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RE: What do you mean, 'Who's the author?' - ALL OF THEM!
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Fluknu
Posts: 151
Joined: Jan. 11 2021
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 RE: What do you mean, 'Who's the aut... (in reply to Ricardo)
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I galls and guys,
I thought a lot about that discussion. I wrote more than a couple of posts and then pressed "cancel"...:). Then the whole thing went into tortilla and rock...Good thing because it's quite a heavy theme.
This theme touches something deep in me. About freedom, and How I see this fleeting value disapearing slowly but shurly. Beeing from the left or the right.
So I decided to start to read some Foucault (Barjavel will have to wait). I'm not so sure about those post modernist socioligsts. I've tried Derrida and Didn't enjoy it. I'm more into Edgar Morin and Theilard de Chardin when it comes to that field (The collective field). But Foucault seems to be a major influence, and quite a thinker that I never engaged.
Estebanna, which book do you suggest for a start? I don't want to start from the anti psyichiatry dimension, as I have read many italians on that subject.
Other than that, my recepie for a good regressiv beasty night is Janes addiction, two toast, a fried egg inbetween, some grated cheese, a slice of cucumber (to avoid guilt), mayonnaise, ketchup and harissa. I call that the "le sandwich de la mort qui tue la mort"- And if you can double the quantitities that's a treat.
Ok, back to flamenco now...
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Date Mar. 24 2021 20:46:41
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estebanana
Posts: 9351
Joined: Oct. 16 2009
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RE: What do you mean, 'Who's the aut... (in reply to Fluknu)
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Fluknu,
My main point was about the differences between authoritarian and democratic forms of government and power. And now the strange mixes of authoritarians trying to insert themselves into democratic systems and how that's tolerated or not. ( and who falls for it)
Foucault, I mentioned him because he wrote a lot about the function and history of policing and how its power operates. How nationalism and authoritarian power bends the same way.
As far as reading him, for fun I like the essay on Las Menina's in The Order of Things, or the essay on authorship. I don't agree with everything, but he's fresh. I think it's in Discipline and Punish that he gets into police state stuff and especially his take on the Panopticon prison is interesting. ( I'm not interested in his handling of the development of the clinic, that's probably been tackled better more recently.)
I'd also highly recommend 'Caste' By Isabel Wilkerson and the book by Heather Cox Richardson, How the South won the Civil War - Which is essentially a history of authoritarianism, Jim Crow ordinance, with a democracy.
I'm not so worried about freedom, as I am about corporate or industrial power in alignment with authoritarian regimes, like the way China is now moving. The American left is run mostly by muddle headed dimwits like Bernie Sanders who end up being 'America First' nationalists by way of not watching or putting in check the power of overseas threats to democracy. He's asleep on it and would have been a disasterous president. We dodged a bullet. The left is a bit dangerous, but not really, but dangerous because it wraps itself in a kind of left tempered nationalism that's not globally vigilant. On the other hand, the far right is even crazier, they think guns will protect them and abortion is about male power that will save them from satan. Fools. I don't have much good to say about either, as they are both anti center zealots.
Reproductive rights are economic rights, and human rights, and I worry more about that in relation to future genetic modification and global markets with a rise of authoritarian rabble and right wing agitators in governments.
_____________________________
https://www.stephenfaulkguitars.com
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Date Mar. 30 2021 2:59:23
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Fluknu
Posts: 151
Joined: Jan. 11 2021
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RE: What do you mean, 'Who's the aut... (in reply to Ricardo)
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Hi Estebanna, I started Foucault and I'm into"Les mots et les choses" (I guess it translates itself into "words and things"). He's very learned and interesting. I have a lot of pleasure reading him. But I can't say I'm a fan. I'm familiar with deconstructiviste thought, so it's not mind blowing, but the book is full of gems. I do not agree with some things, but other I do. I'll go on with the reading.
I agree with you. The only thing where I disagree a bit is about the left. But that's a very specific problem as it's so peculiar to each country. Our left here is different than Frances' or the US's. So is our right. We have a middle right, and a far right. But the far right is, in Switzerland for example, not against abortion. The right to abort is here a given. But the far right is certainly against immigration.
As an example, there's been recently a backlash against comedians who have mocked the cancel culture/woke culture. But that is also very specific, because they made fun of what is called inclusive language. In french, we have Masculine and Feminine. So now they are making word endings for trans and other categories. So now if I would translate it in english it would make :"Hello Folk-s-kette-kut-kat" - something like that. Those comedians have made fun of that. It has been taken as an attack against the lgbtq community. So the left has called for censure of comedians. I have to say that swiss comedians are not very corrosive. We're a really deeply consensual. Those comedians have caricatured the gymnastic of language, the evolution of culture, the divide, but they have never aimed at the person in itself. They also, in course of time, have caricatured mostly swiss caractere. Like the swiss rich hippie, the banker, the freudian psychologist, the typical swiss drunkard, you name it. Those comedians are a reflection of what we are and help us take distance. And here, for the first time, there's been a call for censure, from a minority. I think it's just the beginning, really. That's what makes me sad.
As for the loss of freedom due to global market, big techs and so on, I totally agree. And our left here in Switzerland fights aginst that.
So my fear lies here: the surveillance capitalist society (in reference to Soshana Zuboff's book - a good read) is way to powerfull at the moment and is already engulfing us. On the other side, the well inteded left, is going to shut our mouth and is creating a social tension.
It's the perfect storm for me. I hope I'm wrong, but I think at the moment both sides are working towards a limiting of our freedom of movement. Neither of them makes sense.
That's why I like Flamenco: you start stuck, in a jail, crappy, unable to express anything. But slowly you see some spaces of freedom emerging. It's a fight for freedom. But freedom within discipline.
(that last part I wrote to go back to Flamenco :) I'm not sure it relally makes sense.)
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Date Mar. 30 2021 21:47:15
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ernandez R
Posts: 737
Joined: Mar. 25 2019
From: Alaska USA
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RE: What do you mean, 'Who's the aut... (in reply to Fluknu)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Fluknu
Hi Estebanna, I started Foucault and I'm into"Les mots et les choses" (I guess it translates itself into "words and things"). He's very learned and interesting. I have a lot of pleasure reading him. But I can't say I'm a fan. I'm familiar with deconstructiviste thought, so it's not mind blowing, but the book is full of gems. I do not agree with some things, but other I do. I'll go on with the reading.
I agree with you. The only thing where I disagree a bit is about the left. But that's a very specific problem as it's so peculiar to each country. Our left here is different than Frances' or the US's. So is our right. We have a middle right, and a far right. But the far right is, in Switzerland for example, not against abortion. The right to abort is here a given. But the far right is certainly against immigration.
As an example, there's been recently a backlash against comedians who have mocked the cancel culture/woke culture. But that is also very specific, because they made fun of what is called inclusive language. In french, we have Masculine and Feminine. So now they are making word endings for trans and other categories. So now if I would translate it in english it would make :"Hello Folk-s-kette-kut-kat" - something like that. Those comedians have made fun of that. It has been taken as an attack against the lgbtq community. So the left has called for censure of comedians. I have to say that swiss comedians are not very corrosive. We're a really deeply consensual. Those comedians have caricatured the gymnastic of language, the evolution of culture, the divide, but they have never aimed at the person in itself. They also, in course of time, have caricatured mostly swiss caractere. Like the swiss rich hippie, the banker, the freudian psychologist, the typical swiss drunkard, you name it. Those comedians are a reflection of what we are and help us take distance. And here, for the first time, there's been a call for censure, from a minority. I think it's just the beginning, really. That's what makes me sad.
As for the loss of freedom due to global market, big techs and so on, I totally agree. And our left here in Switzerland fights aginst that.
So my fear lies here: the surveillance capitalist society (in reference to Soshana Zuboff's book - a good read) is way to powerfull at the moment and is already engulfing us. On the other side, the well inteded left, is going to shut our mouth and is creating a social tension.
It's the perfect storm for me. I hope I'm wrong, but I think at the moment both sides are working towards a limiting of our freedom of movement. Neither of them makes sense.
That's why I like Flamenco: you start stuck, in a jail, crappy, unable to express anything. But slowly you see some spaces of freedom emerging. It's a fight for freedom. But freedom within discipline.
(that last part I wrote to go back to Flamenco :) I'm not sure it relally makes sense.)
Fluknew,
Your last couple thoughts brought this out:
I've been working on this idea that it is the marginalized who really experience life while everyone else is trapped within their system bordered by rules which have become bars to growth.
It's my recent experience with Flamenco history which has began to solidify this idea that, sure the world needs rules and conditions and limits, but there has always been a people with a deep soul of experience, painful experience quite often, that allows an event as simple as a sunny day to uplift them into song.
I've written about this a few times, specifically, if you have never been hungry how can you taste; sure food and wine, a new pair of guitar strings, but what about a social security, just having a day when you are safe, your family is safe, your like and kind free from the hate of those trapped within the rules that can't include those outside. And once power has been castrated what does a man do, what can a man do, how does he take the rage inside and keep it from eating him alive, sure there is wine and whisky, so what has humanity done over the ages but cry?
Flamenco and it musical kin, heard in desert dry and from field hands the world over, its sounds are almost guarantied, it's a price really, that men and women the world over ever sing, cause they must.
HR
_____________________________
I prefer my flamenco guitar spicy,
doesn't have to be fast,
should have some meat on the bones,
can be raw or well done,
as long as it doesn't sound like it's turning green on an elevator floor.
www.instagram.com/threeriversguitars
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Date Mar. 30 2021 23:30:17
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Piwin
Posts: 3559
Joined: Feb. 9 2016
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RE: What do you mean, 'Who's the aut... (in reply to Ricardo)
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quote:
It starts with the mentality that some guy can’t get away with telling a joke. It evolves quite easily to physical torture and burning at the stake.
The first inquisition started because the Western Catholic Church felt threatened by the rapid growth of competing religious movements in Lyons and Albi. In Lyons it was the "Fraternité des Pauvres de Lyon" launched by Vaudès. Vaudès was a sort of proto-Protestant, doing things like translating the Bible into vernacular, criticising money in the Church, etc. In Albi it was the Cathar movement, which harkened back to the early Gnostics in that they believed in two Gods, one good and one evil.
What happens is that once repressive state or church mechanisms get rolling, some people attempt to resolve petty disputes by using the larger political/religious conflicts they find themselves in. Your neighbour said your wife looks like a fat cow and you just can't get over it? Go tell the priest that you overheard him saying a Cathar prayer. That sort of thing. But those petty mentalities aren't what started the inquisition. They just profited from it.
If the "cancel culture" crowd today tried to physically torture someone or burn them at the stake, they would go to prison. Which is why I said earlier that if "cancel culture" is such a big problem in the US, then perhaps the solution is a slight tweak to certain laws. Tightening privacy laws, making anti-defamation laws easier to use, etc. etc. All of the examples given above, from individual comedians being called out to school boards making X or Y decisions, all of them are constrained by the laws of the state. A totalitarian state, however, is not. They are the law. In one case you have recourse. In the other you do not. That seems like a rather important distinction...
Dunno man. I don't see anything wrong with being concerned about apparent trends. But when I hear comparisons to Mao and whatnot and people who really believe this is what they're experiencing...dunno, to me that comes off like the white dude who got called "puto guiri" once by some grumpy old man and now believes his experience is similar to that of being Black in Jim Crowe America.
_____________________________
"Anything you do can be fixed. What you cannot fix is the perfection of a blank page. What you cannot fix is that pristine, unsullied whiteness of a screen or a page with nothing on it—because there’s nothing there to fix."
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Date Mar. 31 2021 17:42:07
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Fluknu
Posts: 151
Joined: Jan. 11 2021
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RE: What do you mean, 'Who's the aut... (in reply to Ricardo)
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The complexity of that discussion is mind boggling. I'm twisting the whole thing in my mind with the input of Ernandez R, because somewhat I think it is connected. Things are not clear in my mind so i'm just gonna throw the flying thoughts here.
- woke culture is the striving for acceptance from an abused/marginalised/unrecognised group.
- the means they are using is by silencing/cancelling a majority group, in which a minority (or a majority) is against them, but another minority (or majority) is for inclusiveness and has no problem with them.
- When woke culture demands are beeing institutionalised or put in law, what is it? When their demands are for inclusiveness or for cancelation (exclsuiveness) is that the same?
- Right wing base is for protectionism, but the isn't the core demand a demand for recognition?
- isnt'it all a problem of how we get to inclusion? What means do we use to accomplish that?
- Isnt'it that any attempt for exclusion will be used by the power in place...to stay the power in place?
- Saying that the left cannot be totalitarian (because their demands will be used by the power in place), isn't it an elegant way of whitewashing the left of any totalitarian impulse ?
- isn't the primary fight for freedom against nature? The limitations of speech, body, the external elements?
This is messy , I need to cook some tortilla naked and take care of my woman...
Hugs
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Date Mar. 31 2021 20:21:03
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Piwin
Posts: 3559
Joined: Feb. 9 2016
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RE: What do you mean, 'Who's the aut... (in reply to Fluknu)
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Once you're finished doing the naked tortilla sex, you might enjoy Amin Maalouf's book Les identités meurtrières (translated in English as In the name of identity: violence and the need to belong). It predates all of this talk about cancel culture (IIRC it was written in the mid 90s) and is mostly focused on cultural differences, but a lot of it seems relevant to these discussions today.
Two short passages (and apologies to those who don't speak French. I don't have the English version.):
"Ce sont ces blessures qui déterminent, à chaque étape de la vie, l'attitude des hommes à l'égard de leurs appartenances, et la hiérarchie entre celles-ci. Lorsqu'on a été brimé à cause de sa religion, lorsqu'on a été humilié ou raillé à cause de sa peau, ou de son accent, ou de ses habits rapiécés, on ne l'oubliera pas. J'ai constamment insisté jusqu'ici sur le fait que l'identité est faite de multiples appartenances ; mais il est indispensable d'insister tout autant sur le fait qu'elle est une, et que nous la vivons comme un tout. L'identité d'une personne n'est pas une juxtaposition d'appartenances autonomes, ce n'est pas un « patchwork », c'est un dessin sur une peau tendue ; qu'une seule appartenance soit touchée, et c'est toute la personne qui vibre.
On a souvent tendance à se reconnaître, d'ailleurs, dans son appartenance la plus attaquée; parfois, quand on ne se sent pas la force de la défendre, on la dissimule, alors elle reste au fond de soi-même, tapie dans l'ombre, attendant sa revanche; mais qu'on l'assume ou qu'on la cache, qu'on la proclame discrètement ou bien avec fracas, c'est à elle qu'on s'identifie. L'appartenance qui est en cause — la couleur, la religion, la langue, la classe... — envahit alors l'identité entière. Ceux qui la partagent se sentent solidaires, ils se rassemblent, se mobilisent, s'encouragent mutuellement, s'en prennent à « ceux d'en face ». Pour eux, « affirmer leur identité » devient forcément un acte de courage, un acte libérateur...
Au sein de chaque communauté blessée apparaissent naturellement des meneurs. Enragés ou calculateurs, ils tiennent les propos jusqu'au-boutistes qui mettent du baume sur les blessures. Ils disent qu'il ne faut pas mendier auprès des autres le respect, qui est un dû, mais qu'il faut le leur imposer. Ils promettent victoire ou vengeance, enflamment les esprits, et se servent quelquefois des moyens extrêmes dont certains de leurs frères meurtris avaient pu rêver en secret. Désormais, le décor est planté, la guerre peut commencer. Quoi qu'il arrive, « les autres » l'auront mérité, « nous » avons un souvenir précis de « tout ce qu'ils nous ont fait endurer » depuis l'aube des temps."
Plus loin:
"A l'ère de la mondialisation, avec ce brassage accéléré, vertigineux, qui nous enveloppe tous, une nouvelle conception de l'identité s'impose - d'urgence ! Nous ne pouvons nous contenter d'imposer aux milliards d'humains désemparés le choix entre l'affirmation outrancière de leur identité et la perte de toute identité, entre l'intégrisme et la désintégration. Or, c'est bien cela qu'implique la conception qui prévaut encore dans ce domaine. Si nos contemporains ne sont pas encouragés à assumer leurs appartenances multiples, s'ils ne peuvent concilier leur besoin d'identité avec une ouverture franche et décomplexée aux cultures différentes, s'ils se sentent contraints de choisir entre la négation de soi-même et la négation de l'autre, nous serons en train de former des légions de fous sanguinaires, des légions d'égarés."
_____________________________
"Anything you do can be fixed. What you cannot fix is the perfection of a blank page. What you cannot fix is that pristine, unsullied whiteness of a screen or a page with nothing on it—because there’s nothing there to fix."
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Date Mar. 31 2021 22:41:35
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estebanana
Posts: 9351
Joined: Oct. 16 2009
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RE: What do you mean, 'Who's the aut... (in reply to Piwin)
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quote:
f the "cancel culture" crowd today tried to physically torture someone or burn them at the stake, they would go to prison. Which is why I said earlier that if "cancel culture" is such a big problem in the US, then perhaps the solution is a slight tweak to certain laws. Tightening privacy laws, making anti-defamation laws easier to use, etc. etc. All of the examples given above, from individual comedians being called out to school boards making X or Y decisions, all of them are constrained by the laws of the state. A totalitarian state, however, is not. They are the law. In one case you have recourse. In the other you do not. That seems like a rather important distinction.
When I was in Guatemala a couple guys were caught allegedly producing and selling child pornography in a rural area. The boys in the community put them in a locked car on a soccer pitch and immolated them alive with gas poured all over the car.
That’s more than cancel culture, that’s vigilante work. America, the US has a similar group, or what used to be a similar group. The KKK is a vigilante terrorist organization that carried out extrajudicial killings for the sake of the preservation of their concept of a state.
Again, not today’s cancel culture. The terror was state sanctioned until a certain point at which it was disbanded, which proved unpopular to some former members.
_____________________________
https://www.stephenfaulkguitars.com
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Date Apr. 1 2021 5:49:01
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Fluknu
Posts: 151
Joined: Jan. 11 2021
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RE: What do you mean, 'Who's the aut... (in reply to Ricardo)
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Here's the english version of Maalouf (Translated by an AI that will soon put all translator out of job :))
Thanks Piwin. I think Maalouf summarises well that discussion. (I've read many books of him, but not that one.)
"It is these wounds that determine, at each stage of life, the attitude of men towards their belonging, and the hierarchy between them. When one has been bullied because of one's religion, when one has been humiliated or mocked because of one's skin, or one's accent, or one's patched clothes, one will not forget it. I have constantly insisted until now on the fact that identity is made of multiple belongings; but it is essential to insist just as much on the fact that it is one, and that we live it as a whole. A person's identity is not a juxtaposition of autonomous belongings, it is not a "patchwork", it is a drawing on a taut skin; if one belonging is touched, the whole person vibrates.
Sometimes, when we do not feel strong enough to defend it, we hide it, so it remains deep inside us, lurking in the shadows, waiting for its revenge; but whether we assume it or hide it, whether we proclaim it discreetly or loudly, we identify with it. The belonging that is at stake - color, religion, language, class... - then invades the whole identity. Those who share it feel solidarity, they gather, mobilize, encourage each other, attack "those on the other side". For them, "asserting their identity" necessarily becomes an act of courage, a liberating act...
Within each wounded community, leaders naturally appear. Enraged or calculating, they say things to the point that put balm on the wounds. They say that one should not beg others for respect, which is a due, but that one should impose it on them. They promise victory or revenge, inflame the spirits, and sometimes use the extreme means that some of their wounded brothers may have secretly dreamed of. Now the stage is set, the war can begin. Whatever happens, "the others" will have deserved it, "we" have a precise memory of "all that they made us endure" since the dawn of time."
Further:
"In the age of globalization, with this accelerated, dizzying intermingling that envelops us all, a new conception of identity is needed - urgently! We cannot be satisfied with imposing on billions of bewildered human beings the choice between the excessive affirmation of their identity and the loss of all identity, between fundamentalism and disintegration. But this is what the prevailing conception in this field implies. If our contemporaries are not encouraged to assume their multiple belongings, if they cannot reconcile their need for identity with a frank and unabashed openness to different cultures, if they feel compelled to choose between the negation of oneself and the negation of the other, we will be forming legions of bloodthirsty madmen, legions of lost ones."
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)
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Date Apr. 1 2021 13:24:43
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Ricardo
Posts: 14799
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC
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RE: What do you mean, 'Who's the aut... (in reply to Piwin)
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quote:
All of the examples given above, from individual comedians being called out to school boards making X or Y decisions, all of them are constrained by the laws of the state. A totalitarian state, however, is not. They are the law. In one case you have recourse. In the other you do not. That seems like a rather important distinction...
Look, we had the cautionary tale of “Mcarthyism” witch hunt story in this country. This cancel culture is the seeds of the exact same thing, and the fact that some folks want to “defend” it by pretending it is unrelated to the totalitarian state, is actually the most disturbing thing about it. The laws are pointing in the direction of being in FAVOR of the cancel culture, not the opposite thing you think would be the obvious simple counter balance. “If you are doing nothing wrong then what is the problem with it? Cancel culture is not killing anybody yet, just destroying their lives cuz they deserve it. What are YOU hiding by the way????”
_____________________________
CD's and transcriptions available here:
www.ricardomarlow.com
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Date Apr. 2 2021 18:09:56
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Bulerias2005
Posts: 632
Joined: Jul. 10 2010
From: Minneapolis, MN
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RE: What do you mean, 'Who's the aut... (in reply to Ricardo)
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I am jumping into an ongoing discussion here, but I have to say I cringe when I see spirited attacks on "cancel culture," which truly doesn't exist other than small pockets of overzealous leftists who have long forgotten what it means to be a progressive. As a physician working in psychiatry at a county hospital, I see every day a variety of issues that underserved populations are faced with -- racial, economic, and gender disparities, among many, many other issues that rank *way* higher on my list of concerns than cancel culture. I don't really care what some hotheads are spouting off about on a random Twitter feed, but to pick cancel culture as one's hill to die on is ultimately to be complicit in a colonialist, white supremacist system. I agree that sometimes the political correctness BS is taken way too far. It is another side to the same evil as overt racism and sexism. But there are real problems afoot that absolutely must be addressed through enacting progressive agenda -- Medicare for All, universal basic income, free public education, loan forgiveness, etc. With regard to "victims" of cancel culture, sure, I agree, the dilution of comedy is a real thing and I do feel sorry for all the Johnny Depps of the world, but for every Johnny Depp there are 99 Harvey Weinsteins. Nothing wrong with getting rid of that crap at the root.
_____________________________
Daniel Volovets
Jazz, Classical, Flamenco, & Latin-American Guitar
http://www.danielvolovets.com/
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Date Apr. 2 2021 21:50:04
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BarkellWH
Posts: 3458
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
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RE: What do you mean, 'Who's the aut... (in reply to Bulerias2005)
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quote:
but to pick cancel culture as one's hill to die on is ultimately to be complicit in a colonialist, white supremacist system....But there are real problems afoot that absolutely must be addressed through enacting progressive agenda -- Medicare for All, universal basic income, free public education, loan forgiveness, etc....for every Johnny Depp there are 99 Harvey Weinsteins. Nothing wrong with getting rid of that crap at the root.
Speaking for myself, there are aspects of Cancel Culture that deserve criticism, but that does not constitute a "hill to die on." As I noted in my comment earlier, I think the San Francisco School Board's decision to rename schools lacked historical accuracy and was ideologically motivated. The 44 to be renamed included those named for George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, Abraham Lincoln, Paul Revere, Theodore Roosevelt, the poet James Russell Lowell, and even Senator Diane Feinstein, among many others.
That our founding fathers kept slaves has long been known, but they are not honored for slavery. They are honored because they created institutions that still ring true today--the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, our form of government consisting of checks and balances, etc. That the United States has not always lived up to its promise is no reason to "cancel" their work. To criticize such an ahistorical decision is not, as you put it, "ultimately to be complicit in a colonialist, white supremacist system." To make that charge is to engage in Cancel Culture yourself.
Your laundry list of a "progressive" agenda--Medicare for All, universal basic income, free public education, loan forgiveness, etc.--is notable for your failure to address how it would be financed. Even Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren could not state specifically how Medicare for All would be paid for, much less the other items on your agenda.
Finally, bringing Harvey Weinstein into your screed against criticism of Cancel Culture is to create a straw man. No one, to my knowledge, has ever said that Weinstein's conviction and prison sentence was an example of Cancel Culture.
Bill
_____________________________
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white,
With the name of the late deceased,
And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here,
Who tried to hustle the East."
--Rudyard Kipling
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Date Apr. 3 2021 21:18:14
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BarkellWH
Posts: 3458
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
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RE: What do you mean, 'Who's the aut... (in reply to Paul Magnussen)
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quote:
Umm… how about asking the Pentagon for the $21,000,000,000,000 back that it can’t account for?
The 2018 article in Truthdig was written by Lee Camp, a self-described stand-up comedian. Apparently he thinks he knows something about the Pentagon budget. A much more reliable account can be found in a December 3, 2018 article in the New York Times, quoted in part below.
"Representative-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the New York Democrat who has become a darling of the progressive left, was quoting from an article in The Nation about “massive accounting fraud” committed by the Pentagon from 1998 to 2015. But her suggestion that the $21 trillion in military transactions could have “already” paid two-thirds the cost of a “Medicare for all” health care system goes beyond what the article reported — and is misleading.
"For starters, the combined Pentagon budget from 1998 to 2015 was $9.2 trillion. One study by a libertarian economic think tank found that “Medicare for all” legislation by Senator Bernie Sanders, independent of Vermont, would cost the federal government $32.6 trillion over 10 years.
"So where did the $21 trillion figure originate?
"It comes from an analysis of the Pentagon’s “unsupported journal voucher adjustments,” by Mark Skidmore, an economist at Michigan State University. The term refers to improperly documented accounting adjustments that are made when different financial ledgers do not match.
"In other words, $21 trillion is the total value of adjustments made to the Pentagon’s financial records over those years that could not be traced. That is not the same thing as $21 trillion in spending."
I remember Ocasio-Cortez making this statement and being ridiculed for not knowing that the combined Pentagon budget for the years 1998 to 2015 was $9.2 trillion, not the outlandish figure of $21 trillion in [unaccounted for] spending that was being bandied about by the likes of herself and, apparently, Lee Camp of Truthdig.
Bill
_____________________________
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white,
With the name of the late deceased,
And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here,
Who tried to hustle the East."
--Rudyard Kipling
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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date Apr. 3 2021 22:57:28
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