Thank you for sharing this educational video. I want to read Mr Ari Berman’s book.

I’m not sure the US being an oligarchy is the freshest take ever but definitely true from the start

Unhealthy societies are what happens, over time, when political sociopaths are afforded adult authority in a society. A political sociopath is someone who is willing to do harm to another for the sake of opportunity, social capital, hierarchy, profit and/or pleasure. Political sociopathy is a class of behavioral choices, not a diagnosis. People with a diagnosis needs treatment, which may mean some degree of sequestration from mainstream society is required. Yet, once it is determined that there are no physiological impairments to empathy generation other than choice, the responsibility is theirs within that circumstance, and that choice belongs to that individual. Hierarchy is a privilege creating structure that is sociopathic in its inception. Economic hierarchy being the most destructive to the society. Economic hierarchy exacerbates the distortion and misapplication of meritocracy. Hierarchy interjects competition into contexts where only provisioning is required. It detracts from the goals of healthy society creation with competitive conflicts of interest such as click formation, withholding knowledge and resources from the provisioning processes, and with the general distractions of conflict. It limits the flow of ideas that are being sifted through to find the widest value to the largest percentage of the population. Why? Because scarcity elevates perceived and sometimes actual value. This is particularly true for technical information and policy creation factors, generating erroneous gatekeeping behaviors. The rhetoric to tax the rich is not countered by the rich on its economic principles because it serves the rich in its distraction from how the rich embezzles from the public purse. Societies form to allow specialization such that provisioning can be done more efficiently and in greater volumes for all of its members. Healthy and holistic citizens advocate nurturing policies and will not begrudge resource usage with best practices procedures to see the nurturing done. The assumptions are based on the idea that whatever provisions are produced will be applied to the meeting of basic needs equitably. They are also based on the idea that everyone will have more time to focus on quality of life enhancements, equitably. But, most of all, although often unspoken, it is founded on the idea that the members who do not proclaim themselves political sociopaths with their actions deserve optimal autonomy and not just to simply survive. Individualism's self interest as a social ideology is born of political sociopathy affecting the efforts of society creation. The question then becomes; How do we limit political sociopathy? Why is this important? Because we know from history the sociopaths will band together and raid our productive achievements. We must defend ourselves from this either proactively or after the fact and we see how doing so after the fact is working out, so maybe we need to try something not yet attempted. We may want start by adopting a zero tolerance for political sociopathy in policy creation. All governance will descend into oligarchy, plutocracy and fascism at rates that are determined by the quality and stability of its consensus seeking strategies, the tolerance of bad faith actors in its processes, its best practices policies and the documentation of data that goes into the making of its policy choices. They cannot be compared outside that framework in regard to speed of that descent. Consensus seeking strategies are what create the possibility of a society. Anything less creates a war zone. As such these are the foundational topics of establishing a healthy society.

The trilateral commission and the problem of democracy :)

Dr cornell west! :)

Michael klarman and his writing on the constitution as a coup against democracy :)

I can remember when Mother Jones was a genuine leftist periodical, before being co-opted; distant memory.

The negative rap viz reconstruction is so apt. …… pointing out whitewashing…… nothing was expanded nor overthrown…… all y’all are left with is Clarence Thomas and his missus. Miss Jenny