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(04-24-2018, 08:27 PM)Another Xer Wrote: (04-24-2018, 01:53 PM)David Horn Wrote: (04-22-2018, 11:24 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: (04-22-2018, 09:34 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: This brainwashed bottle blond makes me sick to hear her. Someone like her could have been as easily extolling the wonders of the German Democratic Republic (the infamous East Germany) at one time.
Certainly there's plenty of polling showing that Millenials as a whole care little for democracy and like socialism, both of which would make them good fits for the former East Germany. I don't think that particular Millenial has gone that far on those issues, but plenty of her generation has.
Why should they care about democracy, when it has failed them at every turn. Capitalism, likewise. That doesn't make them authoritarians or communists. Trump is more authoritarian than any leader we've ever had, and the Millies hate him. I do think they prefer socialism, though they seem ill prepared to understand it very well.
They will usher in a post-capitalism era, or they will become the worst type of wage slaves. At some level, they understand THAT very well.
Nobody understands socialism. For various people socialism means anything from Stalinism to social security. We need better words.
I agree with this entirely. It's impossible to discuss any topic if the words we use to discuss it don't have mutually agreed meanings. Even more to the point, as AI makes much work -- even highly paid work like Radiologists -- obsolete, what then? We've been trained to believe our personal value is tied to what we do. If that is ground into dust, then what replaces it, chaos? Socialism, in some undefined form, is the most likely option for a positive result, but what form?
Whatever direction the economy takes, I won't be around to see the final product. I won't be around to see the final version of the first draft. Do I maintain the right to put in my $0.02 worth, or is this the purview of the next generations? I have strong opinions, but I won't have to suffer if they prove false.
Intelligence is not knowledge and knowledge is not wisdom, but they all play well together.
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The winner of the 4T is whatever faction is left standing at the end of it. Enough said.
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(04-28-2018, 05:00 AM)Kinser79 Wrote: The winner of the 4T is whatever faction is left standing at the end of it. Enough said.
That is as simple as it gets. I find it hard to believe that a Man in the High Castle scenario is possible (for one thing, the absence of a large number of competent Jewish scientists would have made even the more modest Space Race that we have had, let alone any Nazi effort to reach Mars, possible). Maybe a Stalinist world conquest was more likely (although I can imagine a powerful German commie state going to war with the powerful Soviet Union over some ideological difference; the Soviet Union typically thought that East Germany was the least trustworthy of its satellites, so just imagine how troublesome a unified "Socialist" Germany would have been to the Soviet Union. Or maybe the Commies take over Germany instead of the Nazis in 1933,and the rest of the world gets the hard decisions of whether to support Thallmann or Stalin.
What results will seem, no matter how absurd or implausible before it happens, inevitable after it happens. That includes a Franco-like "Union of Christian and Corporate States" around 2025 to about 2060. Horrible, but able to survive because it crushes all political dissent and cultural 'deviation'.
We all have our ideas of who we don't want in command at the end of the 4T and the start of the 1T. May "the better angels of our nature" (Lincoln) prevail, and may they prevail quickly!
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
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(04-28-2018, 05:00 AM)Kinser79 Wrote: The winner of the 4T is whatever faction is left standing at the end of it. Enough said.
This is always the case, but that doesn't make it any less important to seek a solution you find best. And let's be honest, your idea of 'best' and mine may differ dramatically.
Intelligence is not knowledge and knowledge is not wisdom, but they all play well together.
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(04-28-2018, 05:00 AM)Kinser79 Wrote: The winner of the 4T is whatever faction is left standing at the end of it. Enough said.
Precisely why the Silents and Boomers are out. Gen X is always out. Who else you got?
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04-28-2018, 11:16 AM
(This post was last modified: 04-29-2018, 11:09 AM by pbrower2a.)
To put it to grim humor, which much history is -- the winner is often the one who decides who remains capable of standing -- and who is turned into remains.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
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(04-28-2018, 11:14 AM)Another Xer Wrote: (04-28-2018, 05:00 AM)Kinser79 Wrote: The winner of the 4T is whatever faction is left standing at the end of it. Enough said.
Precisely why the Silents and Boomers are out. Gen X is always out. Who else you got?
The Millies will set the new course by virtue of their numbers, but which path gets chosen is still open for discussion. As an early Boomer, I'm on the tail end in any case, but I still may be part of the winning faction ... or not.
Intelligence is not knowledge and knowledge is not wisdom, but they all play well together.
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