But as we all know, the US Government is fully up for sale and has been for sale since the Citizens United Ruling. In fact, you can even get a Tax Deduction for buying a US Politician.
Not to take the blame off politicians, but there is an intermediate step. Citizens United allows unlimited spending on advertising. You still can't buy politicians directly. You still have to get voters to vote for them.
This is on us. We have the responsibility to look at the advertising and make a choice.
We are so, so much worse at it than I would ever have believed.
It came down do an instant where people were given a choice of two levers. The government does not control them at that point. They make their choice freely.
The American people said what we want, and deserve to get it, good and hard.
The government assumes it is in charge of everything, and accountable to and for nothing.
People are always responsible for their own actions. If anyone else was responsible then people would become objects to be acted upon and no longer people.
The current practice I call "accountability laundering".
This is where you create situations where somehow no one is accountable. Where no one knows who to point a finger at.
This causes like 90% of the worlds problems. People create systems this way on purpose. Public companies, private equity, governments, huge orgs where no one is actually at the helm.
All so no one can point a finger when something goes wrong.
>This is on us. We have the responsibility to look at the advertising and make a choice.
It's not on "us" -- many people have long argued against the current state of legal bribery and corruption in the US, both advocating against and voting against this outcome.
It's very much on the owners and workers of media channels, traditional (television, newspaper) and modern (adtech).
>many people have long argued against the current state of legal bribery and corruption in the US, both advocating against and voting against this outcome.
Do they, or do they mostly argue that one party is the corrupt one and vote for the other party?
Do you normally question whether people deviate from behaving as stereotypes and are generally incapable of individual behavior, or just when corruption and bribery in the US is discussed?
People do tend to normally behave as stereotypes where American politics is concerned, and the essentially two party dynamic of the American political system encourages that.
I don't know what you're trying to accuse me of, but the near absolute fixation on partisanship and identity politics in the US is well known.
Apologies, I could have been clearer in my last comment. I found that your reductive approach to assumed polarization is a thought terminating cliche, which signals an end to any interest in conversation by the invoker of the cliche.
> the near absolute fixation on partisanship and identity politics in the US is well known.
It really isn't, unless, I would argue, we believe cable news or propaganda sources are a good source of daily information and infotainment. I think they do a poor job communicating complex nuance and people not being solely engaged in wedge issues, forcing a narrative of existential danger in exchange for more clicks and views.
> People do tend to normally behave as stereotypes where American politics is concerned
only a vocal minority. The vastly larger silent majority only care about the economy (or how they perceive it) and their favorite celebrities (sports or political) and not much else. All you have to do is look at the number of women who voted for Trump to confirm
Every US election is Christmas for months for the advertising industry. All those political dollars raised? 95% given to media channels to air political ads. The US elections are nothing about the people, and everything about pouring as much money as they can shake from the citizens into the media machine. And we don't even want the ads, don't need them, it's all a giant farce.
Publicly funded elections are good solution to this and get dark money out of politics. Bernie Sanders, for example, has talked about this before and has a page dedicated to how we can have more free and fair elections[0], notably:
> Abolish super PACs and replace corporate funding with publicly funded elections that amplify small-doner donations.
It is interesting how Kamala out-raised Trump by nearly double in this most recent election. I guess it's not as simple as 'buying' a politician after all.
Not really. Denmark does not have the resources to develop (or defend) Greenland the way the US can.
Denmark's entire annual subsidy to the Greenlandic government (which the latter very much needs to keep afloat) as of 2020 was $670 million, which is less than the annual budget of El Paso. <https://web.archive.org/web/20200708202258/https://www.thelo...> A US-owned (or US-affiliated under a compact of free association) Greenland will in a decade see more development than it has in the past century, just as the US bases that dotted the island during the Cold War were themselves more development than Denmark built in the past century.
Jokes aside, the recent MAGA talk of buying Greenland and taking over the Panama Canal and annexing Canada is an example of the same kind of vindictive nationalist mindset that rose in Russia after 2000.
Nobody in Russia cared about Ukraine in the late 1990s. They were the harmless neighbors who talk a bit funny, just like Americans think of Canada. Invading their country wasn’t on anyone’s agenda.
Putin built it up gradually over decades. Ukrainians are actually Russians, it’s not a real country, they’re colluding with foreigners and ruled by fascists, etc.
Americans should be careful with this talk. It always starts as a jokey provocation.
Moscow had issues with Kiev before Americas were found by Europeans. And invaded it multiple times, many of them successfully. Including in 20th century. With a genocide. Bucha was not something strange when you take into account last 100 years. Or 1000.
I don't see a reason for all this reason redirection. Putin's historical article is very reasonable continuation of Moscow policies towards Kiev for literally centuries.
Given that Denmark gave Ukraine F-16s and didn't bat an eyelash, I'd be all for it. I would be pretty happy if they hand out 2-3 fully loaded B-2's and be like "hey guys, go nuts with them".
Saudis already bought US during the last administration.
Trump administration is going to have 13 billionaires, plus there are several billionaires in the shadows. If Denmark or EU would drop to the level of making deals with them directly and paying for their companies for US policy decision, they could do that.
Looks like a bad investment, isn't it better to have USA as an industrial zone where very little worker rights are provided, taxes are low and then make them work extremely long hours a better strategy?
Just invest in America, have your products and tech developed there then use these products and tech to improve Denmark living standards and increase your wealth as you recoup your investment through stock and dividends.
In order for that work, you'll need people to maintain the harsh conditions for the working masses. They will need to be very well compensated so as to maintain incentivized to keep the status quo. This CEO class will have be as wealthy as they are apathetic to suffering and injustice. So good luck trying to make a system like that where very few benefit from the work everyone else who struggle for basic living standards. No way that people would put up with that.
Well, it's already common among techies to flex about how shitty they live - like a bed, a chair, a TV and a game console and no decoration.
They already like to glamorize concentration of wealth, they love how America has the largest companies and Japan&Europe is failing because they don'y have as large companies.
They already obsess over things like sexuality, identity, culture wars etc. When the tension becomes too high, You can always give them a win over destroying a character you created? Let them really hate the vegans, glamorize Lamborghinis or Teslas, hook them to the online world and reduce the real world interactions so they can have wins cheap for you and keep working very hard.
To curb any social movements that don't align with this model, you just make sure that have control over the communications.
Ideally, CEOs stay in London, Zurich, Frankfurt and Paris as it might be dangerous if they are among the workers in New York etc.
Get the valuation of the country done by the same individual who valued Trump's Mar-a-Lago at $18 million and they should be able to close the deal without breaking a fiscal sweat. As a warning to future Danes-at-large, the language of legoland does take some getting used to. Imagine trying to speak Norwegian with a hot potato stuck in the back of your throat and you're getting close. If you don't know Norwegian or Swedish just imagine trying to cough up that potato one it has descended into your windpipe for a somewhat less accurate but still close approximation.
Just keep in mind the old adage on paying Danegeld: if you pay the Danegeld you'll never get rid of the Dane.
47 comments
[ 4.4 ms ] story [ 117 ms ] threadThe government is one of the worst parts of the United States. You'd be doing them a favor.
https://www.britannica.com/place/Denmark/Health-and-welfare
But as we all know, the US Government is fully up for sale and has been for sale since the Citizens United Ruling. In fact, you can even get a Tax Deduction for buying a US Politician.
https://www.texastribune.org/2022/10/30/johnson-amendment-el...
This is on us. We have the responsibility to look at the advertising and make a choice.
We are so, so much worse at it than I would ever have believed.
Are people responsible for their actions or is the government responsible for people's actions?
The American people said what we want, and deserve to get it, good and hard.
People are always responsible for their own actions. If anyone else was responsible then people would become objects to be acted upon and no longer people.
The current practice I call "accountability laundering".
This is where you create situations where somehow no one is accountable. Where no one knows who to point a finger at.
This causes like 90% of the worlds problems. People create systems this way on purpose. Public companies, private equity, governments, huge orgs where no one is actually at the helm.
All so no one can point a finger when something goes wrong.
It's not on "us" -- many people have long argued against the current state of legal bribery and corruption in the US, both advocating against and voting against this outcome.
It's very much on the owners and workers of media channels, traditional (television, newspaper) and modern (adtech).
Do they, or do they mostly argue that one party is the corrupt one and vote for the other party?
Do you normally question whether people deviate from behaving as stereotypes and are generally incapable of individual behavior, or just when corruption and bribery in the US is discussed?
I don't know what you're trying to accuse me of, but the near absolute fixation on partisanship and identity politics in the US is well known.
Apologies, I could have been clearer in my last comment. I found that your reductive approach to assumed polarization is a thought terminating cliche, which signals an end to any interest in conversation by the invoker of the cliche.
> the near absolute fixation on partisanship and identity politics in the US is well known.
It really isn't, unless, I would argue, we believe cable news or propaganda sources are a good source of daily information and infotainment. I think they do a poor job communicating complex nuance and people not being solely engaged in wedge issues, forcing a narrative of existential danger in exchange for more clicks and views.
> People do tend to normally behave as stereotypes where American politics is concerned
Again, I think this is reductive.
> Abolish super PACs and replace corporate funding with publicly funded elections that amplify small-doner donations.
0: https://berniesanders.com/issues/free-and-fair-elections
It's likely more effective than campaign spending...
Direct fundraising by candidates is a small part of the picture.
Denmark's entire annual subsidy to the Greenlandic government (which the latter very much needs to keep afloat) as of 2020 was $670 million, which is less than the annual budget of El Paso. <https://web.archive.org/web/20200708202258/https://www.thelo...> A US-owned (or US-affiliated under a compact of free association) Greenland will in a decade see more development than it has in the past century, just as the US bases that dotted the island during the Cold War were themselves more development than Denmark built in the past century.
My favorite anecdote about Greenland is that the US presence during and after WW2 brought Sears catalogs that residents used to for the first time obtain many goods. <https://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/how-abandoned-mining-t...>
Nobody in Russia cared about Ukraine in the late 1990s. They were the harmless neighbors who talk a bit funny, just like Americans think of Canada. Invading their country wasn’t on anyone’s agenda.
Putin built it up gradually over decades. Ukrainians are actually Russians, it’s not a real country, they’re colluding with foreigners and ruled by fascists, etc.
Americans should be careful with this talk. It always starts as a jokey provocation.
That’s the kind of ancient nonsense that nationalists love to dig up.
And its regime has mega issues in regard to its long-term survival. Which it attempts to redirect, by causing issues for Ukraine.
That's what the last 11 years have been about, in a nutshell.
Saudis already bought US during the last administration.
Trump administration is going to have 13 billionaires, plus there are several billionaires in the shadows. If Denmark or EU would drop to the level of making deals with them directly and paying for their companies for US policy decision, they could do that.
Just invest in America, have your products and tech developed there then use these products and tech to improve Denmark living standards and increase your wealth as you recoup your investment through stock and dividends.
They already like to glamorize concentration of wealth, they love how America has the largest companies and Japan&Europe is failing because they don'y have as large companies.
They already obsess over things like sexuality, identity, culture wars etc. When the tension becomes too high, You can always give them a win over destroying a character you created? Let them really hate the vegans, glamorize Lamborghinis or Teslas, hook them to the online world and reduce the real world interactions so they can have wins cheap for you and keep working very hard.
To curb any social movements that don't align with this model, you just make sure that have control over the communications.
Ideally, CEOs stay in London, Zurich, Frankfurt and Paris as it might be dangerous if they are among the workers in New York etc.
Just keep in mind the old adage on paying Danegeld: if you pay the Danegeld you'll never get rid of the Dane.