Mediaboss Marketing

In this episode of New Ideal Live, Ben Bayer and Elan Journo discuss Ayn Rands philosophic analysis and critique of liberals. They explain what makes Rands evaluation of liberalism different from that of conservatives, why she thought liberals began concealing their collectivist goals, and how todays liberals are different from (and worse than) those of Rands time.

Among the topics covered:

Recommended in this podcast are Journos Ayn Rands Devastating Critique of Liberals and Rands The Intellectual Bankruptcy of Our Age, The New Fascism: Rule by Consensus, The Wreckage of Consensus, Conservatism: An Obituary, and The Left: Old and New.

The podcast was recorded on April 19, 2023. Listen to the discussion below. Listen and subscribe from your mobile device onApple Podcasts,Google Podcasts, Spotify or Stitcher. Watch archived podcastshere.

Podcast audio:

If you value the ideas presented here, please become an ARI Member today.

Do you have a comment or question?

I have a comment

I have a question

Excerpt from:
Ayn Rand vs. 'Liberals' - New Ideal

Only a comprehensive reconfiguration of property rights over the increasingly cloud-based instruments of production, distribution, collaboration, and communication can rescue the foundational liberal idea of liberty as self-ownership. Reviving the liberal individual thus requires precisely what liberals detest: a revolution.

ATHENS My father was the epitome of the liberal individual, a splendid irony for a lifelong Marxist. To make a living, he had to lease his labor to the boss of a steel plant in Eleusis. But during every lunch break he wandered blissfully in the open-air backyard of the Archaeological Museum of Eleusis, where he luxuriated in the discovery of ancient steles full of clues that antiquitys technologists were more advanced than previously thought.

Following his return home, at just after 5 p.m. every day, and a late siesta, he would emerge ready to share in our family life and to write up his findings in academic articles and books. His life at the factory was, in short, neatly separated from his personal life.

It reflected a time when even leftists like us thought that, if nothing else, capitalism had granted us sovereignty over ourselves, albeit within limits. However hard one worked for the boss, one could at least fence off a portion of ones life and, within that fence, remain autonomous, self-determining, free. We knew that only the rich were truly free to choose, that the poor were mostly free to lose, and that the worst slavery was that of anyone who had learned to love their chains. Still, we appreciated the limited self-ownership we had.

Young people today have been denied even this small mercy. From the moment they take their first steps, they are taught implicitly to see themselves as a brand, yet one that will be judged according to its perceived authenticity. (And that includes potential employers: No one will offer me a job, a graduate told me once until I have discovered my true self.) Marketing an identity in todays online society is not optional. Curating their personal lives has become some of the most important work young people do.

Before posting any image, uploading any video, reviewing any movie, sharing any photograph or tweet, they must be mindful of whom their choice will please or alienate. They must somehow work out which of their potential true selves will be found most attractive, continually testing their opinions against their notion of what the average opinion among online opinion-makers might be. Because every experience can be captured and shared, they are continually consumed by the question of whether to do so. And even if no opportunity actually exists for sharing the experience, that opportunity can readily be imagined, and will be. Every choice, witnessed or otherwise, becomes an act in the careful construction of an identity.

One need not be a leftist to see that the right to a bit of time each day when one is not for sale has all but vanished. The irony is that the liberal individual was snuffed out neither by fascist brownshirts nor by Stalinist commissars. It was killed off when a new form of capital began to instruct youngsters to do that most liberal of things: be yourself. Of all the behavioral modifications that what I call cloud capital has engineered and monetized, this one is surely its overarching and crowning achievement.

Subscribe to PS Digital now to read all the latest insights from Yanis Varoufakis.

Digital subscribers enjoy access to every PS commentary, including those by Yanis Varoufakis, plus our entire On Point suite of subscriber-exclusive content, including Longer Reads, Insider Interviews, Big Picture/Big Question, and Say More.

For a limited time, save $15 with the code VAROUFAKIS15.

Subscribe Now

Possessive individualism was always detrimental to mental health. The techno-feudal society that cloud capital is fashioning made things infinitely worse when it demolished the fence that provided the liberal individual with a refuge from the labor market. Cloud capital has shattered the individual into fragments of data, an identity comprising choices expressed by clicks, which its algorithms are able to manipulate in ways no human mind can grasp. It has produced individuals who are not so much possessive as possessed, or rather persons incapable of self-possession. It has diminished our capacity to focus by co-opting our attention.

We have not become weak-willed. No, our focus has been hijacked by a new ruling class. And because the algorithms embedded in cloud capital are known to reinforce patriarchy, invidious stereotypes, and pre-existing oppression, the most vulnerable girls, the mentally ill, the marginalized, and the poor suffer the most.

If fascism taught us anything, it is our susceptibility to demonizing stereotypes and the ugly attraction (and potency) of emotions like righteousness, fear, envy, and loathing that they arouse in us. In our contemporary social reality, the cloud brings us face to face with the feared and loathed other. And because online violence seems bloodless and anodyne, we are more likely to respond to this other with taunting, demeaning language and bile. Bigotry is techno-feudalisms emotional compensation for the frustrations and anxieties we experience in relation to identity and focus.

Comment moderators and hate-speech regulation cant stop this brutalization because it is intrinsic to cloud capital, whose algorithms optimize for the cloud rents that flow more copiously toward Big Techs owners from hatred and discontent. Regulators cannot regulate artificial-intelligence-driven algorithms that even their authors cannot understand. For liberty to have a chance, cloud capital needs to be socialized.

My father believed that finding something timelessly beautiful to focus on, as he did while wondering among the relics of Greek antiquity, is our only defense from the demons circling our soul. I have tried to practice this over the years in my own way. But in the face of techno-feudalism, acting alone, isolated, as liberal individuals will not get us very far. Cutting ourselves off from the internet, switching off our phones, and using cash instead of plastic is no solution. Unless we band together, we will never civilize or socialize cloud capital and never reclaim our own minds from its grip.

And herein lies the greatest contradiction: Only a comprehensive reconfiguration of property rights over the increasingly cloud-based instruments of production, distribution, collaboration, and communication can rescue the foundational liberal idea of liberty as self-ownership will require. Reviving the liberal individual thus requires precisely what liberals detest: a new revolution.

Go here to see the original:
The Strange Death of the Liberal Individual by Yanis Varoufakis - Project Syndicate

The Liberals have put forward legislation that aims to make good on their pledge to tighten passenger rights rules after a year marked by travel chaos and a ballooning complaints backlog.

Tabled in the House of Commons as part of a broader budget bill, the new provisions ratchet up penalties on airlines, shore up the complaint process and target luggage and flight disruption loopholes that have allowed airlines to avoid customer compensation.

READ MORE: Vancouver airport promising improvements following Christmas season travel mess

The proposed $250,000 maximum fine for airline violations a tenfold increase from the existing regulations encourages compliance, said Sylvie De Bellefeuille, a lawyer with the advocacy group Option consommateurs.

So does an amendment placing the regulatory cost of complaints on carriers shoulders, she said. In theory, the measure incentivizes carriers to brush up on their service and thus reduce the number of grievances against them.

If these measures are adopted as they are proposed, these are all good things for consumers. It should fix some loopholes that weve been talking about for the past two, three years, De Bellefeuille said.

Undergoing first reading Thursday, the new legislation further demands that airlines institute a process to deal with claims and respond to complaints with a decision within 30 days. The establishment of complaint resolution officers at the Canadian Transportation Agency (CTA) should expedite the process, De Bellefeuille said.

She also applauded the closure of a loophole that has allowed airlines to avoid compensating passengers for delayed luggage, though not for lost luggage.

This thing was obviously something that was forgotten in the first law, she said.

The bane of many passengers over the past few years, a second loophole has allowed airlines to deny customers compensation for flight cancellations or three-hour-plus delays if they were required for safety purposes as stipulated in the Canada Transportation Act.

The revised section of that law makes no mention of the safety out, paving the way for the regulator to align its rules with those of the European Union, De Bellefeuille said. The EU distinguishes only between flight disruptions that are within the airlines control caused by mechanical issues, for example and those outside its control, such as weather-related delays. In general, only the latter reason relieves a carrier of compensation obligations.

Not all observers found the would-be law so uplifting.

The legislation fails to ensure transparency for the complaints process and leaves too much discretion in the hands of the regulator, particularly when it comes to compensation for flight disruptions, said Gabor Lukacs, president of advocacy group Air Passenger Rights.

Lukacs pointed to one amendment that states the complaints process shall be kept confidential, unless the complainant and the carrier otherwise agree.

Now, airlines are not going to agree to make things public, he said.

Theyre trying to create more smoke and mirrors, he said.

Lukacs also highlighted language stating that compliance officers shall deal with complaints in the manner that they consider appropriate, and argued that stricter guidelines should be imposed on the regulators.

Moreover, he said there is nothing to ensure that the safety loophole around flight disruptions will be closed.

The National Airlines Council of Canada, an industry group representing four of the countrys biggest carriers, said the government should focus on other priorities such as airport upgrades and warned that the cost of tougher passenger protections could trickle down to travellers.

Transport Minister Omar Alghabra first pledged in January to strengthen the four-year-old passenger rights charter with legislation.

He also pledged an additional $75.9 million over three years to reduce a complaint backlog that has ballooned to nearly 45,000, more than triple the tally from a year ago.

The new amendments overlapped with some of the measures in a private members bill put forward last month by NDP transport critic Taylor Bachrach. But the legislation did not go so far as to adopt automatic compensation for travellers whose flights are delayed or cancelled.

Bachrach had called for higher penalties and more rigorous enforcement.

The fines in the legislation as it currently stands are insufficient to act as a deterrent. As long as the cost of following the rules is higher than the cost of breaking them, were going to see airlines operate outside the rules as a course of normal business, he said in a March 17 phone interview.

Agency chair France Pegeot told the transport committee in January that clearer, stronger rules would lead to better enforcement.

But she qualified that the agencys role as a quasi-judicial tribunal handling complaints is priority No. 1, while its mandate to penalize violations comes second.

The first thing we do is that we really focus, first of all, on complaints, because this is what puts money in the pockets of consumers, Pegeot told the committee on Jan. 12.

Christopher Reynolds, The Canadian Press

Like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.

Air passengersJustin TrudeauLiberals

Go here to see the original:
Liberals table legislation to overhaul passenger rights charter ... - Terrace Standard

Susan Holt is leader of the New Brunswick Liberal Party. Image: Submitted

The Liberals swept three provincial byelections in New Brunswick on Monday allowing the provincial party leader to finally take a seat in the legislature.

Susan Holt, who was chosen leader of the Liberals last summer, took her riding of Bathurst East-Nepisiguit-Saint-Isidore with 2343 votes compared to her nearest rival Serge Brideau (Green Party) who captured 1411 votes, while Alex White (NDP) garnered 227 votes.

The Progressive Conservatives decided not to run a candidate to allow the opposition leader to win a seat in a riding formerly held by longtime Liberal MLA Denis Landry.

Voter turnout was barely 35 percent.

In the Dieppe riding, Liberal candidate and political newcomer Richard Losier easily won with 2424 votes over rivals Chantal Landry (Green Party) with 651 votes, Dean Lonard (Progressive Conservative) had 298 votes and Cyprien Okana (NDP) had 96 votes.

Liberal MLA Roger Melanson vacated the seat last fall for a job in the private sector.

Voter turnout was even lower in Dieppe at 31.4 percent.

In the riding of Restigouche-Chaleur, Liberal candidate Marco LeBlanc won with 2462 votes, Rachel Boudreau (Green Party) came second with 1541 votes, Anne Bard-Lavigne (Progressive Conservative) had 771 votes and Alex Gagne (NDP) had 95 votes.

Liberal MLA Daniel Guitard previously held the seat.

Voter turnout was about 43 percent which was the highest among the three byelections.

The Liberals now have 16 seats in the provincial legislature, compared to 30 seats for the Progressive Conservatives and three seats for the Greens.

Follow this link:
Liberals capture three N.B. byelections - 91.9 The Bend

Within the past year, YouGov has explored the industries that Americans have positive and negative views of, as well as the industries Americans think should be more and less regulated. In both instances, we've found that political identity plays a large role in shaping Americans' views on various sectors of the U.S. economy, with Democrats and Republicans holding vastly different opinions on industries such as mining, higher education, and news media.

In our latest poll of 1,000 U.S. adult citizens about economic sectors, we look at how Americans perceive the political ideology of workers within American industries. We asked whether people in the U.S. employed in 30 sectors are very or somewhat liberal, very or somewhat conservative, or equally conservative and liberal. The results show that workers in certain sectors such as cannabis and entertainment are viewed by most Americans as predominantly liberal, while workers in other sectors such as firearms, oil, and gas are more likely to be viewed as conservative.

The five sectors from the list of 30 whose workers Americans are most likely to say are "mostly liberal" or "more liberal than conservative":

The five sectors from the list of 30 whose workers Americans are most likely to say are "mostly conservative" or "more conservative than liberal":

We also find that a person's own ideology shapes their views on the ideology of workers in various industries, with Americans generally being more likely to say a sector's workers belong to the ideology opposite to their own. For example, Americans who identify as conservatives are more likely than liberals to describe sectors as either "mostly liberal" or "more liberal than conservative," with the largest gaps in perceptions existing for news media and government.

Americans who describe themselves as liberal, on the other hand, are more likely than conservatives to say workers in certain sectors are "mostly conservative" or "more conservative than liberal." This is especially true for banking and finance, as well as health insurance and pharmaceuticals.

Despite some large differences on the magnitude of their estimates, liberals and conservatives generally agree on their ranking of sectors by the political ideology of workers.

Related:

Carl Bialik and Linley Sanders contributed to this article

See the results for this YouGov poll

Methodology: This poll was conducted online on March 21 - 23, 2023 among 1,000 U.S. adult citizens. Each respondent was asked about a randomly selected sample of 20 of the 30 sectors. Respondents were selected from YouGovs opt-in panel using sample matching. A random sample (stratified by gender, age, race, education, geographic region, and voter registration) was selected from the 2019 American Community Survey. The sample was weighted according to gender, age, race, education, 2020 election turnout and presidential vote, baseline party identification, and current voter registration status. Demographic weighting targets come from the 2019 American Community Survey. Baseline party identification is the respondents most recent answer given prior to March 15, 2022, and is weighted to the estimated distribution at that time (33% Democratic, 28% Republican). The margin of error for the overall sample is approximately 4%.

Image: Adobe Stock (diter)

Go here to read the rest:
Which sectors of the economy do Americans think are liberal and ... - YouGov US