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Alec Johnson's avatar

Yet another fine column. I had not heard Upton Sinclair's comment about "two wings of the same bird of prey." Thanks for sharing that. I'm still enjoying "capitalocene" as a better alternative to anthropocene. Did I spell it correctly?

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Stewart Whisenant's avatar

Sinclair's phrase is reminiscent of Gore Vidal's characterization of American politics as "one political party with two right wings." In a situation as dire and ridiculous as this, revolution is the only moral option and with the additional threat of climate change in the picture, we'd better make that an eco-socialist revolution committed to dismantling the bourgeois capitalistic oligarchy masquerading as a democratic republic that is destroying the planet with its predatory, fossil-fuel based, neoliberal policies. The challenge is to pull off such a miracle without resorting to violence, which seems unlikely in view of recent polls showing that there are 12 million or more MAGA Republican terrorists roaming around TV Land with AR-15s locked and loaded who are OK with the prospect of exterminating eco-socialist lefties and other minorities along with their entire families. It makes one long for the days when quips like James Ingall's "The purification of politics is an iridescent dream" stood as an acceptable excuse for bad behavior amongst the naughty "gentlemen" in power positions. Now that the liberal class is dead and incremental change is off the table, we're forced to deal with fascist vampires like the Orange Reptile who apparently won't abandon their wicked ways unless we drive stakes through their criminal hearts. Yikes!

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