jabrd

Universities are already dying. It wouldn’t surprise me to see the humanities fully gutted (halfway there!) and a full switch towards a STEM focus as a means of outsourcing the technical jobs training needed to work these production jobs. Just imagine the new engineering building of your university sponsored by Raytheon. Feels like it’s just around the corner

Great point. The bourgeoisie simply pocketing the cash and refusing to actually produce anything is a major issue for the US’s ability to actually accomplish anything. They would need to bring their capitalist class to heel lest they collapse under the weight of their own contradictions, though I’m of the mind that historically empires rarely just collapse suddenly and instead erode over the course of centuries.

Imo the US is primed for a bonapartist figure and the instatement of a new social compact as we deal with the death of neoliberalism and a new profit crisis. Though I don’t agree with all their conclusions, I think Brenner & Riley are pulling at the edges of something real in their piece I cited, specifically the idea of state dictated capitalism or political capitalism as they call it. I think the mode of state capitalism outlined by China and to a lesser extent Russia wherein a state apparatus utilizes the capitalist class as a patronage network to produce the commodities necessary for state projects could become the dominant economic model of the coming century (tho of course everyone will have their own versions. Europe had social democracy when we had fordism and China will have socialism with Chinese characteristics while we get the megacorp imperium). America’s tendency towards monopoly capital makes me think we might just see a fusion between the private and public sectors where the regulatory administrative state is overtaken by private firms operating on a pRiVaTe-PuBlIc PaRtNeRsHiP basis.

Historically wars have been a great place to build new social compacts from and from which bonapartist figures can emerge out of. Maybe the current regional conflict in the mid east expands and the US gets smoked by a Houthi/Hezbollah/Iran coalition and we have our own Russo-Japanese war that inspires a retooling of the American economy and plenty of “stabbed in the back” narratives about the ruling elite that failed us. Or maybe we instead experience a political defeat as China’s efforts to link Iran and Saudi Arabia sees the US’s influence pushed out of the region. MBS has already made indications of a desire to go his own way more separate from US hegemony rather than remaining a junior partner. I’m this instance again I could see the US turning its sights south to secure access to oil reserves there if our relationship with the Saudis becomes fraught. A situation like Venezuela-Essequibo could provide the justification to put troops into SA. Either way I think the American brain pan has a unique craving for global violence. We saw that the number one thing that’s tanked Biden’s approval was his withdrawal from Afghanistan and both parties seem intent on jumping in feet first to any conflict that presents itself. The only disagreement is about which wars to be fighting

You don’t need full revolution to bring the capitalist class to heel. There are plenty of corporatist strategies that could reset and refocus the economy without fully transforming it. America is significantly more likely to solve this crisis by finding a fash solution than anything else imo

We’re not talking about the full scale reindustrialization of the imperial core, just the restarting of the war machine specifically. Germany and the US currently rank in as the 4th and 5th largest manufacturing economies respectively (China, India, Japan are 1-3). Just because less profitable industries got shipped overseas and factories that used to employ hundreds now just need 50 dudes and a ton of automation doesn’t mean the imperial powers lack heavy production abilities. Additionally factors of profitability concerns are moot in instances of direct government funding like defense contracting (tho inflation risks being an issue, Russia is currently undergoing a minor inflation crisis due to their commitment to military production tho this is minor compared to the economic benefits from the overall economic growth). The only thing lacking is a political will to commit to a war economy in the core.

Dark thought but I see a return to the US abusing Latin and South America in the face of a shrinking empire as the justification to revamp the imperial death machine. The current crop of GOP primary candidates has already openly discussed invading Mexico. A wounded US empire forced to withdrawal from the fringes may concentrate its violence more heavily within its own sphere of influence to secure what territory it can still control

There’s been a lot of talk about the production capacity gap between Russia and NATO as it relates to artillery rounds specifically. Russia has retooled its economy and invested heavily in wartime production and is currently seeing it pay dividends both on the battlefield but also in the overall health of their economy. Meanwhile the NATO nations have refused to make the investment in restarting mass production of rounds, a capability liquidated and sold off under the guiding principles of neoliberalism, and instead has solely relied on draining existing stockpiles bits at a time. The result has been catastrophic for the Ukrainians tasked with dying on NATO’s behalf ever since the initial blitz push from the RusFed was repelled and the war has settled into a WWI style trench and artillery game of attrition.

I think though that we shouldn’t confuse an unwillingness with an inability. There’s no reason to believe that the US or Germany are incapable of making the investment to restart the mass production of artillery shells (or any mass produced weapon of war rather than the big ticket, hyper specialized war toys they prefer now). There’s an entire point to be made that in this moment of profitability crisis the only industries that are succeeding are the ones hand chosen by the state to be made so with direct subsidies and funding (re: Brenner & Riley’s Seven Theses in which they attempt to coin “political capitalism” as the new economic model post-neoliberalism). The general consensus seems to be that there’s so far been an unwillingness to commit to the production process because it’s been thought that the Russo-Ukrainian war will end before the investment will be worthwhile and then the general style of combat will return to anti-insurgency missions relying on drones and laser guided munitions rather than mass produced dumb bombs and shells. My fear is that if this calculation changes and there is heavy investment in restarting the NATO war machine it puts us on the path towards another world war. The European nations may see the success of the Russian economy under wartime policies and see the return of a military Keynesianism as an appealing out to their financial woes but, as we know from the start of the previous century, you can only build up your stock of weapons for so long before the imperative to use them arises. I’m worried that the long duree trends of the 21st century see the return of both multipolarity as well as great powers conflicts, but this time we have nukes. Guess there’s nothing to really do about it tho but enjoy the view

To be fair we’re not talking about the dim mak here. The risk is unintentional long term damage to the knee which, as a guy who’s blown multiple knee ligaments, fucking sucks. I agree though for moves that are intentionally dangerous ie controlled motions. Rotational leg locks being banned in IBJJF rules is crazy to me, especially since they currently dominate the no gi meta

A cool thing about coming into multidisciplinary martial arts later is discovering cross over between the styles on the same move. The different names for it, slight stylistic differences on when and how to implement it, and the general perception of the move. All that kind of stuff. Well anyway today I discovered I’m a master of “the most dangerous throw in judo,” the tani otoshi or as we call it in wrestling “kind of a heel stomp sit back or whatever.” Like just a basic mat return I favored because I never felt strong enough to consistently hit the lift on a forward mat return so I’d fake forward then sit to their hip and step on their far side heel to trip them backwards. Allegedly this is a very dangerous movement that threatens to destroy your opponents near side knee if they go down incorrectly and is banned in many top BJJ gyms, but I used it my entire wrestling career without injuring anyone so idk 🤷‍♂️

The more I roll with jiu jitsu guys the more I get why wrestling is the “violent art” counterpart to jiu jitsu’s “gentle art.” Someone asked me why I do a specific move when wrestling since it doesn’t move me closer to a takedown or to pin and I dumbfoundedly just responded “because it hurts him” not understanding that that wasn’t a clear goal in and of itself

There is not nearly as much gay sex on this chart as I would've guessed. Just the one bi girl hookup in the second from the right tree at the top. Actually is that a threesome or do you think they just all screwed at different points in time?

Damn that's true. If I'm calling someone deeply unserious understand it's with the most amount of venom my body can produce

The inevitable conclusion of libs using "but those brown people would kill you for being queer" to justify continuing to bomb the brown people. Thank you liberals for continuously using minority groups as your scape goat to do whatever evil thing you were already doing and getting them more vilified in the process. You are super cool and we are all grateful to get to watch you lose elections on our behalf

TV Show idea: Say Yes to the Trust and it’s a reality show that follows a series of rich kids trying to “go their own way” and finding out quickly that working even a good paying 9 to 5 is significantly shittier than just dealing with their awful parents

Trump consistently able to outmaneuver the Dems from the left because they’re tied to the institutions of liberalism like cement blocks around their feet and they’re sinking fast