Mediaboss Marketing

Joseph Biden ran for president as an environmental candidate, pledging to address global warming. On day one as president, he blocked all new gas and oil leases on federal lands and water, stopped the Keystone XL pipeline, and took the United States back into the Paris Climate Agreement. Now he is proposing a 2022 budget with $36 billion ($14 billion more than last year) for clean energy, improved water infrastructure, and more research. He also proposes to spend $174 million to develop electric vehicle infrastructurethough the Republican Party wants only a small fraction of that.

Environmental groups like the League of Conservation Voters, the Sierra Club, Environmental Defense Fund, and Sunrise, spent some $1.5 million in the 2020 elections mostly for Biden and other Democrats. Yet, in the last few months the Biden administration has given the go-ahead to various projects either on federal land or necessitating federal approval: the Willow project, a large oil drilling project on Alaskas North Slope, oil and leases in Wyoming, and the continued use of the Dakota Access pipeline. All of these projects were approved by Donald Trumps administration and fiercely opposed by environmental organizations. As Gregory Stewart, a leader of the Alaska chapter of the Sierra Club, said of the Alaska project, They are opening up a lane for the oil and gas industry to cause irreparable harm to Arctic communities public health and wildlife habitats.

Since the COVID pandemic, the environmental movementunlike the racial justice movements spectacular demonstrationshas not been very visible. While local environmental protests continue, there is no large, active national movement. Environmental activists have focused on support for the Green New Deal legislation sponsored by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Ed Markey.

Were going to transition to a 100 percent carbon free-economy, that is more unionized, more just, more dignified and guarantees more health care and housing than we ever have before, Ocasio-Cortez says. Do we intend on sending a message to the Biden administration that we need to go bigger and bolder? The answer is absolutely yes. The Democratic Socialists of America says of the Green New Deal proposals, they are conversation startersnot complete and adequate blueprints. While the GND calls for a transition to a more sustainable economy and a more just society, it does not take on the oil and gas companies directly.

The more radical wing of the U.S. environmental movement challenges the culture of growth and argues that carbon emissions can only be reduced by virtually stopping oil drilling and coal mining and closing down and drastically retrenching the industries that drive them: steel, auto, and plastics, among others. To do that, one would have to nationalize the energy industries and bring them under the control of a genuinely democratic government. That is, one needs to fight for socialism as the solution to the climate crisis. As the group System Change not Climate changes states, The current ecological crisis results from the capitalist system, which values profits for a global ruling elite over people and the planet. It must therefore be confronted through an international mass movement of working people around the world.

2 June 2021

Source: New Politics.

Go here to see the original:
Biden, the Oil Companies, and the Environment - International Viewpoint

Much of the time that we think we are talking about issues, we are actually talking about words. One side will argue against one definition of aword, while the other side argues in favor of adifferent definition of aword. Each side can claim that the other is not addressing the issue, because the issue is defined differently on each side. In this way, political debate can carry on unimpeded by any barriers of mutually agreed upon terms, like separate superhighways rushing on at full speed in opposite directions. This characterizes alarge amount of political discourse in this country: Torrents of people talking about different things, all of whom assume that they are talking about the samethings.

There is much hand-wringing today over the idea that misinformation and conspiracy theories and omnipresent propaganda have created asituation in which Americans dont seem to have asingle set of mutually agreed upon facts. That is true. But it does not capture an even more elementary flaw in what we are doing. We allow entire issues to be created and to be talked about endlessly in the national political media without ever determining what those issues mean.

The absurd effect of this failure is twofold. First, it allows bad faith political actors to purposely exploit this rhetorical vulnerability in order to smear the other side by inflating the definition of bad things to include whatever the other side is doing. This is standard issue political scumbag behavior, and is to be expected. Worse, though, it creates aself-reinforcing cycle in which widespread use of some vague, ill-defined term convinces the public that this term is something important, driving media coverage and creating impenetrable towers of meaninglessness that come to dominate our partisan politicallandscape.

If you can push abullshit issue into everybody knows territory, you can get away with never having to define it at all. What does it mean? Stupid question. Everybody knows this is anissue.

What does cancel culture mean? Does it mean Being fired from your job for being racist or sexist? Does it mean Being criticized in public for saying racist or sexist things? Does it mean Things that used to be seen as okay for white people to say now are seen as not okay and Iam upset about that because Ilike to say those things? It is easy to see how at one end of the spectrum of definitions, cancel culture is an extremely narrow, niche problem without any major impact on the general publicand at the other extreme, it is apernicious force that might come for anyone. If Iwere making an honest attempt to offer the definition of this term as it is most often used, it would be: People suffering consequences for things they said, with an overwhelming emphasis on the most goofy or misguided examples that we can find. By this definition, cancel culture is just arebranding of the ordinary human foibles that accompany the slowly evolving standards of society. Engaging in any debate at all about cancel culture without ameticulous definition of terms is to fall into atrap before you have evenbegun.

What does woke mean? Does it mean Aware of racism and sexism and other forms of discrimination and committed to working to eradicate them? Does it mean Khmer Rouge-style fanatics coming to seize and indoctrinate your white babies into their vicious cult? Its genuine operational definition is probably something like Anything that makes white people feel guilty. It is aterm that means nothing, and it is aterm that can instantly serve as aslur to discredit anythingan empty bucket into which people can dump every uncomfortable thing in order to invalidate it. The fact that major media figures allow debates about wokeness to happen with astraight face, and without awritten definition, is ridiculous. It is aperfect political black hole, amagic wand that can tarnish whatever anyone dislikes and be said not to apply to anything that they like. It means everything, which means that it meansnothing.

This same dynamic applies to terms that may have once had alegitimate definition, but which become definition-less by the time they have been elevated into the popular mind, laden with propaganda. Do any of the politicians or commentators decrying critical race theory have aprecise working definition for this academic term? Of course not. It now means Anything that talks about white peoplesracism.

And what does socialism mean, exactly? Apolitical scientist (or, you know, an In These Times reader) could tell you the textbook definition, but that does not matter one bit in the context of the terms actual use in America. Here, socialism is used as shorthand to mean anything and everything from a more democratic and egalitarian alternative economic system to capitalism to Social Security and Medicaid to Kim Jong Un executing his own top officials with anti-aircraft guns. To stand up and argue Hey, many broadly popular government programs could be considered socialist is to miss the point that the other side is not and will never be arguing against anything that is broadly popular; they will always redraw the definition of socialism at will to suit their purpose of making itunpopular.

To attempt to have any kind of good faith debate on any of these topics is the political equivalent of trying to hold back an ocean wave with your hands. Its just going to go around you. We cant expect politicians to stop creating these sorts of terms. After all, undefined words that serve to make the other side look bad and can never be pinned down enough to make your side look like hypocrites are the pinnacle of real world political speech. What we can expect, though, is for the media not to get sucked into this stupid and meaningless game, to serve as amechanism that reinforces the idea that unreal things are real. None of these pseudo-issues should be written about in respectable publications or spoken about on the airwaves until they have been subjected to arelentless and scrupulous defining of what they do and do not mean. Idont care if the attempt to define woke in ameaningful way takes the entire length of acable news segment, leaving no time for the ensuing talking points. The fact that coming to arealistic, mutually agreed upon definition sounds so daunting and time consuming is asign that the underlying issue does not, necessarily,exist.

Meanwhile, things like poverty and inequality and death and disease and climate change and war can all be easily quantified, defined and debated in ameaningful way. When someone instead spends all their time talking about things that seem undefinable, it is probably because they find reality to be an uncomfortabletopic.

Read the original here:
Words That Mean Nothing - In These Times

Spencer Platt / Getty Images May Day March Takes Place In New York City

Watch the CBSN Originals documentary, "Speaking Frankly | Socialism," in the video player above.

Socialism: It's a buzzword in the 2020 election season, having sprung up dozens of times during campaign, particularly during the Republication National Convention. Conservative leaders depict the idea as a democracy-killing bogeyman. Some Democrats including Senator Bernie Sanders and Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rashida Tlaib have embraced the label with gusto.

CBSN Originals presents "Speaking Frankly | Socialism"

Click to expand

UP NEXT

The political philosophy has history going back centuries. Directly or otherwise, it has influenced government policies around the world, including in America.

But what exactly does socialism mean? What do socialists want right now? And is the Republican warning that socialism is threatening to destroy the American way of life a real concern? There are some facts about socialism that are beyond dispute.

At its simplest, socialism calls for a nation's citizens to control at least some of its means of production the major ingredients needed for a healthy economy. Think infrastructure, energy, natural resources. Under socialism, any surplus or profit from those sectors must benefit those same citizens. Capitalism, meanwhile, calls for private owners to control the means of production and to keep any profit they make for themselves.

Many Americans see these two systems as opposites and Republicans, in particular, tend to view it as an either-or situation. In a recent Pew Research Centersurvey, the majority of Republicans (68%) expressed a positive view of capitalism and a negative view of socialism.

But a substantial minority of voters hold a positive view of both systems 25% of the overall group of Americans surveyed by Pew felt favorably about socialism as well as capitalism.

The fact is, the two systems can, and do, coexist in many countries. Some governments blend socialist policies with capitalism and democratically elected leadership, a system usually called social democracy.

No socialists are running for president on a major-party ticket in 2020. Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, the Democratic Party's nominees for president and vice president, are not socialists. They are not members of the current socialist party, called Socialist Party USA, or of the nation's biggest socialist organization, the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), which has about 70,000 members nationwide.

Asked what he'd say to people who were worried about socialism, Biden told Wisconsin stationWLUK-TV: "I beat the socialists. That's how I got elected. That's how I got the nomination. Do I look like a socialist? Look at my career, my whole career. I am not a socialist."

Overall, socialism accounts for a small percentage of America's political makeup. Socialist Party USA had no members in any national or state office in 2020. Only about half a dozen DSA members have held federal office over the years, all in the U.S. House of Representatives, including the current Congresswomen Ocasio-Cortez and Tlaib. Senator Sanders calls himself a democratic socialist and has been supported by the DSA, but he is not a known member and does not run under the Socialist Party.

Republicans have frequently used the terms "socialism" and "socialist" as a threat or insult when referring to progressive candidates who are not actually socialists.

There have always been different types of socialists not to mention wildly varying ideas of what the "means of production" are, what role government should have, and where free enterprise might still fit in. Some socialists see "means of production" as all major industries, such as finance or energy.

For Jabari Brisport, a New York teacher and state senate candidate, "What [socialism] means is that energy, housing, health care, education, finance, and transportation ... shall be controlled publicly and not run by, for profit motive."

Other socialists have pushed for a total ban on private enterprise. Karl Marx, the Prussian intellectual who championed socialism in the 19th century, predicted that capitalism was doomed to fail, and a government-controlled economy would rise. Vladimir Lenin, whose Bolshevik revolution gave rise to the Soviet Union's communist regime, preferred armed struggle to help push capitalism into history's trash bin.

Today, the most prominent of America's socialists are very different from the Marxists of the past. They largely push for progressive reforms within capitalism a philosophy generally defined as social democracy.

The Democratic Socialists of America aims to blend socialism-inspired reforms with America's current free-enterprise system. The DSA does not believe private enterprise should be immediately overthrown in favor of a government-run economy. Instead, Ocasio-Cortez, for example, has pushed for a "revolution of working people at the ballot box" new laws and stronger unions to make private businesses more accountable to what DSA members see as public interests.

Bernie Sanders, meanwhile, has advocated for universal free health care, canceling all student debt, and expanding Social Security benefits within America's free-market economy.

The Republican Party has made socialism or more specifically, warnings about socialism a part of its 2020 campaign messaging. During the Republican National Convention in August, one of the speakers, Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, cast socialism as antithetical to the American Dream.

"If we let them, [Democrats] will turn our country into a socialist utopia, and history has taught us that path only leads to pain and misery, especially for hard-working people hoping to rise," Scott said.

During his nomination acceptance speech, Mr. Trump echoed that warning, calling Joe Biden a "Trojan horse for socialism."

Some of Biden's policy proposals do call for big spending; he has proposed a$2 trillion clean energy plan. But Biden has also rejected ideas that are darlings of the DSA, such as the Green New Deal. (President Trump, for his part, has also pushed for mega-spending on areas that could be seen as means of production including a $12 billionaid package for farmers.)

Opponents of socialism often point to Venezuela as a cautionary tale. Once ranked as the richest South American country thanks to its oil reserves, in 1998 Venezuela elected a socialist leader, Hugo Chvez. Chvez centralized power in his increasingly authoritarian grip and spent billions on social programs from profits on oil. Under Chvez's successor, Nicols Maduro, global oil prices plummeted and Venezuela's petroleum-dependent economy collapsed.

"It's just empty, empty shelves, all over," says Venezuela-born Maria Fernanda Bello, a coalition director for Young Americans Against Socialism. "Socialists are always going to promise you free tuition, free health care, free everything, but they will never promise you freedom."

But American socialists like Bernie Sanders reject the comparison.

"Let me be very clear: Anybody who does what Maduro does is a vicious tyrant," Sanders said at a 2019 Democratic primary debate. "To equate what goes on in Venezuela to what I believe is extremely unfair."

Some of America's most popular policies have been linked with socialism since their inception, whether the label was earned or not. When Social Security was first proposed by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the midst of the Great Depression, a suspicious senator asked the secretary of labor whether it counted as socialism. When told it did not, the senator responded, "Isn't this a teeny-weeny bit of socialism?"

American entrepreneurs have also taken advantage of programs that could be interpreted as socialism-lite.

Donald Trump's father, Fred, got his start building Depression-era homes for New York families with the help of the Federal Housing Administration. The FHA insures home mortgages made by private lenders essentially bringing some control over America's finances under the power of its people, via the federal government. Later, Fred Trump turned to the FHA again, building agency-backed housing for military families. Donald Trump later inherited his father's fortune, built in part by these projects.

See the article here:
What is socialism? And what do socialists really want in 2020?

By what standard do we evaluate a social system? Do we accept a system based on its theoretical structure, its promised outcome, a majority vote or is it by some other means that a system should be judged?

Concerning the system of socialism, most of its proponents seem to be taken in by its theory, not its merit. This is no insult to the socialists intelligence many of the brightest minds fall under its spell. Its a matter of perspective. The socialist tends toward rationalism. I say rationalism in the philosophical sense, meaning the socialist places higher trust in reason than in experience. On paper, this is only logical, but in practice, not all rational arguments unfold with such precision.

On the other hand, the capitalist tends toward empiricism, observing the system and formulating a judgment based on its applied effects. It is no secret that mankinds standard of living and political freedom have rapidly accelerated after the birth of capitalism. Its also no secret that the more society advances socialist doctrines, the more impoverished and enslaved they become.

This is not to say that free markets dont have their own shortcomings nor should it be said that the intentions of socialism are valueless. It isnt perfection that the capitalist seeks, rather effectiveness. It isnt that the capitalist is opposed to social justice, equality and economic freedom, rather that the methods by which the socialist proposes to achieve these ends have proven destructive.

Common ground between these two opposing camps may very well be found in empiricism. To bring about stronger cohesion and a unified political direction, socialists dont have to abandon their goals, only their methods.

Tanner Cook lives in Fargo.

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Forum's editorial board nor Forum ownership.

Follow this link:
Letter: The common ground between socialism and capitalism - INFORUM

Regarding Lance Morrows Can Freedom Survive the Narratives? (op-ed, May 17): Mr. Morrow worries that the corrosive narratives pedaled by the left may lead us into a sinister autocracy. He views race as a pretext for moving toward a post-capitalism era in which individual liberties are sacrificed for a common good. Marxists dreamed of Americas collectivist transformation, but class warfare couldn't overcome institutional obstacles and general prosperity. However, race-related unfairness and inequality can serve as a backdoor to a similar outcome.

Systemic racism is, in effect, a Trojan horse for rooting out what remains of Americas systemic conservatism. Individual responsibility, traditional values and Judeo-Christian faith are impediments to a communal, progressive utopia. In a classic and brilliant bait and switch, the lefts rooting out of racism yanks open the door to statism (i.e., a much more powerful and active federal government) that can remove conservative barriers to progress and force collectivism for a greater good. Legacy media and social media are exposing and canceling conservative heretics who are deemed racists, science deniers and liars.

When Alexis de Tocqueville visited America in 1831, he marveled at its success and potential but warned that its great vulnerability was the surrender of freedom without a struggle. If despotism surfaced in a democracy, Tocqueville thought it would be so pervasive as to entirely relieve citizens of the trouble of thinking and all the cares of living. Our systemic-racism exorcism in which systemic conservatism is the real target paves the way for statism. Leftist elites then can take care of us and relieve us of having to think, as long as we surrender some of our freedom. Mr. Morrow is channeling Tocqueville.

Ryan Graham

Melbourne, Fla.

See the original post:
Narrative May Work Where Socialism Failed - The Wall Street Journal