This is a comment someone emailed to me. It rings true to me.
"Austerity was is an invention it was created after the first world war 1919 1920 .There was great upheaval after this war and shock people had had enough, even the right had enough, they all wanted change a different system.
Those in power gathered economists together and created austerity , which paved the way to fascism."
Diana - the problem here is that it’s the neolibs that PASS the austerity budgets. Greece was brought to her knees by Merkel and Macron, not by Orban and Salvini.
It amazes me that so many are willing to look past the genocide he's actively supporting and vote for him anyways. I wouldn't be able to do it if I was American.
The elephant in the room is xenophobia. The UK's Brexit and the surge of the Right in most of Europe most recently are/were the fruits of a number of causes, but immigration is the one most people are unwilling to address.
Here in the USA, most Democrats seem to wish the problems at the southern border would quietly go away. To suggest that perhaps we lack the infrastructure to assimilate so many millions at once makes one a "racist" (which, for reference, is as egregious an offense as being an "anti-Semite" for condemning genocide in Gaza) -- yet meanwhile, the ReThuglicans spread deliberate lies about the immigrants and blame the Democrats and Biden.
Again: there are MANY issues involved, but they all play to the innate fears of the masses, which the so-called Left, Greens, Progressives, et al. seem unwilling to acknowledge. The Right has descended into outright fascism (or is certainly heading that way), and we must create and present a far better message if we hope to avoid disaster.
In the UK we have the resources to house everyone, immigrants and all. We need a politics of embracing immigration, both because our population pyramid is totally skewed, but more importantly as climate change progresses people are going to be forced to leave their homes and they'll need somewhere to go.
I won't embrace a politician that ends austerity but builds a wall lined with machine guns.
Nice art Diana! (a touch of van Gogh somewhere in there?).
The EU elections seem to reflect a fair degree of anger and disgust at the current batch of ruling elites, much deserved given their obsessive pursuit of the policies of the elite club at the expense of their own people (eg endless war escalation rather than peace, and endorsement of Israel's genocide).
I have to say three cheers for George Galloway - who seems to be an actual principled human being (dragged back into politics by his total disgust at the establishment policy robots of the main parties). Likewise for Jill Stein.
We must actively seek out good people and support them to the hilt!
Thanks, John! I never thought of my art as being like Van Gogh's but, hey, I'll take it!
I agree that the elections in the EU and elsewhere in the western world reflect a lot of anger and disgust with the current elites and, admittedly, I share those feelings. What a betrayal!
However, it scares and upsets me that people are moving to the right instead of the actual left (not just the virtue signallers and the hollowed out left), and even more upsetting is there are so few good candidates to vote for. In Canada, at least, they are just not allowed to run by their parties.
I wish we had a George Galloway or a Jill Stein to vote for where I live.
Very good analysis of the political landscape. The turn to the right by desperate people is curious. Though it may be exasperation with the left. Or maybe they fall into trap of irrational thinking.
When the liberals embrace austerity, war and fascism, people seek an alternative. But yeah, why go farther right? Innate human tendency to tribalism, united around fear/hatred of "the other" in a scary time of scarcity, precarity and rapid change?
Both the right and left are betraying the people. I really urge people to watch this Chris Hedges interview with one of the authors of "Silent Coup". It's only 46 minute but explains so much. The political world we knew is dead. I have ordered the book.
"'Silent Coup'—How corporations rule the world w/Matt Kennard"
"The 20th Century saw a great global uprising against European imperialism as the former colonial countries shook off their shackles and rose up for independence. More than a half century later, global inequality is sharper than ever before. To understand the current predicament of the vast majority of the world's people, we must understand the intervening decades. Matt Kennard and Claire Provost's book, Silent Coup: How Corporations Overthrew Democracy, looks inside the international architecture of global corporate governance that exists to flout and crush any attempts by the former colonial world to enact development on their own terms. Matt Kennard joins The Chris Hedges Report for a look at this intriguing and essential history." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xRrk-cYU-E
You can't fix a problem until you have properly identified it.
We Americans have been gaslit into believing that we MUST vote for the lesser evil. Which is bullshit. If enough of us vote Green Party in the general and down ticket, we can send a message that we aren't putting up with this shit anymore. It's better than not voting
Well said, Diana. One of the central points that you make is spot on, follow the money. One of my favorite features of your posts, as a reader, is knowing that there is art therapy at the end. Love it.:)
I hope your right. In my middle-aged lifetime, there has been exactly one politician in the US who - very briefly - had enough visibility to get a fair number of us believing that a better - saner, more compassionate, more fair, more peaceful future was possible. Of course I speak of Bernie Sanders, 2016 edition.
At first he was ignored- until he grew his following to the point that he couldn't be ignored. And then they mocked him. And when that didn't work, they stole the election from him.
In 2020, they took off the kid gloves. Elizabeth Warren accused him of mysogyny, and nobody spoke up for him. The primary season was declared over in March, before half of the states had even held their primaries or caucuses. Joe Biden got saved by covid, and got to run an armchair campaign. And somehow the Democratic part of the uniparty muzzled Bernie. I suspect blackmail of some sort. He's never been the same. I can't even stand to hear him speak anymore.
If I were in a constituent place where a strong independent was running on a Palestinian freedom/end the genocide/end the war racket ticket then I might. But whate I shall ne'er bee voting for is His Majesties Government. For as long as government serves crown interests, and for as long as there bee suche an anachronism of travesty as that whiche bee called "crown immunity" there shall bee no ending of this horror show; and for as long as said crown is head of state in England and commonwealth there shall bee no peace on earth neither.
I just read that Poilieve (PP) voted against the Pharmacare bill. Yep. That guy who cares sooooo much about the working people that he voted against helping over 3 million people with diabetes and others. Maybe his rich funders from those expensive dinners he attends put a little pressure on him. They would not want their money to go to actually helping anyone.
I try to avoid ideology altogether, as it tends to short-circuit critical thinking.
That said, I can see why the right is gaining votes, because they are the only ones who even bother to pretend to care about what affects the average frustrated citizen.
The centrists flaunt their indifference to the voters, focusing on gratifying their American Master in sexually humiliating ways. The leftists who actually want power ape the centrists. Most leftists don't really want power; and those who don't fixate on burning issues such as how many LGTBQXYZPDQ+ can dance on the head of a pin and otherwise call each other "literal Hitler" over minor PC violations.
This is a comment someone emailed to me. It rings true to me.
"Austerity was is an invention it was created after the first world war 1919 1920 .There was great upheaval after this war and shock people had had enough, even the right had enough, they all wanted change a different system.
Those in power gathered economists together and created austerity , which paved the way to fascism."
Diana - the problem here is that it’s the neolibs that PASS the austerity budgets. Greece was brought to her knees by Merkel and Macron, not by Orban and Salvini.
That's what I meant by not voting for the hollowed out left. That's what those people are, and they don't deserve our vote.
So who do we vote for? In the US I can vote for Biden or Trump. I might be able to cast a protest vote, but it won’t matter.
I wish I knew. The Green Party?
After Bernie, it’s sort of clear that this is not a choice we voters would be allowed to make.
Honestly, if everyone did rally around Stein, we could win. If everyone had written in Bernie's name, he would have won too.
But I can't bear to vote for genocidal Joe.
It amazes me that so many are willing to look past the genocide he's actively supporting and vote for him anyways. I wouldn't be able to do it if I was American.
You can vote for Dr Jill Stein if she is on the ballot in your state.
And if she"s not, is there anything you can do to change that?
And Jill is running for the Green Party.
She sounds like a significantly better option than Biden or Trump.
The elephant in the room is xenophobia. The UK's Brexit and the surge of the Right in most of Europe most recently are/were the fruits of a number of causes, but immigration is the one most people are unwilling to address.
Here in the USA, most Democrats seem to wish the problems at the southern border would quietly go away. To suggest that perhaps we lack the infrastructure to assimilate so many millions at once makes one a "racist" (which, for reference, is as egregious an offense as being an "anti-Semite" for condemning genocide in Gaza) -- yet meanwhile, the ReThuglicans spread deliberate lies about the immigrants and blame the Democrats and Biden.
Again: there are MANY issues involved, but they all play to the innate fears of the masses, which the so-called Left, Greens, Progressives, et al. seem unwilling to acknowledge. The Right has descended into outright fascism (or is certainly heading that way), and we must create and present a far better message if we hope to avoid disaster.
And, of course, immigration has so much to do with what western governments have done to make other countries unliveable. It's so unfair.
It's upsetting that the polls are showing so many western countries moving to the right.
In the UK we have the resources to house everyone, immigrants and all. We need a politics of embracing immigration, both because our population pyramid is totally skewed, but more importantly as climate change progresses people are going to be forced to leave their homes and they'll need somewhere to go.
I won't embrace a politician that ends austerity but builds a wall lined with machine guns.
Nice art Diana! (a touch of van Gogh somewhere in there?).
The EU elections seem to reflect a fair degree of anger and disgust at the current batch of ruling elites, much deserved given their obsessive pursuit of the policies of the elite club at the expense of their own people (eg endless war escalation rather than peace, and endorsement of Israel's genocide).
I have to say three cheers for George Galloway - who seems to be an actual principled human being (dragged back into politics by his total disgust at the establishment policy robots of the main parties). Likewise for Jill Stein.
We must actively seek out good people and support them to the hilt!
Thanks, John! I never thought of my art as being like Van Gogh's but, hey, I'll take it!
I agree that the elections in the EU and elsewhere in the western world reflect a lot of anger and disgust with the current elites and, admittedly, I share those feelings. What a betrayal!
However, it scares and upsets me that people are moving to the right instead of the actual left (not just the virtue signallers and the hollowed out left), and even more upsetting is there are so few good candidates to vote for. In Canada, at least, they are just not allowed to run by their parties.
I wish we had a George Galloway or a Jill Stein to vote for where I live.
Not sure if this would be of interest, but I just found an e-book that looks compelling. And it's free to download. https://www.tectonica.co/age_of_junk_politics_book?utm_medium=email&_hsmi=89441467&utm_content=89441467&utm_source=hs_email
Thank you for that Diana. I'll have a look when I get back to winter in Sydney (just leaving tropical Cairns now).
Very good analysis of the political landscape. The turn to the right by desperate people is curious. Though it may be exasperation with the left. Or maybe they fall into trap of irrational thinking.
When the liberals embrace austerity, war and fascism, people seek an alternative. But yeah, why go farther right? Innate human tendency to tribalism, united around fear/hatred of "the other" in a scary time of scarcity, precarity and rapid change?
Both the right and left are betraying the people. I really urge people to watch this Chris Hedges interview with one of the authors of "Silent Coup". It's only 46 minute but explains so much. The political world we knew is dead. I have ordered the book.
"'Silent Coup'—How corporations rule the world w/Matt Kennard"
"The 20th Century saw a great global uprising against European imperialism as the former colonial countries shook off their shackles and rose up for independence. More than a half century later, global inequality is sharper than ever before. To understand the current predicament of the vast majority of the world's people, we must understand the intervening decades. Matt Kennard and Claire Provost's book, Silent Coup: How Corporations Overthrew Democracy, looks inside the international architecture of global corporate governance that exists to flout and crush any attempts by the former colonial world to enact development on their own terms. Matt Kennard joins The Chris Hedges Report for a look at this intriguing and essential history." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1xRrk-cYU-E
You can't fix a problem until you have properly identified it.
If interested, I did a cartoon and column on all this: https://mark192.substack.com/p/cartoon-the-huge-difference-between
We Americans have been gaslit into believing that we MUST vote for the lesser evil. Which is bullshit. If enough of us vote Green Party in the general and down ticket, we can send a message that we aren't putting up with this shit anymore. It's better than not voting
Well said, Diana. One of the central points that you make is spot on, follow the money. One of my favorite features of your posts, as a reader, is knowing that there is art therapy at the end. Love it.:)
I hope your right. In my middle-aged lifetime, there has been exactly one politician in the US who - very briefly - had enough visibility to get a fair number of us believing that a better - saner, more compassionate, more fair, more peaceful future was possible. Of course I speak of Bernie Sanders, 2016 edition.
At first he was ignored- until he grew his following to the point that he couldn't be ignored. And then they mocked him. And when that didn't work, they stole the election from him.
In 2020, they took off the kid gloves. Elizabeth Warren accused him of mysogyny, and nobody spoke up for him. The primary season was declared over in March, before half of the states had even held their primaries or caucuses. Joe Biden got saved by covid, and got to run an armchair campaign. And somehow the Democratic part of the uniparty muzzled Bernie. I suspect blackmail of some sort. He's never been the same. I can't even stand to hear him speak anymore.
Sorry for the typos, on mobile
Progressives and Independent candidates are the foundation upon which we can build a better form of government in my book!
Also - haven't mentioned it but love the art at the end of each post. Do you have a collection / collage / gallery of all of them?
they’re all for the average working person. But guess where they get their funding? From the people who stand to benefit, writes van Eyk ♥️📢
If I were in a constituent place where a strong independent was running on a Palestinian freedom/end the genocide/end the war racket ticket then I might. But whate I shall ne'er bee voting for is His Majesties Government. For as long as government serves crown interests, and for as long as there bee suche an anachronism of travesty as that whiche bee called "crown immunity" there shall bee no ending of this horror show; and for as long as said crown is head of state in England and commonwealth there shall bee no peace on earth neither.
I just read that Poilieve (PP) voted against the Pharmacare bill. Yep. That guy who cares sooooo much about the working people that he voted against helping over 3 million people with diabetes and others. Maybe his rich funders from those expensive dinners he attends put a little pressure on him. They would not want their money to go to actually helping anyone.
I try to avoid ideology altogether, as it tends to short-circuit critical thinking.
That said, I can see why the right is gaining votes, because they are the only ones who even bother to pretend to care about what affects the average frustrated citizen.
The centrists flaunt their indifference to the voters, focusing on gratifying their American Master in sexually humiliating ways. The leftists who actually want power ape the centrists. Most leftists don't really want power; and those who don't fixate on burning issues such as how many LGTBQXYZPDQ+ can dance on the head of a pin and otherwise call each other "literal Hitler" over minor PC violations.