Critics complain about the ability of certain central banks to create money out of thin air and lending it with the effects of compound interest, leading to inflation.

Inflation devaluates the savings of those who earned that money, so the capital owner has following choices:

1. Invest that money in shares or real estates
2. Spend the money on other stuff
3. Wait and watch how money is devalued over the years
4. Try to escape this system with crypto currency

Some say that inflation/deflation regulated by politics could boost/stabilize the economy because with inflation, for instance, it would force people to actually spend money instead of saving it in the bank for eternity.

Others say that the effect of compound interest and the ability to create money out of nothing is the biggest theft by oligarchs in the history of humanity.

What is your opinion of our current banking system (pros and cons)? How would the sole usage of crypto currency affect the economy? Could crypto ever be an alternative beyond being an object of speculation on the stock exchange?

If you were to secede from a tyrannical empire today (but of course there are no modern empires hehehe) what would be said in your Declaration of Independence? What would be the founding principles of your new society? What ideas and ideals would you emphasize?

I'm aware that flairs should be able to answer a large part of this but then again individuals are different and I'm not as acquainted with all the flairs I've encountered as I'd like to be. (Plus I think this would be fun).

​

Reportedly, other than inflation, this is the issue that is killing Biden. However, I have not seen evidence to suggest either

1. There has been some massive surge in illegal immigration under the Biden term. If we look at US population trends the growth rate has not increased. The common statistic pointed out is the increase in reported border encounters, but why is this indicative of some surge rather than not making more arrests?
2. Any of Biden's policies that would have actually contributed to a surge in immigration. Speaking as a progressive, I don't see how Biden is particularly different from Trump in border policy, when he's kept much of the Trumpian era policies. The only difference is that he doesn't use the racist rhetoric and he repealed a few policies such as Remain in Mexico and Title 42. But if you want to attribute the border situation on the repeal of these policies, these policies weren't in effect in Republican administrations before Trump either, so does that mean George W Bush was an "open borders" supporter too?

(Edit: that final line was a typo, I forgot to proofread. That statement is incorrect; the Nazi regime was a fascist dictatorship, and opposed socialism).

The National Socialist German Workers Party was formed in February 20, 1920. For the next 25 years, their leader, Adolf Hitler, terrorized Europe in order to bring about the death of all Jewish diaspora across the continent and, if he succeeded, the world. While the party’s name contains “socialist,” it is important to observe the party’s affiliation. Socialism is a political movement that seeks out workers owning their own means of production. The Nazis did not abolish private ownership and business. However, the regime pursued a policy of state control and regulation of the economy. While the government exerted significant influence over the economy through measures such as the Four-Year Plan and the appointment of Nazi officials to key positions in industry, true socialism entails the abolition of private ownership and the establishment of a centrally planned economy. Furthermore, the Nazis brand of “socialism” was rooted in racial and nationalism superiority. The party's emphasis on the supremacy of the Aryan race and its persecution of minority groups, particularly Jews, contradicted the inclusive and egalitarian principles of socialism. Moreover, the party persecuted leftist parties and trade unions. To conclude, the National Social German Workers Party wasn’t a true socialist party.

Talk about anything and everything. Book clubs, TV, current events, sports, personal lives, study groups, etc.

Our rules are still enforced, remain civilized.

Also; I'm once again asking you to report any uncivilized behavior. Help us mods keep the subs standard of discourse high and don't let anything slip between the cracks.

We'd like to be an expansive, diverse, educational reading list comprised of every frame of thought that may appear on the sub. One of our major goals of the sub is political education and we think that providing a list of political theory/science from all spectrums of the political compass for our members to easily find would be beneficial to our community.

Do you guys have any suggestions?

One of my posts got deleted in a subreddit.

I wrote:

"Democracy and the state are not compatible with each other."

I think this must have caused a stroke in the moderator's head 😅

Why is it so difficult for some leftist people to comprehend this statement? If what I mean isn't obvious to you, I'll explain:

Democracy actually was created first as a thought out system in ancient greece. At that time it meant maximum partizipation of all people in decision making in all aspects of political life. (I know slaves, women and foreigners didn’t partizipate, but they weren't considered people in a sense)

I define democracy as this: Maximum partizipation of all people in decision making in all aspects of life. Today of course actually everyone.

This too was the view of democracy that all intellectuals that wrote about democracy had. James Harrington, Montesquie, Sivies, James Madison and so on, all had this view of democracy (I would call it a pre-modern meaning of democracy)

So. These people also created our modern system of democracy. This is often called "representative demoracy" today. BUT they actually didn’t think democracy and representation were compatible. They hated democracy because they feared that if you had a really working democracy then people would expropriate the rich. So what did they create? They created a representative system, but they considered representative systems as oligarchy and NOT as democratic systems.

That today we have this strange view that representative demoracy is democracy is part of a lie that was hammered in our heads for decades. Also: How can it be democracy if there exists a monopoly of violence that the state has? It's just ridiculous to think the existence of a state is consistent with democracy 🤦 For democracy to become reality we not only need to abolish capitalism (which is monarchy in the economic sphere), but also the state.

Here's a link to the bill:

Medicare For All Act Of 2023

​

Let me give a overview of what this bill does and why it's so important.

Medicare For All expands on the framework of Medicare to include all residents of the US not just seniors. It sounds like an expensive thing to do, and it's not necessarily cheap. But compared to what we are already paying under private healthcare insurance plans, it's absolutely clear that this plan is the superior.

First, it cuts out the middleman private insurance agencies. Regardless of your view on private businesses it's commonly accepted that our healthcare insurance cost way too much. With M4A, we would no longer need to pay for their costs of business, their CEO packages, their cooperate lobbying, or anything else associated with running a private business. All of those fees GONE.

Second, it includes negotiation rights for all drugs. That means EVERY DRUG will be cheaper, across the board. No more drug companies hiking prices above the rate of inflation, no more price fixing from big pharma, etc.

Third, it eliminates co-payments and deductibles. No need to meet your set payment to use what you've already put hundreds into.

Fourth, it includes dental, hearing and eye care.

Fifth, since it covers everyone, the split of the payments will be much lower than the spilt of customers at a private business. The more people included the less each payment will be due to the "bullet being spilt" everywhere instead of just among the customers of a private business.

​

This bill saves us TRILLIONS over a span of 10 years. If you read above, you understand why that is. If you want to read something else, Here's a link to a quick M4A fact sheet. Really it's not hard to understand why it would save us money given all the excess from the healthcare industry as a whole, but there's a link anyway.

I asked this in the atheist sub, but ironically enough, nobody was on-board - nor did I receive any insightful responses.

I think state-atheism is a crucial part of societal maturity and could be practiced, if implemented correctly. The issue is that most people are completely ignorant of what state-atheism actually is and believe it to be an oppressive policy to implement because they haven‘t done any research.

In the Soviet Union, religion could still be practiced freely in religious institutions and homes. It was merely banned in public and frowned upon. Religious groups were also discriminated against by certain political action groups but, obviously, that‘s not something I suggest implementing.

I simply suggest banning religion in public schools, imagery, government and applications. What people do in church, mosques or whatever temple they may be in is their business. Additionally, the practice of religion in one‘s home is likewise a private matter. Instead, schools and public institutions could be built upon progress and promote scientific youth groups based on what is established through modern and future research initiatives. I‘m sure scientists would love this, no? I‘ve been in public settings, where they‘ll bring in a chaplain or pastor and ask everyone to bow their head for a prayer and I‘ve thought to myself „shouldn’t we be past this?“ In order to get past religious quackery, we need to establish a state that discourages it. Lest, we have more Kenneth Copeland‘s or Bobby Lenard‘s.

The commons is the cultural and natural resources accessible to all members of a society, including natural materials such as air, water, and a habitable Earth. These resources are held in common even when owned privately or publicly.

Education and Skills: Prioritize immigrants with high levels of education, especially in fields where there's a shortage of skilled workers in the host country. Work Experience: Give preference to candidates with significant work experience, especially in occupations that are in demand. Language Proficiency: Assess language skills, particularly proficiency in the official language(s) of the host country, to ensure effective communication and integration. Job Offer: Prioritize immigrants who have secured job offers from employers in the host country, demonstrating their immediate contribution to the economy.

Progressivism is very science based. It relies on observing, measuring and quantifying things it seeks to address.

Conservatism addresses the things that we are unable to properly observe, measure and quantify.

For example. Value is a very a real concept. Everything has Value. Money is a tool that we use to interact with Value in order to observe, measure and quantify it.

Good decisions have value. There is a number value associated with making a good decision in an environment. We can't really observe, measure, and quantify that. ...a determined scientist might be able get estimations in specific instances. But it's too complex to do.. continually and across situations.

However. It is possible to create environments where good decisions have poor, no, or even negative value.

Because we lack the capacity to properly observe, measure, and quantify this.. progressive policies may unintentionally harm it.

For example. Student loan forgiveness, damages the value (a real number) associated with the good decisions made by people who sacrificed to pay off their loans, went to a cheaper school, didn't go to school, took a job instead of internship, didn't pursue the next level masters/doctorate, etc.

The literal value of good decisions has been lessened in that environment.

Society has many very important, underlying fundamental constructs that we are unable to currently properly observe, measure, and quantify. Such as the value of good decisions.

The function of conservatism is it address those constructs.

I was PM'd by a person' a few weeks ago, after a page had banned him on Facebook. His claims are

"Hitler is a socialist".

This is one of the Hitler quotes he uses to promote that Hitler is a socialist.

Hitler on German Socialism

“Is there a nobler or more excellent kind of Socialism and is there a truer form of Democracy than this National Socialism which is so organized that through it each one among the millions of German boys is given the possibility of finding his way to the highest office in the nation, should it please Providence to come to his aid?” – January 30, 1937, On National Socialism and World Relations speech in the German Reichstag"

He had several other quotes on Hitler and him claiming he is a socialist, but historians are saying otherwise that I have read so far.

This man who DM'd me, had stated that he is someone who has been studying Fascism since 2016, and that if I use historians, and deny his claims, I'm admitting a fallacy as he claims.

It seems contradictictory to claim I'm committing the Appeal to Authority fallacy, when they themselves claim themselves as an expert?

To not get off topic, he also posted this...

"What must fundamentally distinguish the populist world-concept [Nazi worldview] from the Marxist one is the fact that it recognizes not only the value of race, but the importance of the personality, and thus makes these the pillars of its whole structure…If the National Socialist movement were not to understand the fundamental significance of this basic realization, and instead were superficially to patch up the present State, or actually to regard the mass standpoint as its own [i.e. Democratic Socialism, which was a major party in Germany at the time], it would really be only a party competing with Marxism.”- Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf (New York: Stackpole Sons Publishers, 1939), 434-435"

So, the question is, is Hitler a socialist, what was he?

Rules:

1. Citation is absolutely needed, I won't take anything at face value without a link to the source or a citation of a book
2. Context matters: Numbers compared to previous census are needed. Example, if I gave a stat, I need to show the previous year as well, because just current stats alone don't always prove that my is indeed the best, it can be purely coincidence.
3. Use as much/all standards or metrics to measure as possible. For example, I can't only use Unemployment Rate. Economic Growth, Investment, Quality of Life, Health, Access to XYZ (Basically anything)

I hate it that today leftist philosophy is associated with ideas like that of Foucault, which basically says that there is no human nature and humans are socially constructed.

In reality, classical leftist thinking assumes that there's a human nature. That human nature is basically made up of three components:

• Inner drive for freedom
• Cooperation over competition
• Equal intellectual capacity
• Rational thinking

It's time that leftist activists propergate old classical leftist thinking. And stop this nonsense and myth of the blank slate.

Currently, "diverse" in the context of American culture (possibly others, but I can't speak for them) is used more or less as a shorthand for a non-white, non-cis, non-het, non-male, or non-Christian person. When companies or politicians talk about diversity quotas or diversity hires, it's always with that context in mind.

First and most importantly: I think this is a good thing. Groups which have been marginalized in society for decades/centuries need specific, targeted focus in order to arrive at a more equitable future state alongside the groups which have been privileged during that time.

However, what I'm unsure of is the endgame state. Is the goal of broadening diversity in the workplace to have all demographics represented equally or in proportion to their demographic size in the country? How will we collectively know that we no longer need to target initiatives for diversity & inclusion...because we have become diverse and inclusive? Are there metrics that indicate this? Will there be a shift in language?

What do you envision as the endgame state for diversity?

Talk about anything and everything. Book clubs, TV, current events, sports, personal lives, study groups, etc.

Our rules are still enforced, remain civilized.

Also; I'm once again asking you to report any uncivilized behavior. Help us mods keep the subs standard of discourse high and don't let anything slip between the cracks.

PBS is funded by tax dollars but (20 years ago) a friend of mine made the case that “our children should have healthy television options without being showered with commercials” and I think he had a decent point.

What, exactly, is the purpose of NPR? What public service do they provide? You can’t say they offer an unbiased news platform, obviously. The standard “defense” for NPR is that they are almost completely funded by donations to which I say…AWESOME! Why the fuck can’t we make them 100% funded by donations? Give them tax-free status, like churches, and let NPR thrive proselytizing the Leftist vision of heaven without forcing all taxpayers to participate.

People, including the NPR listener base, need to realize that “tax-funded” automatically means “state-controlled”. State-controlled news outlets are a terrible thing whether you like what they’re saying or not.

DEFUND NPR PLEASE!

I am pro-Ukraine and pro funding Ukraine, but in the same time funding Ukraine is a battle of attrition of our tax money and military resources that has risks of creating a weakened state of the US that can be exploited later, and Ukraine, even as it actually manages to kill more Russian soldiers than vice versa are still losing so many men.

I believe that a peace deal and threshold Ukraine should be willing to give up in exchange for a treaty of peace, namely giving up Crimea and pre-2022 Donbas. This wouldn’t completely undermine Ukraine’s sovereignty or enforce the idea that a country like Russia can launch a war of aggression without consequence. The consequence is that they get a single province and have to retreat their army to pre-2022 levels, while NATO is closer to them. Doing this saves us money and men, and only Russia daring a world war would break that consequence.

Isn’t that good enough?

I get the jist that Communism is supposedly scientific instead of anarchic, but I think its really close to Anarchism regardless imo.

I can picture a Communist society almost to tee, but I can't seem to wrap my head around Anarcho Communism yet.

I get that instead of a government of people there are administrations of things, like libertarianism. But how is that different from Anarcho-Communism?

What's are the major differences between them? How can they be collectively anarchist? How would an Anarcho-Communist society work in practice? How would a "day in the life" of someone in such a society look?

In my opinion democracy has got to be one of the most nonsensical ideas ever brought up, to summarize it is simply to naive and impossible to ever truly achieve on how it’s supposed to be practiced.

The idea of democracy is ‘of the people, for the people, by the people’ this while in theory sounds good and all it is in practice almost impossible to implement.

The people attracted to power are the ones who will become your politicians, your ‘representatives’ if you prefer. This makes logical sense, the people attracted to power for the sake of power(or whatever PR branded reason they give) will go to wherever they can find power. These politicians are never good, they are only self serving meaning the peoples interests will be almost entirely ignored unless it is somehow beneficial to them in some way.

While yes I conceded that there might occasionally be that Jesus like figure who really does just want to help the people, they are few and far between. When they do appear they almost immediately have the metaphoric door slammed in their face since the majorly of politicians view people like that as threats to them, meaning they simply be regulated at best to meaningless desk jockeys or at worst be entirely forced out.

There is also the cost of campaigning, no average man can possibly afford to run as candidate for president or even local mayor likely. It costs millions if not hundreds of millions in order to be president, this means that realistically speaking only the wealthy and elite can become president or attain any significant leadership position. The people are forgotten and are only seen as means to an end in my opinion.

Some might argue that these leaders will only last for so long! That eventually their term limit will be up and a new leader will take their place and everything will have a chance to change! In my opinion I disagree with that, regardless of what politicians they are all the exact same once you reach a certain level of power meaning regardless of who takes power, right or left they will almost entirely confirm with the status quo which amounts to nothing changing for the people.

Democracy does not deliver on any of promise or statements, in my opinion all democracy leads to is plutocracy

Democracy = plutocracy

The biggest struggle I have with these conversations is reaching people of other beliefs. There are many reasons as to why, but I think it's deeper than it may seem. I don't think it's about a sector of politics/ideology, I think its a fundamental, psychological self defense instead.

To explain simply, most of us wear our beliefs on our sleeves (or in this case as our user flair) and have come to identify with them as apart of us. Therefore when in discussion a criticism against our beliefs becomes an indirect attack on us as individuals for holding these beliefs and instead of being reasonably constructive we, naturally, become (self) defense to preserve our identities.

Marxists do it to justify Stalin.

Libertarians do it to justify Capitalism.

MAGA does it to justify Trump.

Democrats do it to justify establishment Dems.

My idea when creating this subreddit was to provide perspectives, and indirectly incite political education. Basically "iron sharpens iron". I've learned a hell of a lot on here personally, like books of things actually, but idk if everyone has too.

I'm beginning to think that political science, theory and education on its own isn't enough. It's a deeper game of human fundamentals regarding open mindedness, self consciousness and accountability, a desire to progress/improve, and a ability to un-learn what we may currently hold as our beliefs.

Now that I've explained my struggle, what can be done to solve this? What is the psychological formula for political "deprogramming"? The scientific approach to restructuring the human brain into a dialectic (mechanism of thinking) for everyone to learn from? How do we install it? How can we enforce a means of indirectly collaborating with our political opposition to progress our personal beliefs into scientific fact instead of naturally falling to self defense mechanisms of preserving our beliefs as our identities against each other?

Edit: Our automod pinned comment is an example of this. People who have been led to hate "Communism" simply disregard the facts on it presented below and instead revert to their hate based talking points and showcase their fundamental misconceptions of the ideology even when we literally gave the facts right before their eyes.

Instead of accepting fact, in this case, people revert to ignorance to preserve their position of hating Communism. They never acknowledge to themselves that their understanding of it is not what the facts about it are.

This posts isn't about communism, but that's one example of the situation I'm addressing.

The speaker debacle in October and the one going on right now have shown us two things: Firstly, that the Trumpist and non-Trumpist wings of GOP have fundamental differences in both governmental and partisan policy that cannot be rectified through compromise. Secondly, that the Trumpist wing of the GOP is large enough to sabotage the non-Trumpist wing's pursuit of its policies. While the non-Trumpists hold mainly to the unchanging conservative principles of Reaganism, the Trumpists follow Donald Trump, a populist as well as a man who, by nature of being an active politician, changes his stated agenda to suit his needs.

As of April 19th, there are now enough pro-removal Republicans from among the Trumpists to remove Mike Johnson if the entire Democratic Party also votes against him. Based on the events following the removal of McCarthy as well as the testimony of some House Republicans, it is unlikely that a replacement within the GOP will be found. If he is not removed but is instead saved by the Democrats, then he will be turned into a bipartisan speaker just as accountable to the Democrats as to his own conference.

I believe that is now time to ask whether the Republican Party can even function as a single party at this point. The idea that a majority party is unable to elect a speaker without the opposing party's help is simply ridiculous. The only rational conclusion to make from such a state of affairs is that the "majority party" is not actually a single party but a coalition of two parties that are in the midst of breaking their alliance. You might be wondering "what makes the extremist Trumpist wing any different from the Democrats' extremists?", and the answer is that while the Democrats' extremists are too few to make a difference, the Trumpists are numerous enough, and because of this, they can afford to make even greater demands than any Democratic extremist.

I believe that in the wake of this next speaker crisis, the stage will either be set for the non-Trumpists to push the Trumpists out or (more likely) for the Trumpists to voluntarily leave and form their own party.

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I’m a right leaning libertarian, and can’t for the life of me understand how there are still Marxists in the 21st century. Everything in his ideas do sound nice, but when put into practice they’ve led to the deaths of millions of people. While free market capitalism has helped half of the world out of poverty in the last 100 years. So, what’s the main argument for Marxism/Communism that I’m missing? Happy to debate positions back and fourth

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/israel-reportedly-attacks-iran/ar-AA1nh24R

Breaking news;Israel attacked key Iranian assets

I keep running into a communication issue with Campists for the Russian & Chinese governments.

When talking to some types of Marxists, they disregard everything from outside their school of philosophy & claim a monopoly on truth. "Dialectical Materialism", they call it.

They say "Dialectical Materialism is science" but can't define how it meets the peer review process standard of the Scientific Method. It's at that point they start applying Logical Fallacies (primarily of False Equivalence), Bad Faith Argumentation, & Trolling/Brigading.

So I am confused;

Why are some folks claiming Dialectical Materialism meets the standard of the Scientific Method when it is simply old philosophy?

Why are some folks claiming Dialectical Materialism has a monopoly on Fact/Truth?

How to start a revolution?

We should not only ask us if people are ready to do a revolution, we should also ask how can we start a revolution? The state seems omnipotent with all its weapons and technology. But we have the numbers. So where should we start?

Well. If you look at history and revolutions, how did they organize a revolution in the past? It was always similar. What they did was they created a "Dual Power" structure:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_power?wprov=sfla1

A more western style type are the so called national-assemblies:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Assembly?wprov=sfla1

OK. So we have to create self-organized and democratic structures like this from the bottom up and this will be the dual power structure that will challenge the state.

Now the question is, where should we begin organizing something like that?

In my opinion we should begin with this in areas in which the state is weak. This is mostly in rural areas in which the state and corporations can't extract much profit and taxes out of people, these places are often neglected because of this. (Deindustrialised areas are also good) Also it should be in an area in which the police is weak (weak police = weak state) and where there is only a small number of police stations and police officers, at least where the police can easily be overwhelmed by the people.

A good book for tactics is this:

Che Guevara - Guerilla Warfare

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guerrilla_Warfare_%28book%29?wprov=sfla1

From this we should go on and try to capture area after area. Or build like a permanent structure and hope it spreads through the country and we need to convince people to join us ✊

You think this is a consivable strategy? 🤔

Many orthodox marxists want to conquer the state first and then with its help introduce socialism. I always thought that this is a silly argument, because what is the state? The state is not some abstract entity that serves everyone who happens to be in government. As Colin Ward says, the state is a social relation between people. So what happens if the people who run the bureaucracy of the state or the military refuse to obey the people who are in government? What happens in this case? 🤔 It's just silly. The state has to be destroyed.

Im not too politically educated as most but I have basic understanding and I want to become more Involved and do what I can with out becoming extreme.

I have read somethings about centralism and feel it could be the best route to go for any country.

If there is anyone out there with this ideology please shed light on this subject but all are welcomed to throw their 2 cents (sense?) Lol help with that aswell!

Thank you all!

Whenever people advocate against voting third party, particularly in this election right now, they say you might as well just vote Trump and you’re hurting the people you claim to want to protect. I see this is just a self fulfilling prophecy (calling it sfp from here on out) because if all the people repeating this sfp could a) recognize it as an sfp and b) recognize the brutal shortcomings of their proposed “lesser evil”, we could easily oust both evils and look for a better option. I’m curious if there’s any good reason not rooted in defeatism that makes people proclaim this sfp when confronted with the fact that their candidate is also in fact evil, even when the “opposite” candidate is “more” evil.