I watched about 2/3 of the movie "The Corporation" today. I stopped because it was pretty repetitive in it's condemnation of capitalism and praising of "public" ownership and solutions, which is to say they were pretty much old fashioned socialists. I happen to agree with them that corporations are vile and evil, but the movie only made occasional passing mention of the fact that virtually EVERYTHING corporations are able to do is due to the backing of the government (a corporate subsidiary these days). Everything from the courts to the police to the legislature to the president of the USA are dedicated to the corporations, which means they are dedicated to the ultra-rich stockholders actually. Which lets us know how this all came down. Rich folk, tired of being held accountable for their actions bought laws allowing them to pretend that they are not responsible for their actions! Of course, since every organ of the government is and always has been dedicated to serving those very ultra-rich folks, this was not only allowed but celebrated and protected with all of the power at the government's disposal. It's not capitalism that is the problem, that's just free people making free decisions to trade. No, the problem is government and it's control of the markets through violence, imposing monopolies, "regulating" trade to keep competition from entering markets and so on, that is the problem. There is no governmental solution to corporate greed because government is the very foundation of the corporation. Naturally I advocate disbanding, peacefully, all governments :-) I do agree with the film makers that Corporations are not people and should not be treated as such, but I think the chance of changing that and still retaining the violent government we have is effectively ZERO. Every government official, elected or appointed or hired is a CORPORATE WHORE, they will never give up the easy money and easy power they get by whoring for the corporations and their ultra-rich owners. What should we do then? We should ignore government whenever possible, obey them only when their enforcers are watching, sabotage everything they do and withhold all support financially and morally, de-legitimize all government as much as you can, mock them and point out their evil nature, from cable monopolies to government indoctrination camps posing as "schools" to bombing civilians for the profit of oil companies, point it all out over and over again, that is all we can do if we are unwilling to resort to violent revolt, and I am unwilling to revolt because really, it's never worked in the past anyway and it's not likely to work now either, maybe education will work. NOT government controlled education of course but education by free people speaking the truth.
I didn't make our local Tea Party , but it pulled hundreds of people as well... Tea, anyone? from Father Hollywood by Father Hollywood Like hundreds of thousands of other Americans, the Hollywoods enjoyed a tea party this past Wednesday. "Tea party" (wink wink). Nothing subversive about sipping a little Darjeeling, eh wot? Nothing to see here, Miss Napolitano. Anyway, our local festivities were held at Veterans Memorial Boulevard in Metairie. There were literally thousands of people crammed into the neutral ground (though on that day, the ground was anything but...), as cars and trucks poured by the busy boulevard laing on their horns in support. Here are pictures. And like every such gathering in our environs, there was even a brass band and an improptu "second line" parade. It was a "party" after all. But it was a party with a serious reason. The crowds were so overwhelming that it was hard to hear the speakers, and unfortunately, we did have a fe...