Tucker Carlson Tonight 1 6 21 FULL (mostly very good show)

Mr Carlson also says that the only reason the USA is so rich and powerful is that for centuries it has been a democracy, so that voters can make their wishes known and influence policies.

But that is untrue. If in doubt, read this:

“Testing Theories of American Politics:Elites, Interest Groups, and AverageCitizens” by Martin Gilens and Benjamin I. Page

https://scholar.princeton.edu/sites/default/files/mgilens/files/gilens_and_page_2014_-testing_theories_of_american_politics.doc.pdf

The proposition “the USA is rich and powerful” is itself untrue – or at best too vague to be meaningful. Some individuals and groups in the USA are rich and powerful, true. But most citizens have absolutely no part in that wealth and that power. Indeed, it has been concentrated at their expense, and often directly from their pockets.

Consider the two-party system of “democracy”. It’s almost as if someone had looked at the one-party systems of Nazi Germany and the USSR, and thought, “Wow, what a terrific way to run a country! We get all the power, and everyone else has to knuckle under and do what we say – or else!”

Unfortunately, it wouldn’t really quite work in the West, where political and academic blowhards spend so much time raving about the wonders of freedom and democracy.

But why not have two parties – ostensibly – that are joined beneath the surface? They can pretend to fight to the death, thereby absorbing all the attention and energies of citizens, while actually having almost identical aims and policies. Then the suckers can line up every four years to vote, little realising that their votes make absolutely no difference.

And here’s the nicest part! Every time there’s an election, the suckers (excuse me, voters) who support each party are begged to contribute all they can to defeat thos vile, inhuman monsters in the Republican (or Democrat) party. Every time, they cough up tens of billions – all of which goes into the same pipe that funnels the cash into the pockets of the super-rich.

And there you have it: the ultimate scam for getting the poor to enrich the wealthy – quite voluntarily!

@ Tom Welsh,

“the USA is rich and powerful”

How well I remember a quote from my youth from a Dr. Ward about America having something like 1/3 of the worlds population and using up 81 % of the worlds resources. America was indeed the most powerful and wealthy country on the earth. After WW2 however, things changed and dramatically incredibly so. A quote from Willard Cantelon book. Shocking doesn’t even begin to express what is atutally going on since the 1950’s?:

“Soon it seemed that almost every nation on earth was standing on the doorstep of Washington. None seemed to apologize for their appeals for loans or outright gifts. Friend and foe alike went away with his requests granted, whether he was worthy or unworthy. For my own interest I had recorded the roll call of countries who came knocking on America’s door asking for aid and receiving it:

Austria $1,170,100,000
Belgium-Luxembourg 1,935,200,000
Denmark 822,200,000
France 9,423,600,000
Germany 4,993,900,000
Berlin 127,000,000
Iceland 62,600,000
Ireland 146,200,000
Italy 5,517,000,000
Netherlands 2,416,000,000
Norway 1,024,500,000
Poland 509,400,000
Portugal 370,600,000
Spain 1,470,300,000
Sweden 108,900,000
United Kingdom 8,668,300,000
Yugoslavia 2,132,400,000
Burma 93,900,000
Cambodia 263,600,000
Republic of China 3,894,500,000
Indochina 1,535,000,000
lndonesia 558,000,000
Japan 3,462,500,000
Korea 4,486,600,000
Laos 301,200,000
Malaya 21,800,000
Philippines 1,555,700,000
Thailand 571,800,000
Vietnam 1,895,900,000
Greece 3,073,500,000
Iran 1,012,500,000
Iraq 65,300,000
Israel 709,100,000
Jordan 230,900,000
Lebanon 86,100,000
Saudi Arabia 46,600,000
Turkey 3,094,900,000
United Arab RePublic 295,000,000
Yemen 11,300,000
Afghanistan 145,700,000
Ceylon 65,300,000
India 2,383,900,000
Nepal 39,400,000
Pakistan 1,255,700,000
Argentina 460,500,000
Bolivia 191,700,000
Brazil 1,376,500,000
Chile 364,600,000
Colombia 249,500,000
Costa Rica 68,700,000
Cuba 52,000,000
Dominican RePublic 8,800,000
Equador 84,300,000
El Salvador 10,000,000
Guatemala 117,400,000
Haiti 80,400,000
Honduras 34,900,000
Mexico 600,000,000
Nicaragua 42,500,000
Panama 58,600,000
Paraguay 39,500,000
Peru 334,300,000
Uruguay 72,300,000
Venezuela 73,300,000
West Indies 11,500,000
Ethiopia 115,000,000
Ghana 4,000,000
Guiana 3,800,000
Liberia 73,300,000
Libya 154,000,000
Morocco 194,700,000
Nigeria 6,200,000
Somali Republic 9,100,000
Sudan 44,100,00
Tunisia 135,200,000

By 1962, America had given away over $80 billion. But the giving did not end. Soon it was 100 billion, and then 200 billion.
Prior to World War I, we prospered like no other nation on earth. Our national debt was only $2 million. Now it was so great that it would take a path of dollar bills reaching to the moon 70 times to pay it. The interest alone on the national debt was costing the American public $500 per second. Cries of “Unfair!” were increasing in volume and number from those who understood the unbelievable truth of America’s bankruptcy. By signing seven treaties, America was pledged to assist 43 countries of the world whose populations represented almost 1/3 of the world’s total population. In less than a quarter of a century following World War II, America had scattered over the world enough wealth to equal the total worth of 50 of the nation’s leading cities.” pgs. 24-25

Shocking, truly shocking and when you add what Dr. Cantelon says in the next few paragraphs about the unbelievable cost of WW2 it is mind boggling, simple mind boggling. She spent 250 million for each day of the war totalling $341 billion as their part alone in World War 2. Get it 250 million times 1,364 days of the war.

Tucker makes a good point about the hatred directed toward people who resemble the aspirational upper middle class but who belong to the lower class proletariat. Denigrating these people as armed terrorist or racists is extremely dangerous and is something no media pundit would dare say of even the most violent BLM protestors — and rightly so as far as the BLM protests go.

I rarely watch television but when I checked in on my parents yesterday I caught a glimpse of cable tv news that speaks to the same prejudices Tucker identifies here. A retired US admiral was interviewed about China and expressed his frustration that China is not subordinate to the US empire. Chna “feels it can vie with the US on equal footing” he said, citing it’s treatment of Uighurs, the hong kong protests, the South China Sea, and Taiwan. All are examples of a rogue government that ignores the empire’s agenda on matters most would consider to be regional or intra-China issues.

I don’t believe for a moment that the empire really cars about the rights of uighur minorities in China or pro-democracy protestors in Hong Kong, but the notion that this propaganda would work on the aspirational upper middle class in America speaks exactly to the prejudice Tucker identifies. Tens of millions of working class Americans — most are white but certainly not all of them are — honestly believe that our elections were rigged and they were disenfranchised as voters. But their concerns can be blithely ignored as the concerns of transgender men who want to use a girls locker room or who want to read nursery rhymes to toddlers, and concerns of ethnic and political minorities like uighurs all the way across the globe are elevated to high importance. Meanwhile the working class in America is ignored, and nativist-cauvanists like the “proud boys” are labeled as white supremacist terrorists even though they are explicitly not racist and even though many of their leadership are non-white.

The working class has no one to look after them and after many decades of stigmatizing racial minorities today our elites have turned to stigmatizing white working class with overt hatred. Without anyone in the two-party duopoly looking out for their interest these people are in danger of being turned into scapegoats in a much worse way than we have yet seen before. Calling the capitol hill protestors armed terrorists and stigmatizing charges of election fraud as terrorist propaganda do not bode well.