudimentary educations. Only two reasons caused their failure to beat both the Rs & Ds—racism and the lack of 100% female enfranchisement.
I agree. Education is the key, especially critical thinking which is currently lacking, thus allowing bullshit to proliferate relatively unchallenged. Thinking is not an easy skill to master and requires work and attention to detail.
A little bit of civics education would go a long way as well as too many people have hardly a clue about the system under which they live.
None of this is new, as the ancient Greeks talked about these matters almost 2,500 years ago.
When I taught, I sought to get students to think critically and to become civicly literate and was involved in a program that promoted both.
What's very disappointing is after 1500 views only 12 clicked the link to the Wolff/Nima chat that's so vital for gaining a deeper understanding of the essay.
Education, not the cradle to grave crockaganda you find in most outlets.
I can't get my daughter to read but 12 hours straight on her smartphone hasn't made her so smart, despite her mother forking out on private school and tutors.
She's been covering the Soviet Union up to 1945 and I've had to listen to these disinformation tapes she's been given while I'm cooking. Barely recognised anything worthwhile being told.
So a week ago I said you've been listening to that crap for months now. Ok, what nationality was Stalin. The furtive gaze, Russian of course.
To her credit she's promising in math and science which I take full credit for, free of charge. lol
I've succeeded with both my sons, so I feel entitled to give you a piece of parental advice. Discuss these matters with someone at the outer range of her hearing (the young have very keen ears), but trying to give the impression that you do not want her included, that you think these topics are not appropriate for a teen. Stop talking when she walks by, etc. She will learn more by eavesdropping than she would from a boring lecture. ;-)
Edit: Now, of course, my sons have been recognized as "adults" (tee hee) and I talk with them openly. But when they were in the contrary years, I hooked them with the method outlined above.
Crafty! :-)
Wolff and Michael Hudson are always worth listening to.
Well, it was well past midnight for me; I did click, but did not find the fortitude to prop up my eyelids through a one-hour non-trivial discussion, I am not young anymore. From what little I did see, it was worth every minute, so I am going back to it now. :-|
FYC: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGfr2Xu8qt4
Edit: I did watch it through; it is worth watching.
Yes, too often there aren’t enough hours in the day.
This is the best post I've read in a long time, thank you Karl.
What do we do now? For me, dig into the better practices of my Catholic education: examine my conscious. Do I worship the golden calf? Do I follow the latest flim flam man/woman? Stop being a "fan". Man up and take responsibility. Learn how to engage with reds and blues and learn how to respond and how to form questions that will push them to "examine" their fairy tale constructs.
Regarding the Wolff/Nima chat, I will listen when I'm in the woods on my phone. I can't do youtube on my laptop because I don't have good tech. Nima is impressive, along with Wolff and Hudson.
Glad to see your comment at the Gym! Your “What to do now” is a good path. I suggest going to Martyanov’s and reading this entry, which in many ways is stunning, https://smoothiex12.blogspot.com/2025/04/a-rather-indicative-trend.html
And you have to have a full belly to learn to think.
"The only hope I see to properly manage the Outlaw US Empire’s decline is ..."
Quite a laundry list there, all coming down to one major thing -- a VASTLY expanded government. But we all know that government consists of corrupt politicians and power-hungry senior bureaucrats, plus an army of mindless drones waiting for their pensions.
Just ask yourself -- Where was the Democrat Party when 90,000 US factories & workshops were shut down in the last few decades, most of them being offshored along with their Working Class jobs? (The 90,000 figure came from a Union official -- Where were the Unions while this was happening?). We know where the Democrat Party was -- opening the border to illegal aliens and opening female restrooms to "transgendered" males.
Unfortunately, the US (and most of the West) will have to hit rock bottom before there can be a drastic re-ordering of society. Probably a lot of ropes & lampposts will be involved. There will be a bright future after that ... eventually. We won't ever see it. History tells us it will take generations to get back to something better.
The Ds stared it all with Carter and exacerbated the situation with Volker, which brought Reagan/Bush. oddly enough GHW Bush warned America about the “Voodoo Economics” those who employed Reagan had planned. Some Ds went along while some remained honorable and fought. Then Clinton was installed, the towers wired, the USSC Coup of 2000 gave GW Bush the keys, and he was followed by the massively corrupt Obama/Biden crew. Wolff spelled it all out two months ago as a predictable Capitalist outcome—the System more than anything else is the primary enemy and cause, while Hudson shows how Neoliberalism will end up eating itself in “Killing the Host.”
Don't worry Karl, Israel will find a new host.
Israel is a tool, not the master. The religious zealots are useful idiots, ditto the christian crowd and their fairy tales.
Yes I agree it's a tool for Murder Inc US.
The point I'm making is Israel is a parasite. When the US is finally bust, Israel will attach themselves to another host.
The cycles of boom and bust occur each time at magnified intensity, to the point where we are now. The instabilities in the financial system are never adequately addressed and the oligarchs are too corrupt to allow correction, so the system is bound to collapse. What will replace it, other than dystopia and chaos, is anybody's guess.
The panopticon these clowns want relies on industrial capacity and energy, something that the EU will find in short supply. And likely the US as that TSMC facility in Arizona is an exercise in marginal production. The unwinding tech bubble will make cloud computing a luxury item.
There’ve been collapses before that saw only chaos but no mass dystopia. Yes, context is key.
Dystopia yes, but not chaos, except transitionally. A malignant (New World) order, what Orwell predicted when he spoke about a boot standing forever on the human face.
Yes, I agree that one of the options might be to form (perhaps) people’s party. But you still have a problem with ideas — to do WHAT? As you also acknowledged, what is needed is: “people with vision will be needed to put forward the social-political-economic agenda required to take advantage of the opportunity.” And that seems to be missing…everywhere. Thank you, Karl.
Yes, NATIONALIZE banking, energy, land, resources. Develop self-sustaining nationalist economies. Redistribution of the wealth. Enough with oligarchs, aristocracies and neolibrial RENT TINA ideology.
The best (in my opinion) companion to this presentation is Michael Hudson interview with Glenn Diesen: https://youtu.be/bTnVECM81H0?si=41dWVw3BaNcEpugy
Yes, I viewed that yesterday. The last few minutes are the most relevant, although the history that precedes it is also worth of knowing: The how did we get here and when did the ladder get removed.
I really admire your work, Karl! Where do you find the time? Thank you!
It’s my job in my retirement.
I am retired and I struggle to keep up with all the moves in geopolitics……while trying to read outside of it. Simply amazing!
Excellent read. I would like to respectfully point out a likely typo: "We’ve seen how Team Obama/Biden and now Team Trump have completely mismanaged the Outlaw US Empire’s decline that began with the Great banking Fraud of 2008-9 when Obama filed to enforce the law and allowed the basis of the Neoliberal Structure to remain in place." I think you mean "...Obama failed to enforce the law..."
Yes, I earn my bowl of rice as a poofreader. How did you guess?
Thanks for pointing that out. The spell checker didn’t catch that nor did I. The b in banking ought to be Capitalized too.
Unfortunately there is simply no moral foundation in America to support an economic model where the primary goal is to increase the economic well-being of workers. That is the China model, steeped in Taoist and Confucianist morality and responsibility underlying an explicitly economic, not political, revolution. This can be seen in Deng Xiaoping's Southern Tour where his motto "Development is the only iron law" was a direct appeal to making worker-first economic change primary to political change, the opposite of a Gorbachev strategy that sought to drive economic change through political change. Which approach survived and thrived?
So to fantasize about a political revolution in America where the two political parties are replaced with another political party really misses the point of understanding what underlying values would drive worker-first economic success. Fascist empire Christian values? Nationalist Judaist values? The "invisible hand" of profit driven oligarchy values? Some chimera of Constitutional values that quickly fail when confronted by dictatorial regimes built upon executive orders?
Putin when he speaks of the new world order for Russia isn't referring to a centralized system or economic values that run roughshod over the primacy of the worker. Russia is not a nation, but like China is a civilization. He's looking to the China model, a Russian future underpinned by centuries old Orthodox Christian values, which unlike fascist America Christianity is binds together the Russian people with worker-first values that survived even Tsarist and Soviet structures that sought to pry Orthodoxy from the Russian people. But in the end Orthodoxy was all that survived as a foundation for modern moral worker-first growth and development when the USSR dissolved. This melding of Russian civilization morality and values and current economic goals and structures to benefit workers first is evident in Putin's meetings, speeches and proclamation with Patriarch Kirill over the last two decades.
It is the top-down goals and structures of the American economy that must be unseated, destroyed, and replaced by worker-first, decentralized economic goals and structures that infirm political reformation. You can see that in China and you can see that emerging in Russia even in its constitutional reforms of 2020 that furthered decentralization.
Neither Trump not any other American yet revealed represents the caliber and quality of leadership required for success in the new world. The American economic system must first collapse and end, as had China's end Russia's before it. America did well as a post-WWII economic monopoly on world power. It has failed in creating a moral worker-first economic model that is sustainable without brute force, because its intent was control and dominance and not development. And so it will be replaced chaotically as all such systems are.
I agree with the points you make. Altering the basic philosophy in America is clearly the fundamental challenge but lacks any sort of broad historical basis, although a few narrow ones do exist. And the manner in which US History’s been bent makes the task even harder.
"Jewish elephants"
Smiles :)
Brilliant. You, Richard and Alastair. I liked the manifesto in particular:
"The only hope I see to properly manage the Outlaw US Empire’s decline is to completely disown the Neoliberals that is to nationalize their monies, to let the Billionaires keep one billion and forfeit the rest, while raising capital gains to 60% and inheritances over 100 million to 100%. That leaves those entities with plenty of capital compared to the bottom 90%. The other major move would be to nationalize the stock and bond markets and abolish the Federal Reserve also via nationalization. New regulations on the remaining banking system would be imposed and the Tobin Yax applied to currency speculation. The other major move would be the provision of national health insurance. Another move would be some measure to deflate the housing market to make it affordable once again. The aim of all the above is to lower the wage costs paid to make American industry competitive once its reestablished—for it will do no good to finance a massive plan to build factories unless the employed labor will allow those new enterprises to be competitive globally. Of course, none of that is wanted by Neoliberals who want the exact opposite—they dream of collecting rents from everyone."
so I felt the need to set it out once more.
When Michael Hudson was asked how to fix things, in a conversation with Glenn Deisen and Alexander Mercouris, he pretty much said the same thing. Leaving both somewhat speechless. Mr Wolff said much the same in his chat with Nima.
It seems to me that Richard attracts some negativity because of entrenched prejudices around the dangerous words 'socialism' and 'marxists/marxism' that seem to arise automatically. Much like the reaction to spilling salt and then throwing more salt over one's shoulder to thwart the 'devil'.
Anyway enjoy your Easter.
PS thanks for the AURELIAN (Another Country) substack; I've bookmarked it.
As I replied on this thread, the enemy Creditor Class has cloaked itself very well making its existence hard to see—and if you can’t see the enemy, you can’t defeat it. Hudson is one of the few economists that deals with economic rents, their origin and evolution over time. The Class War has existed for thousands of years but many only understand it as a Marxist creation and thus Communism is the only solution, which of course is incorrect but propagandized as such. Few look at other ways to structure political-economies yet that’s the way to eliminate the Class War—nationalize all means of harvesting economic rents thus making the process of becoming rich productive for society and the entrepreneur—Win-Win.
I suppose the 'issue' from a humanistic perspective is how do we develope structures and values etc wherebye the production process produces neither an under-class nor an over-class.
In terms of what has developed I often wonder if it is possible to convert worker's surplus value into a financial instrument while establishing principles of a 'fair profit' level for entrepreneurs before they sell the whole production process to the work-force who then operate the enterprise as a cooperative? I do not have the expertise to develope such an idea. Just a thought.
The idea is sound but IMO it would take a cultural revolution to make it work as the society would need to know and be convinced of the value and superiority of sharing.
Well, as I've said elsewhere, I heartily approve of Cultural Revolutions. China appears to have benefitted greatly despite the price. It's certainly preferable to plain Genocide, if one wants to compare such events.
Cheers.
Thank you - and I'm not laughing.
Excellent summary of the mess the world is in.