erronis
erronis's Journal"Why American and Britain are Self-Destructing" - great piece via Eudiamonics
How The Death Spiral of a Rich Society Begins With Austerity, and Ends With Poverty, Despair, and Collapse
https://eand.co/why-american-and-britain-are-self-destructing-a8693ebb097
There are only two societies in the rich world where life is getting shorter, poorer, meaner, and more hopeless fast. Where life expectancies, incomes, and savings are all falling. America and Britain. Where middle classes have imploded, people live hand to mouth, and upward mobility has all but vanished. Where the idea of living a better life is somewhere between a joke and a distant memory. Where entire generations of young people at last count, three, Gen X, Millennials, and Get Z live worse lives than their parents and grandparents. Just two such societies where trust, happiness, and purpose have all imploded catastrophically while depression, rage, anxiety, and suicide are all surging.
In fact, there are just a handful of societies with those grim statistics anywhere in the world Venezeula, perhaps, Russia, North Korea, war torn African shells. Failed states, in other words. That is what America and Britain are becoming.
In a failed state, progress has become regress. Thats what happened to these societies. They are self-destructing. America, of course, is further down that road. But Britain is catching up fast. So how did they get here?
America and Britain have entered a vicious cycle, a death spiral. Its a novel and bizarre phenomenon for a modern, rich society, unseen since Weimar Germany. It goes like this. In the 1980s, America began decades of underinvestment in public goods and social systems. It privatized whatever there was to privatize. The idea was that whatever it was healthcare, education, finance the private sector could do it better. The Reagan Revolution was in full effect as a backlash to the advances civil rights made in the 1960s and 1970s, the good white American using choice as a shield to protect themselves from ever having to invest in or mingle with those dirty, filthy subhumans. All that was called neoliberalism. Let markets sort it all out! Translation: let the strong survive, and the weak perish.
It's wonderful. I think men should be banned from any form of power.
Being an XY myself with loads of daughters, sisters, aunts, grand-daughters.
Women seem to have a much better sense of how to make this planet livable and our lives enjoyable.
Perfect. The amba$$ador has just witnessed the streisand effect.
How to call attention to something most people wouldn't know about.
Bunch of clowns in the executive branch. Thanks (r)epuglicons and russians.
Wrong. It's just pure greed and dominance. Ne'er do wells decide to go into religion
Not saying that Jesus the carpenter wasn't a good cabinet maker...
I've known too many people with too few skills that get themselves into a church and essentially beg for money.
Great thread. I've been umair haque's writing in Eudaimonia for a while
https://eand.co/@umairhHe has a striking perspective on our cultures.
Let's see. This is the reformulated SCOTUS with Anthony Kennedy giving up his seat for Kavanaugh
and Kennedy's son in Deutsche Bank being one of the heads of the unit that loaned trump money.
and Gorsuch being installed by Sen. BugEyes instead of Garland.
and the Federalist Society pulling strings.
that are being played by Putin.
Sounds like a plot line.
Ann Telnaes always outdoes herself. Brava!
Misinformation Efforts Over Kentucky Vote Could Be Playbook for 2020 - ProPublica
https://www.propublica.org/article/misinformation-efforts-over-kentucky-vote-could-be-playbook-for-2020I'm sure the rUSSRian trolls are behind a bit of this. Altho the (r)epuglicons are evil enough already, they just aren't as smart.
That Uplifting Tweet You Just Shared? A Russian Troll Sent It
(Thanks, G_j)
So Purdue Pharma funds the American Enterprise Institute (AEI)
I wonder how much $$$s from opioid manufacturers, gun makers, prison corporations, military industrial complexes go to AEI and other RW spouts.
https://www.propublica.org/article/inside-purdue-pharma-media-playbook-how-it-planted-the-opioid-anti-story
OxyContins makers delayed the reckoning for their role in the opioid crisis by funding think tanks, placing friendly experts on leading outlets, and deterring or challenging negative coverage.
That October, an essay ran across the top of The New York Times health section under the headline Doctors Behind Bars: Treating Pain is Now Risky Business. Its author, Sally Satel, a psychiatrist, argued that law enforcement was overzealous, and that some patients needed large doses of opioids to relieve pain. She described an unnamed colleague who had run a pain service at a university medical center and had a patient who could only get out of bed by taking staggering levels of oxycodone, the active ingredient in OxyContin. She also cited a study published in a medical journal showing that OxyContin is rarely the only drug found in autopsies of oxycodone-related deaths.
When you scratch the surface of someone who is addicted to painkillers, you usually find a seasoned drug abuser with a previous habit involving pills, alcohol, heroin or cocaine, Satel wrote. Contrary to media portrayals, the typical OxyContin addict does not start out as a pain patient who fell unwittingly into a drug habit.
The Times identified Satel as a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and an unpaid advisory board member for the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. But readers werent told about her involvement, and the American Enterprise Institutes, with Purdue.
If these murderers were held accountable for their crimes they'd never need to worry about hiding their filthy riches.
Garry Kasparov: Trump's behavior is disgustingly corrupt and impeachable
This is a powerful piece by an incredibly intelligent person.
The truth in front of our noses: Donald Trumps behavior is disgustingly corrupt and impeachable, whatever his defenders do or say
[link:https://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/ny-oped-the-truth-in-front-of-our-noses-20191117-ztrkifsw4vbinmd3byexvvts6q-story.html|
It was foolish to hope that Donald Trump would be cowed into better behavior by the start of impeachment hearings last Wednesday. His type never admits wrongdoing, never apologizes, never changes for the better. Instead, they smear their accusers, attack the witnesses, and cause as much chaos as possible to distract from the growing pile of evidence against them.
Along the way, they drag their supporters down to their level, obliging them to twist the truth and contort their morals to defend the indefensible.
Thanks to the live feed of the hearings from the Longworth House Office Building, those with strong stomachs can watch this performative debasement in real-time. Just listen to the Republican congressmen during the hearings as they reel off denials, fabrications and distractions while never attempting to refute the core of the allegations against their master.
And how could they, since Trumps lawyers, officials and Trump himself have already admitted to it all?
There is no limit to the possible number of lies and only one truth, so its easy for the facts to be lost in the rising tide of falsehoods. Instead of falling into the trap of refuting every conspiracy theory and slander, the best remedy is to keep repeating the truth, as often as necessary, like taking a medicine.
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