Capitalism – Page 11

The Planet’s Fucked, But We’re Allright, Jack

Published on October 27, 2006

We all know now that the planet is on an inexorable slide to climate chaos, but some special people are planning on running away. The World Wildlife Fund , via the BBC:

The planet’s natural resources are being consumed faster than they can be replaced, according to the WWF. If current trends continue two planets would be needed by 2050 to meet humanity’s demands.

[…]

Countries are shown in proportion to the amount of natural resources they consume.

Humanity’s demand for resources is now outstripping supply by about 25%, as the growth of our ecological footprint shows. Meanwhile the health of the planet’s ecosystems, measured by the living planet index, is falling, at “a rate unprecedented in human history,” according to the WWF.

No wonder the neocons, the Nietzschians, the Randians and the warhawks like Instapundit are so keen on the idea of transhumanism. In the transhumanist ideal the enhanced elect, the ubermenschen, will inherit the earth, and then when that’s bled dry, the other planets. That’s the general idea put in very simplistic terms; unfortunately the plans only seem to have room for Americans – the rest of us untermenschen can go hang, or rather drown or starve. I suppose someone has to be the Morlocks in this narrative and it’s us non-rich-white-males.

This all sounds rather bizarre but actual US government policy bears it out. The US is currently attempting to militarise all of near-earth space and to claim the other solar planets as their own, using their own warped version of ‘manifest destiny’ for justification. You can bet your ass the transhumanists’ll be on that like white on rice. Humanity ( but only of a certain type) uber alles and fuck the universe. They’re entitled.

US stakes claim on space

New policy just slightly territorial

By Lucy Sherriff Published Thursday 19th October 2006 13:06 GMT

The US has claimed “dibs” on the Universe with its new space policy. The document, signed by President Bush, was released on a Friday, just before a long weekend in the States. This, in itself has caused a bit of a stir, but not more so than the tone and content of the document.

In it, the US government allocates itself rights to access and use space without anyone else getting in its way. It also sets security at the heart of the space agenda, frequently citing its right to use space as part of its national defence.

Significantly, however, it does not commit to restrict, or even to join talks about restricting the development of space-based weapons. This is despite a UN vote last year in which 160 nations voted in favour of such talks.

The rapacious gluttons* have fucked over one ecological system irreparably, now it’s on to the next and screw the rest of us left to face the dangerous death throes of a dying planet. That’s why the Right don’t care what damage they do. They think they have an escape hatch when it all goes to shit.

* I”m one too. I live in Northern Europe, so I can hardly exempt myself from the description.

UPDATE: here’s something we can do at least. Make your own solar panel for less than 150 euro.

‘Buy Walmart Toys Or an Elf Gets It’

Published on October 8, 2006

Yes, it’s that time again already – October. Just listen to the sound of the hysterical Christmas marketing campaign revving up to full power. Crooked Timber has and finds that Walmart is already deliberately scaring children into making their parents buy them toys:

Walmart’s Christmas Site

Posted by Harry

Susan Linn from the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood was just on the Chris Evans show (of all places) describing Walmart’s new website, on which kids can choose a bunch of toys to add to a list which Walmart will email to their parents. Evans clearly didn’t believe Linn’s description of the site, especially the bit where she says that when you reject a toy one of the elves says that the other elf will lose his job. I think Linn is terrific, but I, too, thought she must be making that bit up, despite, like Evans, having already heard the astonishing accents the elves have been given.

No. Try it. It really is unbelievable. Come on folks, defend poor old Walmart. What good could come of this for the wider world?

Newman on pro-corporate market fundamentalism

Published on May 31, 2004

Nathan Newman:

But the triumph of pro-corporate market fundamentalism is a core part of at least a wing of conservatism, from Milton Friedman to supply side economics to the Federalist Society. These folks always were always more concerned about government protecting property interests than limiting government per se. Look at intellectual property rights– the economic right has been demanding that China — China for gods sake– increase its government repression to get rid of software and entertainment piracy.

[…]

While I’ll defend Clinton relative to Reagan and the Bushes and want Kerry to win, Robert Rubin or the equivalent that Kerry will appoint is not going to confront head-on the economic warfare that working people are facing, at both the government level and by private sector corporate organizing. And the fact that liberals don’t take the economic component of conservatism seriously enough is exactly why the rightwing can get away with it given the often deadening media silence.

Untitled

Published on August 28, 2003

The Sideshow on “creative destruction”:

This is pretty much the kind of thing I think of when folks start talking about how the Invisible Hand is going to sort things out for us in the latest upheaval. I think of ordinary people with plans and hopes for their lives and their families, suddenly tossed into the meat-grinder of “competition”. I think of dreams lost, jobs and products disappearing from the landscape, shops closing, whole communities turned into ghost towns. I look at this and wonder who can possibly be so abstracted, so divorced from human society, that they can talk about “market adjustments” as if they have some meaning above and beyond those splintered lives, as if they are not agents of wholesale tragedy. What is an economy for, I wonder, if not to preserve the chances of ordinary people like us to secure our futures, to practice our crafts, to reach for our dreams?

Untitled

Published on August 20, 2003

Nathan Newman on the silliness and danger of companies like Faux News and Verizon trying to shutdown satire/criticism by launching trademark infringement lawsuits against critics.

Basically, corporate America is asserting the right not to be mocked for their b——- slogans. Let’s be clear what parody and satire aimed at corporations is usually about — it’s the hijacking of the money spent by megacorporations to destroy the warm-and-fuzzy feelings the public may have. Which the corps hate, but it’s one of the main weapons of those without those megabillions to have chanc e in public debate, much as many martial arts allow a smaller combatant to use the strength of an assailant against them.

Trademark law should have a simple rule– if you aren’t selling the same product and there is no consumer confusion, a lawsuit should be dismissed on its face. That’s unfortunately not the legal situation now, but it should be.