Archives for category: authoritarianism
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graven Image

July 28, 2023 //
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“Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me“

“The Reuters/Ipsos poll, which surveyed 4,414 adults nationwide online, showed a tight race in the November 2024 general election should Trump face Democratic U.S. President Joe Biden, who is seeking reelection and is not expected to face serious competition for his party’s nomination.

Biden led Trump 37% to 35% in a hypothetical matchup, with the remaining 28% saying they weren’t sure who to pick or would vote for someone else or no one at all.
Neither Biden nor Trump were widely liked by people outside their parties. Just 31% of independents had a favorable opinion of Trump and 32% thought as much about Biden.
At 80 years old, Biden is the oldest U.S. president ever to sit in the White House, and 63% of Democrats in the poll agreed with a statement that he was too old to work in government. Thirty-seven percent disagreed.

Still, Biden leads the Democratic contest by even more than Trump leads the Republican field, with 63% of Democrats’ support compared with 15% for anti-vaccine activist Robert F. Kennedy Jr.”

What’s going on here?
What happened with/in the greatest/most powerful democracy on Earth?
Why has the American People allowed itself to be split in half? Each of those halves bowing to its own idol…

Only because ‘they had avocados’?!?

And what about Reagan? He was right, after all… Trump was the government, wasn’t he?

Reagan was incomplete.
Government is nothing but a tool. A tool for the society to govern itself with. “of the people, by the people, for the people“. But also a tool for a dictator to exploit a country.
Blaming the tool never takes the blamer out of the ‘unpleasant’ situation.

A more complete statement would have been:

‘Any unchecked government tends, sooner rather than later, to become a problem.’

The key word here being ‘unchecked’, not government. For the same reason which had prompted ‘god’ to warn us:

Any graven image you will ever make will inevitably be incomplete. Not because of your incompetence but because of my infinite complexity. I, your god, am infinite. Hence incomprehensible. You might glimpse some, or even a lot, about my ‘true’ nature but you’ll never find out enough. Enough for you to make a ‘usable’ graven image.
A reliable idol…

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Categories 1989, alternative ways of acquring knowledge, authoritarianism, awareness, Choices we make, collective identity, democracy, effective communication, evolution, man as a measure for all things, Mutual Respect, Psychology, skin in the game, teleology, Transparency, Trust

Dictatorship sucks!

July 2, 2023 //
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As usual, Chomsky is only half-right.
Opportunities shouldn’t be provided. Period!
In fact, nobody should be able to control/provide sizable amounts of opportunity!

On the other hand, making it so that only a small number of people enjoy all the opportunities in the world is, indeed, criminal.
Unsustainable for the longer time frame, actually!

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Categories 1989, alternative ways of acquring knowledge, arrogance, authoritarianism, awareness, Bounded rationality, Choices we make, collective identity, effective communication, In English, Mutual Respect, skin in the game, The kind of world we are building for our children, Trust, yes but

Small wonder

June 10, 2023 //
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I’m convinced Putin still believes he might get away with it.
With whatever he wishes to accomplish…

Why?
Because he is convinced that the only thing which might prevent him from achieving his goal is ‘the West’.
You see, he is adamant that without the ‘western influence’ he would have imposed his will upon Ukraine a very long time ago. After all, he’d already done that in Russia, didn’t he?
And the West seems to be loosing its focus….

A lot of ‘distraction’. Trump is indicted on 37 counts, mainly for mishandling highly sensitive information, while Boris Johnson quits his MP chair claiming he is the victim. ‘I did mislead the Commons but I didn’t do it on purpose’.

According to Putin’s book, there’s no difference between him and these two guys. All three of them have nothing in their mind but their own interest. In this respect, Putin is absolutely right.
What he fails to realize is that Trump being indicted and Johnson being investigated by the Commons are signs of strength. The US and Britain, respectively, seem to have came back to their senses. And started cleaning up their act.

He, Putin, also fails to realize that the Western help might come in handy. For the Ukrainians.
But what keeps them fighting is their will. Their quest for freedom!

The very same thing had happened during WWII.
The West did carry huge amounts of weaponry to the former USSR. Which weapons had helped the Red Army resist – and then defeat – Hitler’s attempt to enlarge the German Lebensraum. But without the ordinary Russians putting up with the war… all western help would have been lost!
Same thing is happening under our own eyes. The arms beefing up Ukraine’s army might come in handy but it’s the Ukrainian determination to lead their own, independent, life which will eventually douse Putin’s ambition.

One final thing.
Nazi Germany had ultimately failed because it was an ‘imperium’. A socio-political arrangement where all decisions were made in a highly centralized manner. Where mistakes accumulated and eventually made it impossible for the arrangement to survive. Because unsolved past mistakes make it impossible for a system to evolve. To solve present day challenges.

Any resemblance to what’s going on in present day Russia is nothing but yet another proof that failing to understand history forces you to repeat the lesson.

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Categories 1989, alternative ways of acquring knowledge, authoritarianism, awareness, Choices we make, collective identity, effective communication, evolution, In English, man as a measure for all things, politics, Psychology, Rule of Law, skin in the game

Getting across

May 1, 2023 //
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I’m not sure what ‘timid’ meant in those times.

I would have used ‘coward’.

On the other hand, it would have been politically incorrect…

And ‘somewhat’ inefficient! Being blunt, often scares your audience.

And makes them impervious to what you need to share with them.

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Categories 1989, arrogance, authoritarianism, awareness, Choices we make, cooperation, democracy, evolution, In English, limited rationality, man as a measure for all things, man induced fragility, Mutual Respect, Psychology, skin in the game, Trust

Does communism work?

April 16, 2023 //
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Not even on paper!

If you read carefully Marx’s communist manifesto, you’ll realize that it doesn’t. Work. Not even on paper!
According to Marx, communism will come to be when enough people formerly belonging to the middle class will have become poor. As a consequence of their wealth having been siphoned away from them.
Becoming poor will make those former middle class people open to communist ideas. And will convince them to follow the already ‘enlightened communists’ into revolution.
For a while – again, according to Marx, the society will have to be led by the successful revolutionaries. In a dictatorial manner, because not all people will have risen to the communists’ level of understanding.
So. ‘Communism’ will be instated by some disgruntled people using dictatorial methods.
How auspicious is this?
Let me go even further.

Why were those people disgruntled in the first place?
Because capitalism!
Not so fast. The Adam Smith kind of capitalism worked just fine. Only after it had been warped by greed it had started to sputter. Specially after Milton Freedman had enshrined greed…
This being the moment when I need to remind you that Adam Smith’s first book on this subject was “The Theory of Moral Sentiments”…

‘Those’ people had become disgruntled after too many in that society had been convinced, at least for a while, that ‘greed was good’. And what was Marx’s proposed solution for that disgruntlement?
That all ‘means of production’ – meaning all property/wealth, to be taken away from individual people. And entrusted to ‘the people’.
Since ‘the people’ were going to be led by the “communists”, in practice the communist revolution meant that all wealth was going to be confiscated from those who happened to own it and entrusted to a very small number of people. Who happened to own the secular power in that moment. As the main consequence of the communist revolution. Apud Karl Marx’s Communist Manifesto…

Let me revisit now Milton Friedman’s words.
‘Greed is good’.
According to this line of thinking, wealth becoming as concentrated as possible is a good thing. Since greed is already good, concentrated wealth is but a logical consequence…

Then Marx’s Communist Manifesto was nothing but an avant-la-lettre short-cut for an easier implementation of Milton Friedman’s greed hailing ideology!

See what I mean?

Karl Marx communism did not and cannot work.
Because it leads into a vicious circle.
It creates a monopolistic situation which cannot be avoided. Time and time again, history has proven that ‘this time is different’ is nothing but wishful thinking. Whenever too much decision power is concentrated in a too small number of hands, the situation becomes untenable. The more concentrated the decision power, the faster – and more dramatic – the eventual collapse.

How about a ‘different’ kind of communism?
The only sustainable kind of anything – ‘social arrangements’ included, had been ‘natural’. Had appeared in an evolutionary manner.
In contrast, all revolutionary developments have produced counter-revolutions. In many instances even more destructive than the revolutions themselves.
What will come after democratic capitalism? I don’t know!
But it better be better than what we have now.

And come in quietly!

Otherwise…

How about a return to bona fide democratic capitalism?
To Adam Smith’s kind of capitalism?
The one whose entrepreneurs used to put ‘moral sentiments’ above greed!

Wishful thinking?
Maybe!
But is there any other way to achieve anything? Other than to start by wishing that something?
And since Smith’s brand of capitalism did work, communism always failed and a viable alternative has yet to appear…

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Categories 1989, alternative ways of acquring knowledge, authoritarianism, awareness, Bounded rationality, collective identity, effective communication, evolution, In English, man as a measure for all things, Money as goal, Mutual Respect, Psychology, skin in the game, Trust

“Why did the Russian Revolution fail in establishing a true socialist/communist form of government?”

April 9, 2023 //
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For some reason, there still exists a considerable number of people not yet convinced that what had been experienced in the Soviet Union was “a true socialist/communist form of government”

The sad reality is that the Russian Revolution did establish a true socialist form of government!
As per Marx’s teachings.
The communists had been in charge of things, and the things failed to become better.
In fact, they had become worse.
Eventually, the Soviet Union – along with all other socialist attempts, had crumbled under their own weight.

Those who want to find better alternatives to democratic capitalism – good luck with that – need to find another word but socialism to describe their goal.
Or wait a few generations before attempting to give it a new meaning. The current one had been wasted by the likes of Marx, Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Kim, Ceausescu…

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Categories 1989, authoritarianism, awareness, Bounded rationality, Choices we make, collective identity, effective communication, evolution, fail better, In English, man as a measure for all things, man induced fragility, Mutual Respect, Psychology, skin in the game, teleology, yes but

Choice

March 16, 2023 //
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Basically, there are two meta-rules.

According to the first, if you follow the precepts – to the letter – you get ‘there’.
According to the second, avoiding the forbidden sets the stage for things going your way.

Unfortunately, things are not as simple as they look at first sight.
The first meta-rule deals with individuals. Getting ‘there’ is each individual’s job. They have to do what they are supposed to and failing to fulfill any item banishes the unworthy from the cherished ‘prize’.
The second one is even ‘trickier’. While its precepts must be followed, again, by the individual followers, the ‘spoils’ belong more to the community rather than to the individual. On top of that, they are not ‘certain’! Following the rule only ‘sets the stage’. Disobeying the rule makes it certain that the goal will never be reached while following it only ‘opens the door’. Makes it possible for each of the community members to search for their individual paths towards their particular goals.

Do I need to remember you that both these rules exist only in our heads?
As figments of our imaginations?
And that the difference between the two can be observed at the practical level?

The first rule can never be fulfilled. Nobody can follow it to its ultimate consequence. No matter how hard any of us might try. It would be like measuring with infinite precision. Something will always happen. Go wrong. Throw us back to where we have started.
The second one also leads to disappointment. Some members of the community will inevitably attempt to cut corners. Take the easy way out … Hence the rule needs policing. You’ve certainly witnessed at least on occasion when ‘bad (money) has driven out good’… at least temporarily! Furthermore, some members of the community – while faithfully sticking to the rule, will still fail to get ‘there’. Set their aims too high, didn’t have what it takes… or simply had lots and lots of bad luck! But regardless of the why’s, not getting there still generates disappointment. Usually directed at the rule… and creates a lot of doubt towards the weltanschauung based on the rule…

Which way out?
How to choose?

Would it be helpful to notice that, historically speaking, the communities which have followed the second rule, primum non nocere, have fared decently while those who had attempted to prescribe, and impose, a ‘recipe for happiness’ have invariably failed?
‘Don’t do anything, upon another, which you wouldn’t welcome when done upon you’ versus ‘treat all the others exactly as you would like to be treated yourself’?

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Categories 1989, alternative ways of acquring knowledge, authoritarianism, awareness, Bounded rationality, Choices we make, collective identity, effective communication, evolution, In English, Intent, man as a measure for all things, Mutual Respect, Psychology, skin in the game, teleology

‘Handles’

March 12, 2023 //
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I’m afraid things are a little bit more complicated.
In this translation, the Turkish proverb puts the onus on the ‘forest’ for what’s going on.
Which isn’t helpful. It somehow validates the notion that ‘people’ get what they deserve.
The way I see it, the responsibility belongs to the wooden handles. The axes – the steel parts, do what is in their nature to do. Axes split wood, dictators dictate… and so on.
On the other hand, those who ‘help in the process’… While it also is in their ‘wooden’ nature to be helpful, the handles do not necessarily have to attach themselves to forest hacking axes.
While it is in their nature to give advice, analysts and pundits do not necessarily have to court the Trumps/Putins/Xis of this world.

Blaming the people for voting for those who are being put forward by very skill full political promoters is not that different from blaming the victim of a rape. Yes, she should have known better than to drink that much at the party but the rapist didn’t necessarily had to take advantage of her.

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Categories 1989, authoritarianism, awareness, Bounded rationality, Choices we make, collective identity, effective communication, evolution, In English, man as a measure for all things, Mutual Respect, Psychology, skin in the game, teleology

Instrument

March 6, 2023 //
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‘War is over when the goals have been achieved, not when the enemy had been destroyed.
While sometimes you have to utterly obliterate the enemy in order to achieve your goals, this is not always necessarily true.‘

Hari Bucur-Marcu

This makes a lot of sense, right?

Yeah, sort of…

The problem with this approach being that this understanding degrades war to a simple instrument.

Something used by a decision maker towards the achievement of certain ‘goals’.

The problem with this approach being that it obliterates the decision power of all other people involved in it. Of everybody else but of those calling the shots. Pun intended!

All analysts commenting Putin’s ‘special military operation’ babble on about Putin’s goals.
‘Ukraine will never be able to crush Russia, militarily, so we need to understand what’s going on in Putin’s mind.
In order to be able to ‘bribe’ him into ending the war. Or to black mail him. Only we need to understand first what will constitute a too big of a price for him to pay.’

On the other hand, Putin seems to be thinking along the same lines.
‘I need to preserve my position. MY power. Ukraine is a bad example for the Russian people. They have shifted their ‘allegiance’ and want to build a real democracy. I cannot allow this to happen, otherwise I’ll be next.
Now, how much pain do I have to inflict in order to achieve my goal? Directly, upon the Ukrainians and indirectly, upon the rest of the world?’

Meanwhile, the rest of those involved in this situation bear the brunt of the war. Directly and indirectly.

Some of them understand what’s going on and some don’t.

My point being that not all instruments are born equal.
While all are nothing but mere ‘sticks’ in the hands of the agents wielding them, choosing to use a certain instrument among the available alternatives speaks volumes about the agent making the choice.

What are we, reasonable creatures, to understand when an agent chooses an instrument which debases all other creatures to the role of ‘kill or be killed’?
For whatever reason and under whatever pretext?
Is that agent ever going to stop? To stop setting ‘goals’, further and further away?

Specially after having the ‘first installment’ safely tucked under the belt…

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Categories 1989, alternative ways of acquring knowledge, authoritarianism, awareness, Choices we make, collective identity, effective communication

Capitalism

February 23, 2023 //
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The way I see it, capitalism is an environment. A ‘place’.
A ‘way’ for people to do ‘economy’.
What people do in that place depends on the place itself but also on how they choose to do things. This being the reason for which the American capitalism is different from the European one. And both completely different from the Chinese version.
In this sense, capitalism doesn’t actually work. Not by itself!
If those dwelling in this ‘place’ act freely – as in ‘free market’ – then the whole ‘thing’ remains ‘sustainable’. Not ‘good for everybody’, not always ‘nice’ but nevertheless ‘fair’. As in ‘you have a fair chance of reaching the other end’. Not to get necessarily rich but to make the ends meet!

The alternative to capitalism… if you take your ideological blinders off, you notice that there’s none!
Socialist/communist countries are/were also capitalist. The difference being that their economies are/were centrally planned. Their markets are/were anything but free!
This being the reason for which communism had crumbled under its own weight.
And for which in all places where the market is not free enough the ‘thing’ is not sustainable!

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Categories 1989 and the Global Financial Crises, alternative ways of acquring knowledge, authoritarianism, awareness, Choices we make, collective identity, Economy, effective communication, evolution, In English, man as a measure for all things, Money, Money as goal, Mutual Respect, skin in the game, Trust
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