i wonder whether, given the publicness of bluesky’s backend, it wouldn’t be possible to define some kind of break-glass backstop, by which one could move ones history to “lifeboats” in the fediverse, capturing and reconstituting exodus-participating portions of your social graph?
@marick i think it’s more a normative claim than an empirical one. emperors often fail to secure power through a lineage.
but they insist that it is right to do so, and vigorously propound a politics under which privilege based on “nepotism” and inheritance is legitimate, and, conversely, where deprivation based on circumstances of birth is also legitimate.
@marick (it probably is worth a separate post sometime. it just emerges in this one from my observation that people who support plutocratic politics often seem to make justice claims in terms of families or ones “people” — something more than direct lineage but less than race — rather than individuals.)
“you can be ground to dust, and the echoes of your ghost will be used by your grandchildren to justify new atrocities. the death of your babies will be used to explain why someone else’s babies must die.” @phillmv http://okayfail.com/garden/theyre-going-to-build-camps.html
[new draft post] Plutocracy as a positive ideal https://drafts.interfluidity.com/2024/11/19/plutocracy-as-a-positive-ideal/index.html
“A central pillar of American democracy is that no man is above the law. But Mr. Trump isn’t an ordinary man.” https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/15/opinion/trump-criminal-cases.html ht @jbouie
// well then. which truths do we hold self-evident?
@artcollisions i’m sorry about that!
Action Needed: Your balance is now past due
@admitsWrongIfProven@qoto.org in practice “meritocracy” relied on a mix of educational credentials, recommendations, testing, and pay to establish “merit”.
other conceptions of merit might be better. but there was always going to be a problem with the “ocracy” part of that word.
are you a warrior for free speech, patriot?
@admitsWrongIfProven@qoto.org oh, i think there was, and it was catastrophic. it led to a whole class of rapacious winners who felt like they deserved it, and losers deserved their fate beyond what pity compelled winners to offer.
meritocracy failed, so we're trying meretrocracy.
@WhiteCatTamer @otfrom i think they think that’s true. and Justice Jackson, in her dissent, emphasized that aspect.
but the decision is very clear about the inviolability of the pardon power, under any circumstances. i think a President that wanted to intimidate the Supreme Court or worse could direct subordinates to do that and pardon them, rendering the Court itself a plaything of the President.
they are relying on the decency of the people they are screwing.
@otfrom that’s basically its effect. more precisely it says anything the President does that takes the form of an “official act” — where that form cannot be questioned via inquiry into the President’s motives or alleged criminality of the act — is at least presumptively immune and sometimes absolutely immune from criminal prosecution.
so, as long as a President takes a bit of care to embed their criming in “official” processes and procedures, it’s effectively legalized.
i think the public remains broadly in denial about how dangerous John Roberts’ decision in Trump v United States is.
@BenRossTransit i don’t think “explicitly and clearly critical” works. the reason why plutocrats fund what you are calling “ultra-left” is because that category reflects wedge issues, both between “left” constituencies and the broad public, and within “left” constituencies. they fund the food fight, because the food-fight disrupts and distracts from social democratic reform. taking even the “popular” side on throws you in the melee. 1/
@BenRossTransit i think it’s probably better for social democratic movements to explicitly absent themselves, as an organized force, from debates about social and cultural issues. of course individuals will have their views, but what should be explicit is a detente, when we advocate for social democracy, we leave them at the door. wherever society ends up on, say, puberty blockers as health care, we’ll all be better off if what we define as health care is provided by right. /fin
the mighty fuck around, the meek find out.
funny how the people who claim it’s “the groups” that make it so democrats don’t win somehow seem less exercised by the people who make it possible for them to do all the good and ill they do. https://drafts.interfluidity.com/2023/07/26/if-i-were-the-plutocracy/index.html
even while he is standing for reelection, he is still the sitting president.
Lina would’ve won.