RugbyRebels

Which Tyler wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 11:01 am

Puja wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 10:54 am Ah, but you see she had pronouns in her bio and there's unconfirmed rumour (or, as we like to call it nowadays, fact) that her social media says she was dating a woman. Fox News is already reporting it. So she's basically an extremist antifa leftist terrorist and, as we know, that makes her not a human being.

Doesn't matter if you kill an innocent white woman if you can paint her as a race traitor. Fascism! Wooo!

Puja

I'm sure I'm showing my age here, but... aren't you supposed to fabricate all that BEFORE murdering her?

That would imply that anyone has any kind of plan or thought process to this. Hells, they're so disconnected and disorganised that the ICE officer who did the murdering actually fled the state, apparently under the misapprehension that there was some danger of him being held accountable for his crime. Poor schmuck must've felt so embarrassed when he came back and was razzed by his teammates for running away for no reason! Frankly, he's the real victim here.

Son of Mathonwy wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 11:06 amSeriously though, despite Fox's best efforts it will still be harder to stop white moms (and other standard issue Americans) sympathising with this one than with George Floyd. And a lot of white moms voted Trump (not as many as white dads but still, a lot).

I am worried that you are still thinking in the old paradigm. Trump owns a secret police now. He has loyallists in charge of every branch of government and at every level, as well as all the compliant judges that he planted in his first term, and the Supreme Court in his pocket. Any states with a Republican legislature are already having their electoral maps gerrymandered to shit and their electoral rolls cut to ribbons. It doesn't matter if he loses a chunk of white women, because he's already tilted the next election in his favour. And that's before his pet television channel presents any opposition as radical communists out to steal your toothbrush, and before his internet billionaires suppress any opposition messaging and advertising, and before his secret police are sent to "monitor" the polling stations and intimidate/disappear anyone who might not be of a lily-white hue. And, in the unlikely chance that he does lose, he can scream "FRAUD!!!" and either go to his packed courts to overturn it, or just flat-out refuse to accept the new Congress representatives - physically barring them from taking office with his goons and claiming he's upholding democracy by stopping these fraudulent officials.

And that's even assuming that a large number of Americans think he's done anything wrong here and would vote against him in the first place.

I genuinely don't see how this gets resolved. Certainly he won't be doing anything so prosaic as stepping down at the end of his second term - he'll run again. Maybe his death will unpick some of it? Vance certainly is a charismaless couch-fucker and might not be able to get away with the same things that Trump does and it's not like anyone else has the capability to do any better, but the risk is that too much damage has already been done to the institutions and Vance may be able to keep power, which will be worse cause he's not senile.

I genuinely wouldn't be surprised to see states starting to think about seceding in the case of rigged 2026 and 2028 leading to a third Trump term, especially the New England/New York area and California. Would Trump stand for that though, especially given the amount of the US economy that's in those states?

Son of Mathonwy wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 2:09 pm

Stom wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 12:36 pm The problem in the US is that BOTH Republicans and Democrats have spent so long and so much money labeling any real alternatives as enemies of the state and communists that all those people who voted Trump but wouldn't again...will never vote for any of the alternatives.

And because of gun laws, there cannot be any large scale protests, as the MAGA crowd will just turn up with MP40s and murder a bunch of protesters.

IMO, we need to cut them out of our lives. The question is how can we do that while causing the least damage to our own people? And do we have the leadership with the balls to actually do what needs to be done?

And I fear, with people like Macron in positions of power...we will simply let things happen and be caught in the crossfire.

I had huge hopes for my children and their generation. But now I fear for the world they will inherit.

Which them do you mean?

I believe Stom is referring to the US of A with that *them*. I do tend to agree in terms of foreign policy - I don't think the USA is saveable and, going forwards, is more likely to be someone that we need to defend ourselves from than someone we trust to defend us. The human cost is going to be terrible though.

Puja

Jonathan Pie is, as always, very cathartic, but it's terrifying to hear the subject matter. I miss when he was just getting annoyed at Boris:



Puja

Son of Mathonwy wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 2:09 pm

Stom wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 12:36 pm The problem in the US is that BOTH Republicans and Democrats have spent so long and so much money labeling any real alternatives as enemies of the state and communists that all those people who voted Trump but wouldn't again...will never vote for any of the alternatives.

And because of gun laws, there cannot be any large scale protests, as the MAGA crowd will just turn up with MP40s and murder a bunch of protesters.

IMO, we need to cut them out of our lives. The question is how can we do that while causing the least damage to our own people? And do we have the leadership with the balls to actually do what needs to be done?

And I fear, with people like Macron in positions of power...we will simply let things happen and be caught in the crossfire.

I had huge hopes for my children and their generation. But now I fear for the world they will inherit.

Which them do you mean?

America. Sorry.

Puja wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 2:43 pm

Which Tyler wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 11:01 am

Puja wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 10:54 am Ah, but you see she had pronouns in her bio and there's unconfirmed rumour (or, as we like to call it nowadays, fact) that her social media says she was dating a woman. Fox News is already reporting it. So she's basically an extremist antifa leftist terrorist and, as we know, that makes her not a human being.

Doesn't matter if you kill an innocent white woman if you can paint her as a race traitor. Fascism! Wooo!

Puja

I'm sure I'm showing my age here, but... aren't you supposed to fabricate all that BEFORE murdering her?

That would imply that anyone has any kind of plan or thought process to this. Hells, they're so disconnected and disorganised that the ICE officer who did the murdering actually fled the state, apparently under the misapprehension that there was some danger of him being held accountable for his crime. Poor schmuck must've felt so embarrassed when he came back and was razzed by his teammates for running away for no reason! Frankly, he's the real victim here.

Son of Mathonwy wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 11:06 amSeriously though, despite Fox's best efforts it will still be harder to stop white moms (and other standard issue Americans) sympathising with this one than with George Floyd. And a lot of white moms voted Trump (not as many as white dads but still, a lot).

I am worried that you are still thinking in the old paradigm. Trump owns a secret police now. He has loyallists in charge of every branch of government and at every level, as well as all the compliant judges that he planted in his first term, and the Supreme Court in his pocket. Any states with a Republican legislature are already having their electoral maps gerrymandered to shit and their electoral rolls cut to ribbons. It doesn't matter if he loses a chunk of white women, because he's already tilted the next election in his favour. And that's before his pet television channel presents any opposition as radical communists out to steal your toothbrush, and before his internet billionaires suppress any opposition messaging and advertising, and before his secret police are sent to "monitor" the polling stations and intimidate/disappear anyone who might not be of a lily-white hue. And, in the unlikely chance that he does lose, he can scream "FRAUD!!!" and either go to his packed courts to overturn it, or just flat-out refuse to accept the new Congress representatives - physically barring them from taking office with his goons and claiming he's upholding democracy by stopping these fraudulent officials.

And that's even assuming that a large number of Americans think he's done anything wrong here and would vote against him in the first place.

I genuinely don't see how this gets resolved. Certainly he won't be doing anything so prosaic as stepping down at the end of his second term - he'll run again. Maybe his death will unpick some of it? Vance certainly is a charismaless couch-fucker and might not be able to get away with the same things that Trump does and it's not like anyone else has the capability to do any better, but the risk is that too much damage has already been done to the institutions and Vance may be able to keep power, which will be worse cause he's not senile.

I genuinely wouldn't be surprised to see states starting to think about seceding in the case of rigged 2026 and 2028 leading to a third Trump term, especially the New England/New York area and California. Would Trump stand for that though, especially given the amount of the US economy that's in those states?

Son of Mathonwy wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 2:09 pm

Stom wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 12:36 pm The problem in the US is that BOTH Republicans and Democrats have spent so long and so much money labeling any real alternatives as enemies of the state and communists that all those people who voted Trump but wouldn't again...will never vote for any of the alternatives.

And because of gun laws, there cannot be any large scale protests, as the MAGA crowd will just turn up with MP40s and murder a bunch of protesters.

IMO, we need to cut them out of our lives. The question is how can we do that while causing the least damage to our own people? And do we have the leadership with the balls to actually do what needs to be done?

And I fear, with people like Macron in positions of power...we will simply let things happen and be caught in the crossfire.

I had huge hopes for my children and their generation. But now I fear for the world they will inherit.

Which them do you mean?

I believe Stom is referring to the US of A with that *them*. I do tend to agree in terms of foreign policy - I don't think the USA is saveable and, going forwards, is more likely to be someone that we need to defend ourselves from than someone we trust to defend us. The human cost is going to be terrible though.

Puja

Throughout modern history, nearly every dictator was either communist or anti-business, because they saw the threat that these people posed to their reign.

Because capitalism is vehemently opposed to oligarchy. It cannot survive when wealth and power is concentrated.

And yet people still believe that we're living in a capitalist world.

Insanity.

Stom wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 4:05 pm Throughout modern history, nearly every dictator was either communist or anti-business, because they saw the threat that these people posed to their reign.

Because capitalism is vehemently opposed to oligarchy. It cannot survive when wealth and power is concentrated.

And yet people still believe that we're living in a capitalist world.

Insanity.

I agree with you about communism, but capitalism? You'd need a very narrow definition of capitalism to think that.

Per Wikipedia: Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their use for the purpose of obtaining profit.

By that definition, Hitler, Pinochet and Putin (and would-be dictator Trump) were or are capitalists. (Mussolini is a borderline case, running a corporatist state initially but more free-market as time went on).

Capitalism easily slides into oligarchy (or, I would say, oligarchic capitalism). In fact, strong laws are needed to prevent it from happening naturally over time.

Stom wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 4:01 pm

Son of Mathonwy wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 2:09 pm

Stom wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 12:36 pm The problem in the US is that BOTH Republicans and Democrats have spent so long and so much money labeling any real alternatives as enemies of the state and communists that all those people who voted Trump but wouldn't again...will never vote for any of the alternatives.

And because of gun laws, there cannot be any large scale protests, as the MAGA crowd will just turn up with MP40s and murder a bunch of protesters.

IMO, we need to cut them out of our lives. The question is how can we do that while causing the least damage to our own people? And do we have the leadership with the balls to actually do what needs to be done?

And I fear, with people like Macron in positions of power...we will simply let things happen and be caught in the crossfire.

I had huge hopes for my children and their generation. But now I fear for the world they will inherit.

Which them do you mean?

America. Sorry.

Wasn't sure if you were talking about MAGA or maybe mainstream parties.

Agreed, at least to the extent that we need to become independent of them. We're reliant on a country that is now spectacularly unreliable. This can't go on.

In particular, we need to remove our reliance on their military tech and their IT (social media and AI). If we get it all from them, they have us over a barrel. We need to work closely with the EU. We need to be sure that our nukes are independent (it is unclear). We need independent anti-missile defences and to limit our purchases of F-35s. We need to at least be thinking about independent Facebook, Twitter/X, YouTube and openAI alternatives and should be pushing Linux so we're not forced to go to MS or Apple or Google/Android.

Son of Mathonwy wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 6:30 pm

Stom wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 4:05 pm Throughout modern history, nearly every dictator was either communist or anti-business, because they saw the threat that these people posed to their reign.

Because capitalism is vehemently opposed to oligarchy. It cannot survive when wealth and power is concentrated.

And yet people still believe that we're living in a capitalist world.

Insanity.

I agree with you about communism, but capitalism? You'd need a very narrow definition of capitalism to think that.

Per Wikipedia: Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their use for the purpose of obtaining profit.

By that definition, Hitler, Pinochet and Putin (and would-be dictator Trump) were or are capitalists. (Mussolini is a borderline case, running a corporatist state initially but more free-market as time went on).

Capitalism easily slides into oligarchy (or, I would say, oligarchic capitalism). In fact, strong laws are needed to prevent it from happening naturally over time.

Get a definition that isn’t from Wikipedia, then

The IMF, for example.

https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fa ... basics.htm

I find myself going mad, though, looking at them, because it seems that a lot of sources have been edited to add that tripe you quoted from Wikipedia: that government cannot be involved. When the founding fathers of capitalism wanted government control over markets to ensure competition, because competition was the most important tenet of capitalism.

That these same sources all say that socialism wants the control of everything under the state just shows the continuing use of misinformation by the far right. Because that definition of socialism as communism light was not the definition I was taught when learning it in the early 2000s. It’s not the definition in the textbooks, and capitalism isn’t described that way.

Stom wrote: ↑Sat Jan 10, 2026 9:39 am

Son of Mathonwy wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 6:30 pm

Stom wrote: ↑Fri Jan 09, 2026 4:05 pm Throughout modern history, nearly every dictator was either communist or anti-business, because they saw the threat that these people posed to their reign.

Because capitalism is vehemently opposed to oligarchy. It cannot survive when wealth and power is concentrated.

And yet people still believe that we're living in a capitalist world.

Insanity.

I agree with you about communism, but capitalism? You'd need a very narrow definition of capitalism to think that.

Per Wikipedia: Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their use for the purpose of obtaining profit.

By that definition, Hitler, Pinochet and Putin (and would-be dictator Trump) were or are capitalists. (Mussolini is a borderline case, running a corporatist state initially but more free-market as time went on).

Capitalism easily slides into oligarchy (or, I would say, oligarchic capitalism). In fact, strong laws are needed to prevent it from happening naturally over time.

Get a definition that isn’t from Wikipedia, then

The IMF, for example.

https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fa ... basics.htm

I find myself going mad, though, looking at them, because it seems that a lot of sources have been edited to add that tripe you quoted from Wikipedia: that government cannot be involved. When the founding fathers of capitalism wanted government control over markets to ensure competition, because competition was the most important tenet of capitalism.

That these same sources all say that socialism wants the control of everything under the state just shows the continuing use of misinformation by the far right. Because that definition of socialism as communism light was not the definition I was taught when learning it in the early 2000s. It’s not the definition in the textbooks, and capitalism isn’t described that way.

Interesting link. Somewhere in the middle of it you will see:

More recently, economists have identified four types of capitalism distinguished according to the role of entrepreneurship (the process of starting businesses) in driving innovation and the institutional setting in which new ideas are put into place to spur economic growth (Baumol, Litan, and Schramm, 2007).

In state-guided capitalism, the government decides which sectors will grow. Initially motivated by a desire to foster growth, this type of capitalism has several pitfalls: excessive investment, picking the wrong winners, susceptibility to corruption, and difficulty withdrawing support when it is no longer appropriate. Oligarchic capitalism is oriented toward protecting and enriching a very narrow fraction of the population. Economic growth is not a central objective, and countries with this variety have a great deal of inequality and corruption.

Big-firm capitalism takes advantage of economies of scale. This type is important for mass production of products. Entrepreneurial capitalism produces breakthroughs like the automobile, telephone, and computer. These innovations are usually the product of individuals and new firms. However, it takes big firms to mass-produce and market new products, so a mix of big-firm and entrepreneurial capitalism seems best. This is the kind that characterizes the United States more than any other country.

I'm not understanding why you think the Wikipedia quote is tripe (that government can't be involved?). In the Capitalism page from which it comes we see:

The degree of competition in markets and the role of intervention and regulation, as well as the scope of state ownership, vary across different models of capitalism

Strictly speaking almost all economies are Mixed, ie they include aspects of capitalism and socialism.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed_economy

So it depends on your understanding of the definition of capitalism. If you think that any element of socialism (eg state intervention) invalidates it as capitalism, then there are very few capitalist economies, perhaps none at all. I think the definition is wider than that (as Wikipedia and the IMF seem to say), which means that capitalism can encompass oligarchic or dictatorial or monarchic regimes.

As a slight aside, a measure of state intervention, ie regulation, is required in order to maintain free markets, an important feature of capitalism.