America Can't Solve Crises Because It's a Company-Owned Town

[nashville_brook]

http://blackagendareport.com/?q=content/america-cant-solve-crises-because-its-company-owned-town

America Can't Solve Crises Because It's a Company-Owned Town
“The overlapping American mega-crises of Katrina, the Crash of 2008, the Great Gusher in the Gulf are 'both the products and the illuminators of the wholly corrupt relationship' between Capital and government.”

by BAR executive editor Glen Ford


The United States can no longer engage effectively in “nation-building” in the one place on Earth it has a right and duty to do so: at home. These are the lessons of the 2010 Gulf oil catastrophe, the 2008 financial meltdown and the 2005 Katrina horror – disasters that history will rightfully conflate as symptomatic of the fundamental crisis of the rule of Capital. The U.S. has become a company town of speculative and extraction enterprises whose social and physical geography the rulers relentlessly appropriate, monetize and despoil - all with obscene abandon.

(snip)

No Nation-Building, Here

We are living in the late stages of overwhelming dominance (hegemony) of finance capital – and, secondarily, the oil and gas money-machines. It is a period characterized by destruction of the domestic manufacturing base and frenzied predation of the public sector. The mission of Capital’s servants in government is, therefore, to assist Wall Street and the energy sector in the fastest possible conversion of natural and social resources to private exploitation.

Those among the public and media that still harbor the illusion that government is there to serve the people, despite seeing so much evidence to the contrary, speak of a national “malaise,” a loss of purpose, a temporary failure or flaw in the national character. What nonsense! What we are witnessing is the destructive behavior of a predatory class that sees its future in trillion-dollar derivative bets; commodification of every conceivable resource (food, water, air?) and manipulation of every commodity market; privatization of every possible state function (schools, safety nets); constant expansion of the “market” in the maintenance of empire; and the “primitive accumulation” of the spoils of war.

(snip)

The pace of disaster-making is quickening in America, which indicates something very much like “the end is near.” Maybe these overlapping pyrotechnics of horror – Katrina, the Crash of 2008, the Great Gusher in the Gulf – are necessary to teach Americans the nature of class war, that it is, indeed, hell. At any rate, the oligarchs can be counted on to accelerate the processes of their own demise. It is up to the people to save themselves, through organizing; there are no guarantees.

[tularetom]

1. That seems awfully inflammatory

So it bothers me that I agree with it 100%.

[nashville_brook]

3. i had the same response.

[arendt]

5. Welcome to USA, where truth is "inflammatory" and...

Jimmy Carter abets terrorists.

Good article. Succinct summary. Pulls no punches.

[nashville_brook]

6. arendt!

:hi:

[arendt]

10. Hi, NB

:hi: I always lurk here, but I am:

a) too busy at my latest hitech startup to write anything, much less defend it in this snakepit.
b) I am depressed by the active effort at many "Democratic" sites to marginalize/demonize progressives.

I'm uncloaking just to acknowledge you.

I was very impressed with this article. Thanks for posting it. I think that its black perspective makes it hard for people to shoot the messenger. (Of course, they will shoot the progressive who delivered the messenger ).

Keep up the good work.

[nashville_brook]

18. bravo and good luck on the startup!

i've been thru a hella few weeks at work, and haven't written much in a while.

damn good to see you and good to know you're lucking about!!

[loudsue]

27. You're in good company!

:hi: Good to see you!

Really good article there, innit?

[femrap]

45. I miss reading your

stuff...nice to know you are busy.

[nashville_brook]

76. thank you! life's gotten crazy all of a sudden -- in a good way -- :)

[tomp]

34. agreed. nt

[Jackpine Radical]

37. Truth is inflammatory indeed. That's why

it may only be doled out in small doses to the public, and only then when it is sufficiently diluted with disinformation to render it harmless.

It's all for our own good, you see.

[theFrankFactor]

39. Is This Your Piece? I Like it and the Site.

I'm not in good graces here. It's that wanting to be a "Progressive/Liberal" thing. Anathema! They keep asking me what 2 + 2 is and I keep saying 4. Big problem! LOL!

[nashville_brook]

58. not mine -- Glen Ford

came up on CommonDreams.org.

[Enthusiast]

44. Nice point. Truth is inflamatory.

And outright lies get big air time.

[Capitalocracy]

30. I owe my soul to the company store

Inflammatory but true.

[femrap]

46. Now I'll be singing

this all day AGAIN....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Joo90ZWrUkU

[Enthusiast]

43. Yeah, truer words were never spoken.

This article hits on the central theme that is at the heart of America's decline.

Any politician that fosters this 'commodification' of America is my enemy. I certainly to fuck won't be sending them a campaign contribution. I don't support my enemies. If a politican in my party votes in a way that does not support organized labor they are no longer in 'my party'. Either I am gone or they are gone. Either way.

[femrap]

50. WASF....

great article. During the last 4 yrs. of the W Admin, I felt I was in this 'nightmare.' And the feeling, unfortunately, has continued. I would find myself saying, 'Pinch me. I must wake up.'

Now, since the 'Voilcano,' I feel as if the Nightmare has merged with The Twilight Zone. Truth is the enemy. The Trivial is all important. Intelligence is looked down upon. Creativity and problem solving is not wanted.

I have been asked to move from my apartment because I cause 'expenses'....like for exterminators that are on contract to kill my centipedes. It's starting to feel very, very strange in the heartland. Snow removal is known as 'Spring.'

Must learn to keep mouth shut and just pay many dollars to owner.

This article describes what is happening on a national basis and it stands as an example to the most sadistic of land owners.

[Enthusiast]

64. Yup, it's a great article.

Good luck with the apartment and the centipedes. :fistbump:

[TalkingDog]

2. I'm posting in SMW if it's not already there.....

Good commentary

[nashville_brook]

4. not in SMW --

i don't know what that is -- :)

[TalkingDog]

7. The daily DU Stock Market Watch.

Lots of good articles related to business and economy in the US

[nashville_brook]

19. ah! i need to check in there more often -- it's usually been just when things are

at their most volatile. but yes, there is always good stuff in there!

[Nay]

8. I can't find one sentence I disagree with. That's sad. nt

[Mimosa]

9. Woohoo, K&R n/t

[amborin]

11. K&R

[laughingliberal]

12. Sobering. K&R. nt

[pscot]

13. This is the level of awareness

I hoped I was voting for in 2008. Fooled again.

[xchrom]

14. Recommend

[TheKentuckian]

15. Well, that thar was the straight dope

[Joe Chi Minh]

16. A powerful summation.

[WillyT]

17. HUGE K & R !!!

Bravo!!!

:applause::applause::applause:

:kick:

:hi:

[DirkGently]

20. Nail, meet head.

Chillingly accurate and timely. This is THE single most destructive dynamic damaging America. And it should be the overwhelming primary focus of all progressives.

And we all should be progressives -- as to this, if nothing else. All Americans can see this happening. All Americans, I think, are despairing of it. I keep expecting that as the haves become increasingly more blatant in their desire to take EVERYTHING, and leave us a rotting hulk in its place, there will not be enough of "them" left to stick to "us" any further.

But with every turn of the screw, I can hear them smugly rejoicing that the fix is still in; will ALWAYS be in.

[nashville_brook]

60. Smugley McScrewsters have a rude awakening coming...

when they realize there's no more turns, b/c they've stripped out their screws. Guess, that's when we'll be free.

[Odin2005]

21. kick

[Lorien]

22. K & R. nt

[Amonester]

23. the maintenance of empire

the answer to the WTF are we still dying in these wars for ten years after question...

[William Z. Foster]

24. this passage...

Those among the public and media that still harbor the illusion that government is there to serve the people, despite seeing so much evidence to the contrary, speak of a national 'malaise,' a loss of purpose, a temporary failure or flaw in the national character. What nonsense! What we are witnessing is the destructive behavior of a predatory class that sees its future in trillion-dollar derivative bets; commodification of every conceivable resource (food, water, air?) and manipulation of every commodity market; privatization of every possible state function (schools, safety nets); constant expansion of the 'market' in the maintenance of empire; and the 'primitive accumulation' of the spoils of war.

Thanks nashville_brook. Chilling article. Hard to see how anyone can deny his observations and analysis.

K and R

[nashville_brook]

31. and what's so maddening is it's all a tragic failure. if the vast privatization of the commons

delivered on any of its promises, we wouldn't be having this discussion. but here we sit with our retirements gone, our schools pillaged, and our cities crumbling. the world financial system is barely hanging by a thread, we're fighting wars that make no sense for resources that make no sense while the climate and environment are screaming "STOP IT, already."

it's all a miserable failure, but the whole country has been sold into slavery, it seems, b/c there's nothing we do to regain control of our lives/countries/resources.

sadly, there's no denying these observations.

[Enthusiast]

51. "there's no denying these observations"

While I agree completely, unfortunately the M$M does not. While there is no denying these observations, we still deny these observations every stinkin' day.

As a matter of fact, it is the socialist President Obama and the liberals that are ruining the country. Don't you know that? :nuke: :sarcasm:

[girl gone mad]

25. k & r

Doomer.

;)

[scarletwoman]

26. "...the fastest possible conversion of natural and social resources to private exploitation."

And while people fret over the fortunes of one team of enablers over another, the rape and pillage of the Commons goes on at an ever accelerating pace.

Maybe these overlapping pyrotechnics of horror – Katrina, the Crash of 2008, the Great Gusher in the Gulf – are necessary to teach Americans the nature of class war...

Learning the "nature of class war" is our only hope.

Excellent, outstanding piece. Thank you so much for posting it.

sw

[nightgaunt]

78. You've got it! One aspect of their master plan.

This while Dodd & Sanders weaken the bills that would protect us from that exploitation by the banksters and corporations who make billions for fleecing the people, i.e. we. In effect making sure we will have another go around for a financial collapse of our economic system. Get ready for the sacrifice of Social Security, medicare & medicaid to bail them out again in order to "protect" us.

[Cresent City Kid]

28. Our "nation building" is on par with our "terraforming"

The future won't be like Mad Max, mainly because they had a lot of gas to drive internal combustion vehicles.

[nightgaunt]

77. They made their own "gasoline"

It was from pig shit, converted into methane. If you recall it was a capital crime to kill and eat a pig for that reason. Nasty business that working in the processor to distill and produce the highly volatile and green house gas producing fuel. (269X the same amount of CO2)

[Cresent City Kid]

80. I stand corrected

I hope I'm wrong about the bleak future as well.

[inna]

29. K&R, I was just reading this article on BAR.

[polichick]

32. How many wake-up calls do head-in-the-sand Americans need?! k&r

[tomp]

35. that's a good question.

the answer is blowin' in the wind.

[femrap]

52. You have such

tact...I wish I did. I find myself hollering, 'Get your head out of your ass...you're going to turn yourself inside out pretty soon.'

[DeSwiss]

33. K&R

"The U.S. has become a company town of speculative and extraction enterprises whose social and physical geography the rulers relentlessly appropriate, monetize and despoil - all with obscene abandon."

- No truer words were ever said......

[cate94]

36. Horrifying

and true.

[TZ]

38. Have we forgotten Katrina already...

It was actually private business that got water and food and supplies to the people of the South WAAAAY before the govt. Blaming the private industry for everything is just as stupid as blaming the government for everything. The only difference is that the left demonizes the private industry and the right demonizes the government. The truth is somewhere in between.

[keopeli]

41. The left does not demonize private business, imo. Only mega corporations that exploit.

Whether it's exploiting workers, the environment, or our government, mega corporations are too powerful from the perspective of the left.

As for Katrina, it's just as easy to say that individual citizens were as much help as private business in the early days. Many private businesses were responding to federal dollars being thrown at the calamity without much effort at organization. I have first and second hand experience regarding this debacle, but I acknowledge that it's still just my opinion.

Peace

[Enthusiast]

55. It depends entirely on

the nature of the 'private business'. If the private business is a good citizen I'm all for them.

[area51]

63. Are you forgetting ...

... that the reason the govt. was slow to respond to the Katrina disaster is because Bush hired an incompetent to run FEMA?

[DirkGently]

68. Except the right is lying, and we're not.

The truth is nowhere near the middle on this one. No one demonizes ordinary private enterprise -- we can't even get to that discussion if we wanted to, because we're too busy being shouted down when we suggest that maybe a healthcare oligolipy paying bonuses for killing insureds is a bad idea. That maybe eviscerating government oversight in the sweeping, all-encompassing way the last administration did will be destructive (see, e.g., dead coal miners, dead oil workers, dead oceans, etc.).

We actually have to argue that privatizing frakking SOCIAL SECURITY is not a good idea, even after the market crash that would have ended it overnight.

There is no truth in their truth.

As for Katrina, I hope you're kidding. As for private enterprise beating the government to the punch, the whole situation was a near-perfect example of how Republicans and conservatives prove their case for weak government, which is by becoming the government, and then doing a bad job. Factor in Blackwater keeping people from escaping their neighborhoods at gunpoint, charter schools decimating public education, and developers getting residents locked out of their own, perfectly serviceable homes so that they could turn a buck, and the entire situation is as good an illustration of the poisonous motives of monied interests and the application of Naomi Klein's "disaster capitalism" as could be imagined.

We have federal judges with oil stock actually ruling, right now, that the federal government, which can grant an oil lease with the stroke of a pen, cannot even PUT OFF deepwater drilling until oil companies come up with a better disaster plan than copy-pasted pamphlets so mishmashed they talk about seals and walruses in the Gulf of Mexico, WHILE we watch the results of industry's complete and utter indifference to the destruction OF said Gulf of Mexico on live tv.

In short, we are so badly off-center and out of balance on this issue that we could work for generations to limit the influence of big business and never even approach a middle ground.

[conspirator]

40. Super kick n/t

[Bluenorthwest]

42. This is a great article

Not only do I agree with the content, I think the writing itself has a clarity and a desire to communicate that is often lacking in pieces that approach these subjects. Glen Ford can write. Much to learn from what he says, but also from how he says it. Bookmarking for excellence.

[Enthusiast]

47. K&R!

Good stuff!

[asdjrocky]

48. Sad but true.

What are we to do when voting becomes a joke that only they get?

[liberalmike27]

49. AS to the last optimistic paragraph

Americans are pretty stupid. I come to the inescapable conclusion easily, after decades of intense study. Worse, it seems our media has developed this group of idiots, and then pushed this idea into their heads that they should be proud of their idiot-status. Stupid and proud of it, now there's prescription for disaster.

At the same time, they've been trying to criminalize the intellectuals. I heard the other day Chris Matthews, on the less conservative network, insultingly attacking a White House pundit for mentioning Chu's nobel prize, as if they should be hiding it, instead of being proud.

Yep, we now live in a world where we all have to apologize for being smart, we pat ourselves on the back if our only activity is watching drivers "turn-left" in a NASCAR race, and then repeat whatever they say on FOX,without though of how it affects the human beings we once were.

I see some signs of awakening, but we've got so much going against us, the media that we're supposed to trust is at best an unwilling aid to continuing corruption and multinationality. Many are still claiming that since we drive a car, that we should be OK with the spill, and forgiving of BP. Beck has done some real damage to any ability anyone has to actually reason.

I keep saying this, but it's going to get worse before it gets better. The revolution won't come with people rioting in the streets, but with individual, quiet acts of anarchy.

[Enthusiast]

56. +1 on liberalmike27's post

right here.

[nashville_brook]

57. the faces we see on the teevee are not journalists -- they're pretty loudspeakers.

and, you're absolutely correct, there's not much sympathy for intelligence and even less sympathy for non-mainstream vetted ideas. so, where does that put us? all we get is 'dumb' and 'dumber.'

[William Z. Foster]

67. I think people are looking in the wrong place

People are looking at the MSM - and even though they think they are "immune from the propaganda" - and that is forming their world view. The
right wing media is not so much trying to rally any "base" or promote any ideas. Rather, giving us a false view of the general public and the political landscape is a prime goal. If we think that the general public is ignorant, conservative, lazy, etc., that the working class is out enemy, that confuses and paralyzes us. Alienating us from the general public is the intention there.When people say "we can't do anything because of the power of the MSM and because of the stupidity of the general public" they have bought into that propaganda.

[Greyhound]

65. K&R for "individual, quiet acts of anarchy".

:thumbsup:

[Capitalocracy]

70. You should be in favor of more drilling!

Because oil is used in every product we use from toothpaste to your computer keyboard.

That's the argument I've been hearing a lot lately. Now, apart from the fact that we really could make all those things with something else, my response is, well if we need oil for all that stuff, maybe we shouldn't be BURNING IT all for fuel!

[grahamhgreen]

53. Unfortunately, the majority of our elected leaders refuse to debate this reality.

[Hell Hath No Fury]

54. Wow.

Fantastic article and one that I agee with 100%.

Now the $64,000 question is:

How the hell do we save ourselves?

[bvar22]

73. Learn to Live Well on Less.

*Produce More, Consume Less.

*Grow as much of your own chemical/toxin free food as possible.
Donate excess to food banks or neighbors in need.

*Avoid "Packaged Food-like Substances" and Fast Foods.
Buy in bulk. Cook from scratch. It is fun and healthy.

*Move to a smaller, less expensive dwelling (much smaller and more efficient).

*Remove your money from Wall Street and the Big Banks

*Blow up your TV---(Thanks, John Prine)

*Change focus to local Humanitarian Issues

*Say "No More" to Big Boxes.

*Buy anything NEW wisely, American where possible, from locally owned Independent businesses for absolute necessities.

*Build it yourself, buy 2nd Hand or salvage and Make it work, or do without.

*Reduce your taxable income to the lowest possible level.
(This one is controversial. Taxes do support our Schools and Social Safety Net,
but they are also being used disproportionately to fund the War Machine and Big Corporate "Bailouts". Let your conscience be your guide.)

*Don't trust ANY politician who espouses a belief in "Free Markets" or "Free Trade"
(There is NO Giant Invisible Hand of the Free Market.)

*Accept the FACT that our national "Two-Party" political system is working for the top 2%, and YOU are not included, and that things are going to get WORSE before they get better.
(There ARE some Democrats who still work for you, but they are hopelessly outnumbered and completely marginalized.)
.
.
.
It is not for everyone,
but something as small as this can be a quiet, individual act of Anarchy.

[katandmoon]

59. K and fucking RRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!

[Eyerish]

61. K&R

[leftstreet]

62. K&R A must read article

Thanks for posting

[Jakes Progress]

66. Company Owned - Lock, Stock and three branches of government.

[Hannah Bell]

69. kr

[riderinthestorm]

71. Signed on to DU to get enlightened today, and found this article. Scarily true dammit. K&R. nt

[nashville_brook]

75. what i liked most about it was its focus. you really don't need to go on for 5 pages...

it's something we already understand.

[Helga Scow Stern]

72. As clear a statement as I've seen....

Thanks, n_b!

[me b zola]

74. K&R

[Overseas]

79. K&R! //nt

[TexasObserver]

81. recommend

[susanna]

82. When in Rome... n/t