Daily Archives: September 7, 2022

Suppose you had the revolution you are talking and dreaming about. Suppose your side had won, and you had the kind of society you wanted. How would you live, you personally, in that society? Start living that way now!

-Paul Goodman

A storm is threatening our very nation today and if we dont get some shelter, America is going to do a hell of a lot worse than fade away, or at least so it appears. Every other news story that comes out of this country lately seems to be haunted by a Let it Bleed harmonica riff. America has never been more divided, and the shit just keeps getting worse. While the oligarchs wage open war against each other with insurrections and FBI raids and the divide between the sad tribes of lost proletariats who base their increasingly shallow identities on these creeps deepens, talk of a Second American Civil War and the decline of Western-style liberal democracy has traveled from the fringe to the mainstream with respected partisan wonks and heavily published academics taking turns wailing like Mick Jaggers rusty harp.

Its not hard to see why. Aside from the fact that brilliant if criminally underlooked minds from Oswald Spengler to Ted Kaczynski have been warning us of this fate for decades, all the available numbers seem to be pointing towards an impending cataclysm which you can often catch glimpses of just looking out the fucking window. As Hurricane Trump leaves a tidal wave of white working-class nihilism and resentment in its wake that was present long before the Orange Bastard showed up to exploit it, firearm deaths in the US are on the rise with an increase of nearly 43% in the last decade. With the economic trauma of the Covid Pandemic and the geopolitical trauma of the states total inability to do anything but exploit it still tearing at the already frayed fabric of civil society, homicides in metropolitan areas have surged by 44% in just the last three years alone and the climate feels ripe for that carnage to spill over into the political arena. In other words, war, children, its just a shot away.

Recent studies have shown that one in five Americans believe that politically motivated violence is completely acceptable under certain extenuating circumstances with 7% of 18 million adults in this nation confessing that they themselves are willing to kill for a cause. Nearly half of these Americans expect a civil war in their lifetime and before you go blaming it all on MAGA consider the fact that 41% of Biden voters have stated a desire for their state to secede from the Union along with the lion share of Trump voters. The response from the corporate Washington intelligentsia to this swelling tide of bipartisan disenchantment seems to vacillate between total denial and hair-pulling hysteria. Many on the mainstream left seem to be desperately rifling through their cluttered junk drawers for a jerry-rigged defibrillator to revive faith in our dear old republic and its derelict democratic institutions before its too late. My own personal radical left-wing informed response to these trends however can essentially be summed up with about time and good riddance.

This politically incorrect point of view on the coming apocalypse is largely predicated on three equally taboo positions; America is fucking evil, what we call democracy in this country is bullshit, and with the previous two opinions in mind, any sane radical of any stripe should embrace the inevitable collapse of both with open arms as an opportunity to wipe the slate clean and finally make things right.

Anyone whos read more than two sentences written by Howard Zinn or Lysander Spooner should be well aware of the painful fact that the American experiment has been a toxic exercise in pure evil from the drop. This is a genocidal slave colony that only declared independence from the British Empire to take its place in a malignant competition to see which camp of psychotic white supremacists could rape and pillage the entire circumference of the planet first. The fact that America won this disgusting race to become the worlds sole superpower is nothing to be proud of and neither is the electoral circus erected around it to give it the illusion of a free society.

Americas heretical take on democracy essentially amounts to little more than a childish pig fashion show in which the American people are free to choose a dancing puppet to represent the corporate military elites who really run this twisted fucking mess. Just because the Big Steal is big bullshit doesnt mean that everyday Americans are stupid to suspect that the system is rigged. Theyre only stupid if they believe an old money hustler like Donald Trump isnt in on the grift too. People have lost faith in this system because its a fraud that they never should have put their faith in it to begin with. This isnt disillusionment, its enlightenment and if the far left had any balls or ovaries left, they would approach this populist awakening as an opportunity worth exploiting.

This thing was never going to fucking last. Empire never does. Thats because empires are designed for mindless expansion and the larger a centrally organized territory expands the more impossible it becomes to control. This is why Rome fell. This is why the Soviet Union collapsed. And this is why China will never even become powerful enough to take Americas place. They are a Second World bureaucracy that inherited a First World-sized territory, and their dystopian police state is Americas future if we stubbornly insist on being united states. To put it bluntly, America is simply too goddamn big to be anything but tyrannical and the only other option aside from defacto military rule and a bloody civil war is to destroy America before it can destroy the world.

This only sounds insane because every single institution of power in this country is heavily invested in fooling us all into believing that anything less than full compliance with the status quo they designed to control us and rip us off is a recipe for fucking chaos. Well, take a good look around dearest motherfuckers because were already there. The collapse of any imperial power structure may be as inevitable as the rising sun, but it only ends in carnage when people insist on clinging to these same systems long after theyve clearly failed. Civil wars arent caused by secession. Theyre caused by the refusal of one power to let another leave their broken marriage. Any second civil war in this country will be the result of rival camps trying to impose their will on each other the way both sides of the last one did. The best solution to such a grotesque fate is a revolution or to be more precise, a thousand little revolutions.

Another sorry side effect of the status quos Delusional Industrial Complex is the belief often shared by even the most well-intentioned revolutionaries that we need one big epic revolution to overthrow one big epic empire. This formula generally only ends in one of two ways; either in a colossal bloodbath that only results in replacing one form of tyranny with another as weve seen in Russia and China or more commonly in a state of revolutionary stasis with a bunch of pissed off kids in Che Guevara t-shirts waiting around for some mythical critical mass that never seems to materialize. There are dusty old politburos across the globe clogged with big-mouthed polemics whove grown geriatric and gray waiting for their busted alarm clock to go off. But there is another way, and it is almost criminally simple; just drop out and exist unruled beneath the radar before the grid goes down.

As stated above, all empires collapse and this collapse only results in violence because people stubbornly stick to their designated statist delusions and insist on going down with a sinking ship. True revolution, therefore, is simply a matter of building an escape raft for your people and preparing for the inevitable. Forget about America. Forget about Washington and Wall Street. Forget about Trump and Biden and Republicrats and Dempublicans and all that fucking bullshit. Build the revolutionary society we all deserve right now where you live.

Build autonomous local networks capable of sustaining themselves without state or corporate institutions all while depriving the war machine of the tax revenue it subsists on through theft. Build your own food resources with community gardens and family farms. Build your own social resources with mutual aid societies and homeschooling collectives. Protect yourself and your people with volunteer civilian militias. Prepare for the very real possibility of having to defend your community from state intervention but dont provoke it by attempting to overthrow a busted system when you can simply replace it without even firing a shot and dont make the tragic mistake of trying to force your values on other communities who are just trying to do the same thing in different ways.

This has been done before by unsung pioneers across the political spectrum. The left-libertarian outlaw Karl Hess made his Washington DC neighborhood directly in the heart of the beast totally self-sufficient by building community gardens and creating a primitive but effective fish breeding facility using nothing but pumps from old washing machines and leftover construction materials that produced hundreds of pounds of meat a year. On the other end of the spectrum, the Black Panther Party created a free breakfast program that began with a single Episcopal church and donations from a handful of local grocery stores in inner city Oakland and ended up feeding thousands of impoverished children with 45 programs across the country. The federal government ultimately had to replicate these services themselves just to shut them down and keep the ghettos compliant.

And this is being done as we speak by pioneers across the globe. The Mexican city of Cheran has opted out of the colonialist War on Drugs by arming peasants against cartels and cops alike and forming a vibrant direct democracy built on local indigenous values. In the failed state of Lebanon, thousands of citizens of every creed have abandoned their corrupt centralized government services to rely solely on the services provided by local Hezbollah militias. And the Amish have been taking care of their own peacefully right in my own backyard with their own tightly woven networks of communal farms and craftsmen without even so much as touching a Glock.

It can be done and for some of us there has never really been any other choice. As a genderqueer person in rural Central Pennsylvania, the only thing separating my community from certain extinction is each other. The government will never understand us, and I honestly hope they never do because Ive seen what becomes of those they assimilate. All I want is for the freaks I love to live weird and free from fear and dependence on institutions defined by colonialist violence. By narrowing my goals to this simple and immediate revolutionary dream I can peacefully coexist with Anabaptist Puritans who seem as extraterrestrial to me as I do to them. This is how we prevent another civil war, dearest motherfuckers, by destroying America with nothing more severe than peace, love, and empathy.

I tell you, revolution, sister, its just a kiss away.

Read this article:
The Only Solution to a Second American Civil War is a Thousand Little Revolutions - CounterPunch

"Hacks" is a comedy-drama that stars Jean Smart as wildly successful career standup comedienne Deborah Vance, Hannah Einbinder as her younger co-writer Ava, and Carl Clemons-Hopkins as her closest advisor. The show follows all three characters, as well as the office and career life of Downs' talent agent, Jimmy, excellently portrayed by series co-creator Paul Downs.

The show has won Emmys for writing, directing, and outstanding lead actress for Jean Smart, as well as the Golden Globe Award for best television Series. Alot of that acclaim goes to the writing, which is sensitive, brash, and never mawkish even when dealing with life's harshest twists.

While the celebration of Jean Smart who jumped back into the spotlight with turns in "Fargo,""Legion," and "Watchmen" is well-earned, a place must be reserved for Clemons-Hopkins navigating life as a Black, gay businessman. Audiences will also admire Einbinder's performance, as her complex Ava Daniels is the true lynchpin of the piece. Ava is unlike any character you've ever seen, and she'll stay with you long after the applause has faded.

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12 Best Shows Like Reboot That Fans Should Check Out - Looper

Last week I took a journey, one that had been a long time coming. I was finally opening the curtains to a slice of my childhood that my kids had heard often about, but with youthful (dis) interest had dismissed it as adult nostalgia. The girls and I went to Lawrence School, Sanawar.

Nestled amid a canopy of pine and deodar trees on a hilltop in Himachal Pradeshs Kasauli Hills where the winter sun chases its inhabitants is the oldest coeducational boarding in the country, some say even in the world.

It is also a place that transformed a gawky, anxious teenager too shy to even speak with relatives into a confident teenager who would one day become a prime time news anchor.

Three decades later, memories made unknowingly came gushing in like the mist from the surrounding hills, still as fresh as the day I entered those imposing gates for the first time, the same age then as my elder daughter is today.

If you havent been a citizen of this hilltop in the Himalayas with its slanting red roofs like dots in a forest, the 139 acres that slope up and steeply down can be daunting but nature has never preened as it has here and the hills around are as alive now as they were then.

Established by Sir Henry Lawrence and his wife Honoria in 1847 as a charitable institution, the school was initially set up for the orphans of British soldiers, an asylum from the debilitating effects of the tropical climate and the demoralising influence of barrack-life.

In 1920, it was rechristened Lawrence Royal Military School, its focused military training sending troops directly to the battlefield from the school campus.

Rich military tradition

The rich military tradition continues with a remarkable number of alumni in the armed forces, the bravery of Second Lieutenant Arun Khetarpal, the youngest recipient of the Param Vir Chakra remains legendary.

Staying true to the school motto Never Give In Khetarpal died in the 1971 Battle of Basantar during the Indo-Pak war, barely years after passing out from Sanawar and was posthumously awarded the nations highest gallantry award.

30 years later Khetarpals father went to Pakistan, his host an Armoured Corps officer reportedly admitted after a dinner that he had caused Arun Khetarpals death, adding that there were only two men left standing, one had to go.

Lawrence School, Sanawar has been a window to a rich history that evolved from the British era to modern independent India. The school has been presented the Kings Colours twice- the second time in 1922 by the King of Wales which are still trooped every October during the founders celebrations.

Its centenary celebrations in 1947 were presided by the then Governor-general Lord Mountbatten who read out a special message from King George VI. Shortly afterwards the control of the school was handed over to Indian authorities.

Sanawar is not a school, it is an institution, said former prime minister IK Gujral once. He couldnt have been more accurate. It continues to count as one of the top boarding schools in the country with a heritage that is hard to emulate.

Ask any Old Sanawarian (as those who pass out from school are called) including an abundance of notable alumni and they will tell you, it is a place that keeps its promises.

There are school campus and then there is Lawrence School, Sanawar. Perhaps nothing is as charming as the 149- year old school chapel with its ornate stained-glass windows.

Magic of the place

The war memorial, Birdwood the old stone building housing classrooms now touched with up with modern amenities, a printing press and a quaint post office - the first my children saw - a reminder of the time when without the impersonal email we did write letters home to our parents. A reminder also of times that didnt flirt with innocence.

Yet all this doesnt compete with a fraternity that the school builds, of students- past and present loyal to an imaginary oath of bonding simply because of where they come from. And that bond opens all doors.

I often look at new age school buildings and wonder, how many students will come back with a desperation once they pass out? Or behind the books how many are learning that religion, caste or background are only a means to push us back. No one spoke that language, it was never important.

But that didnt take away from the ingredients of a boarding school. Rumours, ghosts, birthday bumps, extras at lunch- everything was par for the course.

Rudyard Kipling famously wrote in Kim, Send him to Sanawar and make a man of him, it may be politically incorrect in todays woke times but the generation will appreciate how gender neutral the school has always been, with girls competing ferociously.

In 2013, 7 teenage boys from the school summited Mount Everest, not to be left behind 7 schools girls became the youngest trekkers to conquer Africas highest peak Mt Kilimanjaro.

And so the glory continues. Exactly a month from now the school celebrates its 175th (dodransbicentennial) anniversary.

The buildings are shining, the trees have spruced themselves up, the hotels in Kasauli town long booked out and the mist it will come on cue as it always does, reminding us of the magic of a place that is always a step away from a homecoming.

PS: My children admitted the place was charming.

Jyotsna Mohan

@jyotsnamohan

Jyotsna Mohan is the author of the investigative book Stoned, Shamed, Depressed. She was also a journalist with NDTV for 15 years.

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India: Lawrence School, Sanawar where you strive till the set of sun - Gulf News

A business without an app is missing a lot. Over the last decade, apps have played a significant role in company growth. If you want to move your business in the right direction, developing an app is simply a must.

The smartphone market generally features two operating systems Android and iOS. Although there are others, they are insignificant, as most mobile device users are either Android or iOS oriented. When choosing to develop a business app, you need to pick one of these and have your new app developed strictly for these operating systems.

When youre making your choice, consider iOS as your first choice. There are many reasons why, and thats what were talking about in this article. We will share five essential reasons you want to develop an iOS business app. Follow up and learn what the benefits of owning an iOS app are.

There are nearly 2 billion iOS users worldwide. Most of them live in western countries, like the US and Europe. iOS is the most popular mobile device brand in the US, with 211 million devices in use. Statistics say that 87% of teens prefer an iPhone over any other brand.

The western world, in general, has a higher spending power than the eastern world, but it is also well-known that iPhone and iOS users are willing to spend more on particular products. That gives you the right to think that having an iOS-oriented app will generate more profits.

IOS users regularly use around 20 apps. If you manage to develop an app that will be useful for them, you can expect them to use it frequently. If they do, that will provide great benefit for your company because not only will it strengthen the brand awareness, but it may also make profits.

If your business is tech-related, youll find great use of your iOS app. People who use Apple phones and mobile devices are tech-savvy and love exploring and buying new things. They also have a great eye for products created by companies in these fields.

Depending on your industry, youll need an app that is developed specifically for the type of users interested in that particular market. If youre unsure how your app needs to look and what to implement, it will be best to hire a full-service development company, like https://www.miquido.com/, a company that will know what you need.

Hire someone with numerous projects behind them and someone who can give you the right advice about what to implement. They know the markets, and theyll know what to install on your app. When it comes to iOS users, youll want perfection, as satisfying them is not easy.

When youre using a programming language for iOS apps, youre bound to develop something extraordinary. When we say extraordinary, we dont mean a piece of technology that will be flawless, but an app with a unique interface and looks.

Apple apps are always different from anything else. The main reason for this is that Apple as a brand allows app developers to experiment and be creative. When the app is finished, only Apple products will perfectly put the developers idea to practice and have the app look fantastic.

All this gives iOS users an excellent user experience. This is highly valuable for customers everyone using an expensive phone would like to have the best possible experience while using the apps on it. If you lack the perfection that Apple provides, users will quickly delete your app from their phones.

Nearly all iOS users are active on at least one social network. Most of them will post daily, which gives you a great chance for free marketing. Provide a social media integration in your business app, and let the users who download the app do the rest.

Youll also want to have your own social media profiles and pages. Create content that might be engaging for your fans and app users. Send notifications to your clients through the app with discounts, offers, and other activities, and see how the users share this information on their social networks.

If one of your attempts becomes viral, you will reach thousands or millions of viewers. As they say theres no bad marketing, so anything that draws users attention is a great activity. Just make sure youre not politically incorrect, as things like these may ruin your career entirely.

You may be involved in an industry with a local business considering a tight area, but some businesses operate worldwide. Whichever it is, you still have access to many consumers, especially if your business is located in a western country.

If youre trying to sell products worldwide, an iOS app is a must. Apple is a universal brand, and no matter where youre located, owning an app that is available in the App store will give you access to people living on the other side of the globe.

Theres no question that Apple is one of the biggest mobile device players. They might even be the greatest of all times. Android indeed has more users than Apple, but the spending power of iOS users is much greater than the spending power of Android users.

With this in mind, developing a business app means you must have it done for Apple users. Hire the best app developers and work closely with them to create something extraordinary. If you do this, the result will be an app that looks staggering and has fantastic value for your users.

The main things you need to address when developing an iOS business app are functionality, speed, and value for your customers. If youre successful in all three, your app will surely be successful. Millions will download it, and your business will thrive.

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5 Reasons to Have an iOS App for Your Business - Tech Guide

The Hindi film business is searching for explanations after a string of box office flops, but not even entertainment beat reporters can point out where they are going wrong. The list of problems goes on and on and doesnt even touch on things like lousy translations of foreign films, subpar acting, bad directing, terrible VFX and CGI, photography, etc. The audience is stating that the main issue is the basically anti-Hindu content, which may be too politically incorrect for analysts on the left to mention. But if they were, to be frank, and courageous enough to say it, could Mumbai-centered trade get its act together? No. Because the work that those in the profession have done thus far was done as a result of a design that was created soon after the professions creation.

The first Indian talkie, Alam Ara, was released in 1931, after Raja Harishchandra by Dadasaheb Phalke, who purportedly sold his wifes jewelry to produce Indias first silent film in 1913. It is evident that the initial audio production had a Muslim theme. The audience saw a prevalence of Urdu ordinary terms from Persian and jargon from Arabic in the lines recited by performers during the black-and-white era until the early 1960s. Two forces were at work in this situation: the legacy of Parsi theatre and a left-leaning group of artists known as the Indian Peoples Theatre Association (IPTA).

PK was just the next installment in a protracted series, one that ultimately lost Aamir Khan the business of Laal Singh Chaddha. Even the Bharat of Bollywood, Manoj Kumar, had depicted men of three upper castes raping a helpless woman inside a warehouse in Roti, Kapada aur Makaan. If the 2014 movie featured an actor who hobnobs with Tablighi Jamaat Pakistans maulanas and amuses the family of Recep Tayyip Erdoan, he portrays a Hindu guru in his movie (1974). The character of Lala, played by CS Dubey, is one of the violators of Tulsi (Moushumi Chatterjee), who had been portraying Hindu criminals since Seema (1955).

Despite his good relations with the present administration, Ajay Devgn has similar bad luck. Rahim Lalas portrayal of the real-life gangster in Gangubai Kathiawadi sanitized his criminal activities, while a number of Hindu men and women who had aided the prostitute-turned-activist-cum-goon Ganga Harjivandas were all left out of the picture. Since her 2008 movie Raazi completely upended Harinder Sikkas 2008 novel Calling Sehmat, the lead actress Alia Bhatt has been beyond redemption.

Additionally, Ajay Devgn and Akshay Kumar co-starred in the film Sooryavanshi in which terrorists claimed that terrorism is a legitimate response to a complaint!

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Bollywood won't adapt, so we need to find alternatives. - Whizbliz.com