By Francis Lee for the Saker Blog
The referendum on Britain’s vote to Remain or Leave the EU – Brexit – has raised deeper issues than simply whether or not the UK retains its European membership. The real issue is that of the whole Transatlantic bloc from Seattle to Warsaw, its, culture, institutions, politics, and economics has also been undergoing deep structural changes – not necessarily for the good.
The victory of the Leave majority in the first UK Brexit referendum in 2018 and a rerun, which should never have been allowed, of the Remain campaign in the general election of 2019 – both in the face of a massive establishment propaganda blitzkrieg was quite remarkable. The centrist coalition of the centre-right Conservative business class and the still deeply Blairite and third-wayist faction of the overwhelming majority of the Parliamentary Labour Party, the Trades Union Congress (TUC and most of its affiliated unions) and tens of thousands of rank-and-file woke militants, threw everything but the kitchen sink into their campaign but lost. But even then, the issues had not been settled – that is for the self-appointed, London based, middle-class, parvenues who imagined themselves as carrying the torch for civilization. After what was a definitive verdict – which in both instances was a ‘NO’ to the continued membership of Britain in the EU – there was a vicious counter-attack. It started from the premise that EU membership is an absolute good, the absolute truth, and that any opposition is racist, homophobic, xenophobic, misogynist … and so on and so forth. The fuddy-duddy notion of national sovereignty was of course considered completely de rigueur. Therefore, there is not, nor can there be any legitimate critique of the EU. Argument closed: no engagement or discourse on the subject, just hysterical ranting, and mass cancellation. Sound familiar?
In fact the EU before, during, and after the referendum was hardly the Shangri La imagined by the ‘Remainer’ constituency. At that time, their political and cultural love object was the EU of Manuel Barroso, ex-Maoist, ex-President of the European Commission, now working for Goldman Sachs, Merkel’s pet Russophobe, Donald Tusk, and not forgetting Jean-Claude Juncker, at that time President of the European Commission, who was incidentally involved in a tax avoidance scandal in Luxembourg where he was one-time Prime Minister, and then a litany of other self-serving political mediocrities on the make. The EU is also an economic dead zone (particularly in the peripheral areas of Eastern and Southern Europe) with unemployment rates higher than the UK and growth rates lower.
A veritable economic and political Shangri-la? Yeah, right. Like Lord Nelson at the Battle of Copenhagen* the Remainers are putting the telescope to their blind eye: I see no economic and political dead-zone! Maybe they should have gone to Specsavers!
These sentiments are not just conservative, they are downright reactionary and anti-democratic. And the ex-centre-left has played an insidious part in this development. The glaring contrast between the people’s vote for leaving and the vote of the PLP and TUC institutions which supposedly represent them, for remaining, prompted even left observers to conclude that the people, like sheep, had gone astray and handed racist xenophobes a shameful victory. This was the liberal centre-left’s great Brechtian moment when ‘the people should be dissolved and a new one elected.’ The famous German playwright, Bertolt Brecht, was of course making a sardonic comment on the actions of the East German Communist regime in 1953 when it suppressed the workers uprising. It bears a striking similarity to the response by our own neo-totalitarians in 2016. Additionally, the procrastination of the establishment Remainers, which was slowing down the whole exit project, can be thought of as the establishment’s Augustinian moment. St. Augustine ‘’God give me chastity and celibacy, but not yet.’’ the Remainer-speak version being God give me Article 50 but not yet.
In sociological terms the upper-echelons of the liberal class who think that they have the divine right to set the political agenda, represent a sub-hierarchy below the real policy makers and shakers. The 20% beneath the 1%. They tend to be ensconced in the media, academia, professions such as law and medicine, middle-management, financial planners, economists, computer programmers, aerospace designers, and the entertainment business. Quite a number, particularly in business, government, both local and central, advertising, telemarketing, public relations, could be considered to be ‘bullshit jobs’ (in the late) David Graeber’s insightful observation. As a whole this particular social and occupational stratum, look up rather than look down, they serve power not the people. They are Orwell’s Outer party in his 1984 novel, sandwiched between the Inner party and the Proles. Knowing which side their bread is buttered on they identify with and support the Power Elite.
An avant garde leading from the rear, yes. Trahison des Clercs, most certainly but more politically and culturally homogeneous today than as was once the case.
This shell of a once fighting left (now unrecognisable from their previous political and ideological moorings) now embraces the culture of identity but excludes the entity of class. As a result poverty has become the P-word, and the poor the pariahs of neoliberal dystopic utopia. When we talk about class in a Marxist, materialist sense, we are talking about a relation of power, specifically about who does and who doesn’t have power to shape society. Identity politics makes this conflict of interests in society invisible. Neoliberal economics, however, is quite simply class war. It has advanced in part because identity politics depoliticized the public. Is it mere coincidence that the melange of post-Marxism, identity politics, and neoliberal economics saw the light in the same post-sixties decades? Together, they form the heart of the reaction, which is the take-back by the economic elite in the last four decades of every gain the fighting left loosed from the fist of capital before and since World War II. The rapacity of contemporary capitalism is enabled by the weakness, dishonesty, and cowardice of the flaccid and collaborationist left.
On the American side of the pond the same (albeit worse) diseased and morbid social tendencies began to emerge from a decaying body-politic circa 2001 and maybe even before, but the 9/11 was the pinnacle, which was of course no accident. For one of the persistent strands in American political life is a cultish extremism that approaches fascism. This was given expression and reinforced during the two terms of Barack Obama. “I believe in American exceptionalism with every fibre of my being.” said Obama, who expanded America’s favourite military pastime, bombing, and death squads (“special operations”) as no other president has done since the Cold War.
The American political and social-theorist, Christopher Lasch, now unfortunately no longer with us, succinctly identified the political/cultural shifts in the American polity in the late twentieth-century. (1) America has undergone a profound structural, cultural, and political transmutation: it is not the masses or working class, so much as an emerging sub-elite of professional and managerial types who constitute the greatest threat to democracy, according to Lasch. The new cognitive sub-elite is made up of what Robert Reich called “symbolic analysts’. This middle-class occupational stratum – in the British rather than the American sense – traffics in information and manipulates words and numbers for a living. They live in an abstract world in which information and expertise are the most valuable commodities. Since the market for these assets is international, the privileged class is more concerned with the global system than with regional, national, or even local communities. In fact, members of the new sub-elite tend to be estranged from their communities and their fellow citizens. “They send their children to private schools, insure themselves against medical emergencies … and hire private security guards to protect themselves against the mounting violence against them,” Lasch writes. In effect, they have removed themselves from the common life and have moved offshore.
These tendencies, however, have been observable even before Lasch’s observations. Way back in the middle to late 1950s, the great American theorist C Wright Mills, produced powerful polemics concerning the structure and direction in which the Republic was headed. These tendencies were recognised as early as the 1950s. (2)
He argued:
‘’We cannot assume today that men (sic) must in the last resort be governed by their own consent. Among the means of power that now prevail is the power to manage and manipulate the consent of men … and many people are neither radical nor reactionary, they are simply inactionary. If we accept the Greeks definition of an idiot as an altogether private man then we must conclude that many citizens of mass societies are indeed idiots … History making may well go by default, men may well abdicate its continual making and so merely float along as corks in a bottle of an Ocean drift. The implication of this, however, is that history will indeed be made – but by narrow elite circles without effective responsibility to those who must try to survive the consequences of their decisions and of their defaults.’ (3)
A more recent American social critic, Morris Berman, has also been cognisant of the cultural decline and disintegration of America; indeed it would have been difficult to miss. His caustic analysis on the current state of American Culture – The Twilight of American Culture (4) – makes particularly compelling reading for the English-speaking world. Mr. Berman argues provocatively and incisively that the direction of American civilization is locked into a path which will lead nowhere except into its own demise. The American empire has now borne witness to the passage of its most fruitful and triumphant years and its approaching the future – if it hasn’t already got there – and a period of social and political chaos from which there doesn’t appear to be an exit, or at least a controlled exit. So the controlled exit is about the best route on offer, though only 50/50 at best.
‘’For when a population becomes distracted by trivia, and when cultural life is redefined as a perpetual round of entertainments, when serious public conversation becomes a form of ‘baby-talk’, when in short, a people become an audience and their public business becomes a vaudeville act, then a nation finds itself at risk; culture death is a near (extremely near) possibility.’’(5)
CONCLUSIONS:
The fault-lines, stresses and cleavages in the Transatlantic bloc are becoming increasingly clear both within nations and between nations. In Europe the exit of Britain from the EU and Europe, and the possible defections of Hungary, Poland and Italy. In the United States the strain on the Republic with an increasing and assertive emergence of the South and possible mid-west as well as the drift of coastal America away from flyover America. It could be said that these are simply speculative guesses, but these future possibilities are a little more than simply straws in the wind. For better or worse, big changes are on the way.
Interesting times.
NOTES
(1) Christopher Lasch – The Revolt of the Elites – published posthumously in 1994. The title of the book was taken from the name of a book “the Revolt of the Masses” by the elite theorist Jose Ortega Y Gasset in 1930.
(2) The Power Elite, 1959 and The Sociological Imagination 1956.
(3) C Wright Mills – The Sociological Imagination – Ibid – pps. 51, 195
* The naval Battle of Copenhagen (1801) occurred during the War of the Second Coalition when a British naval fleet commanded by Admiral Sir Hyde Parker defeated a Danish fleet anchored just off Copenhagen. Vice Admiral Horatio Nelson led the main attack. During the battle, he famously is reputed to have disobeyed his senior officer, Sir Hyde Parker’s, order to withdraw by holding the telescope to his blind eye to look at the signals from Parker. The signals had given Nelson permission to withdraw at his discretion. Nelson then turned to his flag captain, Thomas Foley, and said ‘You know, Foley, I have only one eye. I have a right to be blind sometimes.’ He raised the telescope to his blind eye saying, ‘I really do not see the signal.’ Copenhagen is often considered to be Nelson’s hardest-fought victory.
(4) Morris Berman – The Twilight of American Culture – published in 2000.
(5) Berman – Ibid., -Introduction.
As Sure As I Live And As Sure As The Master Joshua Lives .These Heads Will Not Again Rape Turtle Island of resources to feed WW wtf!! Your Move ,Satan.
So many trenchant and timely points. I like ‘collaborationist left’. References to Christopher Lash are always welcomed. You describe the reactionary character of neoliberal identity politics as the face of determined class warfare as clearly as I’ve yet encountered. One cannot say these things too often. Also your comments re C.W. Mills are most apt. All very good methinks, and thank you.
‘Big changes are on the way.’ A thought: there’s such a thing as ‘dharma’, which means path, not necessarily The Path in general but discrete paths in particular. What I have in mind here are the respective traditional policies of the USA on the one hand and UK on the other. The path of the US was decisively formed by first president Washington upon leaving office in 1799. ‘Let us trade with all nations, and by all means; but let it stop at that!’ Everybody in the room knew exactly what he meant: stay out of European wars, no diplomatic entanglements, no secret treaties etc. From that moment right down to the last month of 1941 this policy was adhered to and supported by the great majority of the American people. Not long after Washington’s day the policy of GB was formulated by Canning (?) when he said, I think it was during the Congress of Vienna: ‘Great Britain has no permanent allies, only permanent interests’.
Ok, now think of the moment when Churchill pulled America into the War (very messy all this) and the ensuing aftermath. Both countries decisively changed course. America not only gets involved in European wars but almost instantly becomes the imperial policeman of the world, committed not just to an adequate standing army that legislators like Jefferson were highly critical of, but full tilt militarism that would have embarrassed the Prussians in their heyday. And at the same time, GB changes course to. From being guided by it’s interests it becomes committed to an all defining alliance which essentially turns Britain into a compliant vassal state. We see here a radical change and I think this is the relevant history to bear in mind when considering the corruption and decline of both countries.
But presently, we see yet another turn of the tides. In the wake of Donald Trump, we see something that looks like a revival of the old prewar Republican Party: ‘isolationist’, America first, business minded re manufacturing, protectionist re market and jobs. Simultaneously, with the appearance on the stage of Bernie Saunders we also see a revival of the old Democratic Party of Roosevelt’s day: socialism on the rise.
So, now I come to the point, or a possible point. Do you see anything similar going on with the Leave movement in GB? I take it that the Leave business entails a rejection of not just Europe but of Great Britain’s American assigned role in European affairs, that of a North Atlantic sheepdog to keep the Euro flock intact and compliant with The Masters Voice.
But be that as it may it appears to me that the great historical movements that arose during the postwar days have risen and now take a seriously retrograde path. In every way the forces that assumed a hegemonic stature are presently in decline. Forces that once were highly integrated now disperse and everywhere in the West we see trends of disintegration. As this process proceeds the semblance of what once was back in the 30s appears once again. Yes/no?
Yeah I’d like to know more about this emergence of the south, these people are as dumb as a rock and couldn’t lead their way out of a one way tunnel.
“In the United States the strain on the Republic with an increasing and assertive emergence of the South and possible mid-west as well as the drift of coastal America away from flyover America. It could be said that these are simply speculative guesses, but these future possibilities are a little more than simply straws in the wind. For better or worse, big changes are on the way.”
As an inhabitant of “flyover America” it has alway amazed me how we can be considered a solid block in relation to “coastal America.” It’s much more complex than that, Francis. Many of the so-called “swing states” including Arizona, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania are flyover states that went Democrat this time. Recount after recount of actual paper ballots proved that. More than 50 Republican lawsuits contesting those results were thrown out of court by both liberal and conservative judges. Both Democratic and Republican election officials upheld those results as well. It would have to be some absurdly grand conspiracy that all of these hundreds of officials would be complicit in for those results to be wrong. Trump lost the election because Biden had more votes, simple as that.
The only way at this point for Trump to remain president is for some horrible 9/11-style attack to happen that would be the pretext for him to declare a “national emergency” and invoke special powers under the USA Patriot Act. I’m sure his Likudnik pals in Israel are working on it. May Heaven help us all…
All judges serve the ‘establishment’, and Trump has never been part of it. Take your blinders off and do your homework and discover the fraude commited before, during and even after this last election. It is mindboggling. That’s only the first scandal. The second is that everybody, including even the highest judges are trying to sweep everything, including the most solid proof, under the rug.
I’m not pro Trump neither for Biden, they’re both garbage, but this may be the last occasion to get to the bottom of it. Who did what and how and with that knowledge change the system into something solid that all Americans can trust.
Jacques I agree with you.
Tommy sounds naive to me in his acceptance (with a sigh of relief) that everything is in order with the election and the sudden “flips” to Biden in the middle of the night when counting was stopped, because judges so rule.
I think Tommy is also naive or credulous or actually promulgating nonsense with the idea that this pattern of “flips” requires a “conspiracy” of a nature that defies reason–that is, conventionally described by Tommy and others.
This “someone would talk” move to dispense with “conspiracy theories” in plain sight is a very tired and not very strong argument. Especially in this case where huge anomalies were seen that formed a clear pattern.
I do not think that Tommy’s notions outweigh those of 18 state AGs, who wanted to get to the bottom of exactly what happened at ca. 3:30 a.m. in certain counties in certain swing states.
IMO the type of “conspiracy” we may be talking about here is the same type that occurred in Czechoslovakia in 1968 when Czechs switched out and changed the directions of street signs in order to discombombulate the Russian troops. No one labels this CONspired—more like INspired. They didn’t need to “conspire.” It was an obvious idea! People acting spontaneously, or under minimal prompts, can act in concert. People are not stupid and they can “get the idea” pretty quickly from hints.
As to what the American people are going to do about this, I have no idea whatsoever. But I don’t think the main division is red/blue states, because most states are pools of red surrounding islands of blue. Most US counties are red.
I’m not pro Trump neither for Biden, they’re both garbage, but this may be the last occasion to get to the bottom of it. Who did what and how and with that knowledge change the system into something solid that all Americans can trust.
My position as well, Jacques. However, I’m under no illusion that anyone will be getting to the bottom of this – officially at least – just as almost 20 years later the official line on 9-11 has not changed one whit, in spite of overwhelming evidence of coverup. That’s just the way the system operates now. In the strictest sense, it’s not so much a “conspiracy” when the system acts this way anymore, in spite of numerous conspiratorial elements; but rather, just a case of consensus being reached behind closed doors and executed unilaterally. The fact that the plan is semi-secretive is considered immaterial. People (especially Trump!) are just waking up to the fact that we really do live in a two tier society, where the “power elite” that Mills spoke of so long ago rule absolutely and totally without consideration of the plebes they rule over. Further and even more ominously, most Americans and westerners in general are totally fine with that!
Aside from your ad hominem attacks, the idea that “all judges serve the establishment,” that all judges, both liberal and conservative, Republican and Democrat, are corrupt and in cahoots with the never-Trumpsters is absurd on its face. The USA is just too big and too loosely connected for that to happen. This is a union of fifty separate states and hundreds of counties. That the elections were only rigged in blue counties and not in the red counties should be a bridge too far for even Trumpsters to believe, but apparently they will believe anything their Dear Leader tells them.
The biggest factor in the 2020 elections that favored Democrats was mail-in voting. That enabled voters in major cities like Detroit, Milwaukee, Atlanta, and Phoenix to have their votes counted, many for the very first time. Traditionally, Republicans would use voter suppression techniques to make it as difficult as possible for these voters to vote. Lines at pitifully few poling stations were still blocks long even with mail-in voting. That’s why it took many days for the results to come in. They were counting and recounting paper ballots which could be compared to registered voter lists to weed out the fakes. Mail-in voting is used in much of Europe as well, you of all people should know.
This all smacks of sour grapes. Trump has surrounded himself with what can only be called a personality cult with true believers ready to jump off the cliff with him into a war with Iran and Russia that will be the end of the USA as we know it, which is just what many of these folks want apparently as Trump is their ticket to the Rapture. All of this will kick off within the next few weeks when we are attacked again like on 9/11, this time blamed on Iran. I’m sure Israel is working on it to keep Trump and Netanyahu in office.
You don’t have to be a Trumpster to believe that there’s a coverup going on here, Tommy. It’s basically just a case of circling the wagons to expel the outsider and preserve “the system.” In normal times, I might even think that it’s justified, given the fact that Trump’s certifiably unhinged most days, but what Biden represents is likely even more abhorrent. And there’s the damage to the election process itself, which is now revealed to be totally manipulated and corrupted, although that might be viewed as a good thing as well. The blinders are definitely off for anyone capable of seeing after this one. I can’t imagine we’ll have a “normal” presidential election ever again, although I suppose that term is relative these days as well. The US sold off the moral high ground to the lowest bidder with this one; lock, stock, and barrel.
The true believers who surround Trump, many of them Christian Zionists, are not going away anytime soon. Their end-times theology requires an apocalyptic war that will be the end of the USA as we know it, regardless of who eventually wins the 2020 election. No one is going to talk them out of these dominionist fantasies, as they are clearly spelled out for them in the Scofield Reference Bible. Theirs is a faith-based belief system, Trump is their ticket to the Rapture, and that’s that.
The true believers who surround Trump, many of them Christian Zionists, are not going away anytime soon.
Can’t argue with any of that.
But you do realize that the Biden camp is infested with the same vermin, I hope? And radically more focused and efficient at achieving their goals at that. We’ll be replacing a scattershot, schizophrenic, and grossly amateur foreign policy that the globalists hated with a passion (too much bad press), with a coherent, intensely focused, exceptionally professional one that puts Zionist interests and the destruction of all its designated enemies – including the American sheeple themselves – first. We were screwed either way this time.
Yes, it’s in our political DNA to be an expansionist imperialistic power. Biden or Trump, we’re still the “chosen ones” who range around the planet displacing, raping, and pillaging the indigenous. It is no coincidence that the Ashkenazim are doing the same in Palestine. The AngloZionist Empire has clearly overreached. The next war with Iran and Russia will be our demise. But, we’ll use the Sampson Option to take the rest of humanity with us when we go. No “peace on Earth” this year, folks.
Regarding the end times, look the final scenes of “The second coming”. The supreme demon and its minions will devour their followers. I think nothing more will happen as it is completely sufficient to fulfill the death wishes of these people.
Disaffected
Great comment!
…you said…”I can’t imagine we’ll have a “normal” presidential election ever again”,
…that makes two of us…it is farcical to think otherwise as long as the FED private cartel owned central banking model persists. This is the funding base for the US system which is not even capitalism…it is an obscene system plutocratic neo-feudalism on steroids.
To expect a functional democracy to survive out of this broken model is utterly futile. The incredibly inept ‘choice’ of Trump/Biden for 2020 was about as appealing as the 2016 offering.
These imbeciles are exactly what you would expect. They are simply a tragic symptom of a broken empire. This is Rome revisited. Trump is the modern-day version of Caligula and Pompeo is his horse Incitacus which he planned to make a Consul! Apt name too!…except I would hazard a guess that the horse had more brains than this incredibly dangerous lunatic.
Happy Xmas to all on this amazing site
Col
mail-in ballots? Perfect cover for fraud. Electronic voting machines? Another perfect cover for fraud. I don’t know why people no longer use logic and reason to see this election fraud. Trump campaigned across the country and drew huge crowds while Biden mostly stays off the campaign trail and draws few when he was on it.
There are two types of voters in this country; rational and irrational. I think the rational voters outnumbered the irrational voters and that is why the mail-in ballots and rigged voting machines were used to overturn the votes.
To me the Supreme Court was my biggest disappointment. With me the Supreme Court has no more credibility.
“You know santa claus is real right? You know, It would have to be some absurdly grand conspiracy that all of these millions of parents would be complicit in for them to be wrong.”
23rd June 2016, Brexit.
Four and a half years on we’re still fighting the political class, trying to get them to complete on the result of the biggest democratic mandate ever voted for in the history of this country.
Boris turns out to be a jellyfish, real democracy still an aspiration..
The price of freedom is continous energy for the fight, not just vigilance…!
The reality is the Globalists are in fact causing the breakup of regional blocks by the criminal policies – which was only destined to happen because they are not uniting forces but one that create disparity and division.
BREXIT must happen because Britons do not want to be subject to unrepresentative swill in Brussels (ie the wrest of Europe) telling them what their laws and policies should be. Totally inappropriate – same for France, Italy, Greece.
It is also quite clear that German elites who pushed the EU barrow via people like Juncker is wanting to control Europe indirectly via the EU and also is behind the chaos in the US via operative like Soros. It is they who are the problem. Their other venture is to push east and undermine Russia.
Even the average German isnt on board with their plans and this has been crystallized by the alleged pandemic and Merkel’s nazis style policies.
UK elites don’t want to be dominated by them either.
People in Britain have never been comfortable with the EEC and EU. Originally because of France’s obstruction and demands over this and that (like fishing rights) and more lately Germany’s domination and being flooded with people from all over.
The UK should have not entered the EEC and maintained ironclad relations with its former colonies rather than abandoning them as they did in 1973 which was a fatal mistake.
Everything is now coming full circle back on both the UK and EU.
Globalism ignores that fact nations like their own national identity and do not want to be assimilated (just like the crew of USS Enterprise on Star Trek NG did want to be part of the Borg).
It is time to recognize the globalist agenda is over as Trump said.
The current pandemic has been let loose as a last desperate attempt by this evil globalist kabal entity to subjugate everyone, but their plans will fail for several reasons.
A grave situation currently exists and military forces both in US and Russia need to move now asap to address this attack on both the US and Russia before things are too late.
The UK military also needs to be looking at the conduct of the the Govt and move to protect the British people.
Same with the military all over Europe, as it is the politicians and moneychangers controlling them who are the problem.
Otherwise everyone is doomed and the economic and social system will collapse.
The time to move is NOW !
1963 actually Britain announcing their ‘winds of change’ policy shift and followed with their prompt and devastating abandonment of Rodesia to the murderous rabid communists funded by both soviet and Chinese militaries.Then imposed sanctions on their own As detailed in the book Rodesia, s death Europe’s funeral’ by Mike Walsh. Personally I think it was earlier.. I agree with your surmise just thought I’d add that.
The UK military, protect the British people from the Govt? The politicians and moneychangers control the military, in every country. How do you think they get away with it? Brown shirts will always side with the hand that feeds………..Animal Farm 101.
The ‘system’……it’s in collapse……….we are living it, it’s not somewhere on the horizon to be dodged.
Cheers, M
On a happy note, Merry Christmas…….
I remember it was Charles de Gaulle who opposed British entry into the EEC on the grounds that Britain could serve as a Trojan horse for the USA to interfere in European affairs. By 1973 good ol’ Charlie was already gone. Imagine the state of the EEC today (would it have become the EU as it did?) had Britain never joined.
Similar arguments have been made that Britain favored the EU only when it worked to their benefit.
@ Santiago
“A grave situation currently exists and military forces both in US and Russia need to move now asap to address this attack on both the US and Russia before things are too late.”
Please will you clarify for me what you mean by this statement ? Thank you.
I’d like to thank Francis Lee for quoting from my book “The Twilight of American Culture.” I just want to alert readers of this blog to the fact that it is the 1st in a trilogy on the end of the American empire. #2 is “Dark Ages America,” and #3 is “Why America Failed.” These put the nail in the coffin, so to speak.
Hello, Mr. Berman,
I believe you live in Mexico.
Can you provide any insights as to the view of the USA now from Mexico, if it is possible to generalize at all?
Fantastic works all, Morris! I’d like to second Katherine’s question on the view from Mexico. I can easily imagine a mass exodus south from the US in the coming years for those with the means to do it.
Brilliantly written! Great description of the “sub-hierarchy”, the 20% of “educated” white collar workers that serve the 1%.
It is the combined force of the powerful 1%, the sub- hierarchy (20%) and a large proportion of the lower classes brainwashed by the media, which prevents any political change and maintains the status quo…
Regarding EU “fault lines” along Poland, Hungary, Italy:
These countries are the biggest net beneficiaries from the EU budget
https://www.statista.com/chart/18794/net-contributors-to-eu-budget/
As long as the money keeps flowing, (The ECB will do whatever it takes), these EU countries will follow the script.
As for the British, if/when they do eventually exit the EU, they will become part of the American- Zionist orbit. The Brexit campaign was led by pro Israeli conservatives such as Daniel Hanaan. The notable exception is of course Nigel Farage, but he has been successfully sidelined from British politics.
I have never even tried to publish a book – but I have exchanged views with Morris Berman – about 10- 15 years ago…and I did buy his book..and he replied to me on his internet thingy probably Alternet then.
Glad he is still alive.
I have never knowingly had a converstation with Francis Lee, except I think I once thought I saw him at a very close literary fair very near where we live.
He cuts through all the shit, and just writes it as it is..as if his understanding and analysis of the history and everything – is as if Francis Lee Vs ???
I suspect he coud eat Noam Chomsky for Breakfast
I do not know him. Just once I thought I saw him. He is about the same age as me.
Never seen him do a video, and I do not know if he has wriitten a book.
We have got just our Family Round, so far.
Nana and Grandad (me)
Mother and Father
And Our Grandkids
It seems pretty normal to me – still got our kids old Tomy Trainset
(I weep for my Hornby – My Brothers kid’s destroyed lhat – they ripped up the tracks – but it was over 60 years old and they were too young to play with it.)
I have remained a child all my life, as has my wife.
We both dropped lucky. World War II was over, and our Families had survivived.
My eldest sister took me to London from Manchester to me see my Aunty Doris and Family, in Buckhurst Hill when I was 4 years old. She was 17 – training to be a nurse.
She knew how to take responsibity for her youngest brother,
Families are like that.
I don’t think much has changed, exacept we now have a bunch or morons in the press and in government writing crap and occasionaly gettin some puppet to lipsych..to some SATAN??
I reckon even I will survive them.
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/LuwAAOSwCZRfNON2/s-l1600.jpg
Merry Christmas
Tony
It is very simple. The West is living in a Zionist Hell. No more, no less.
Still, Merry Christmas to all !