Notices by David Benfell, Ph.D. (benfell@hcommons.social)

I see the #VoteBlueNoMatterWho (#VBNMW ) folks are out in force. Blocking 'em all.

Neoliberalism destroyed my life. I'll be damned if I'm gonna have people tell me to vote for it.

@goatsarah @pigworker

Fair enough. The memory management you refer to, however, existed in larger machines, I know specifically in the Digital Equipment Corporation PDP-11 series and I assume others.

In those days, as Ken Olsen (DEC's CEO or president or both) was proclaiming that computers would never be needed in homes, I longed for a Heathkit H-11, which used a PDP-11 processor.

@goatsarah @pigworker

Somewhere below decades of accumulated cruft lies a processor that may be faster and more capable, but really not very different from that 6502.

To understand this introduces an entirely healthy skepticism of a lot of new-fangled stuff, especially artificial idiocy.

This thread seems excellent on Gavin Newsom's choice to replace Diane Feinstein.

https://progressives.social/@chargrille/111167353764361491

Really, it couldn't have been anything other than a deal made in a (crack cocaine) smoke filled room.

For those wondering, treat the cocaine bit as rumor. I can't prove it. But rumors spread widely and I'm inclined to believe this one even if it's possible I'm simply failing to distinguish Gavin Newsom's behavior from the psychopathy our system of social organization encourages and rewards.

@chargrille

@Dogzilla @hosford42 @weaselx86 @vikxin @Radical_EgoCom @duckwhistle

We need a lawyer to answer this properly and I'm not one.

My understanding is that co-ops are still corporations limiting liability to owners. The difference is in governance and ownership.

@Dogzilla @hosford42 @weaselx86 @vikxin @Radical_EgoCom @duckwhistle

I've seen a few co-ops that have seemed entirely successful. Just joined one up in Erie, in fact.

@Dogzilla @hosford42 @weaselx86 @vikxin @Radical_EgoCom @duckwhistle

The problem lies in massive capital requirements really to start anything. Capitalists have the capital because of course they're keeping it and disapprove of co-ops.

I spent $100 to join that co-op in Erie. Even if the entire population of the Erie metropolitan area joined at that same cost, it would amount to $20 million.

By contrast, Apple's market capitalization now stands at over $3 trillion.

That's not a reasonable comparison for a number of reasons, but still, if I'm counting on fingers right, it's six orders of magnitude different.

@GhostOnTheHalfShell @duckwhistle @Radical_EgoCom

Don't know what happened to the communes of the 1960s and it's been a while since I heard what happened to Israeli kibbutzim, but I very faintly recall that capitalism had something to do with it.

When we speak of co-ops, I think we may need to be more specific.

Sure, that co-op I joined in Erie is open to the public--anyone can join.

But a bunch of independent car wash operators joined forces in Pittsburgh to meet competition from a couple chains moving in--I don't know how they structured their merger, but it occurs to me they might have formed a co-op with a somewhat higher price of admission (for one thing, you'd need a qualifying car wash).

Then there are co-ops in real estate, a step beyond subdivisions or "plans," but I'm failing to remember the nuances.

@GhostOnTheHalfShell @duckwhistle @Radical_EgoCom

1/2 The ethic was clearly different in the 1950s and 1960s. Corporate executives were more likely to recognize a duty to what we would now call "stakeholders," referring to employees and customers, as well as to shareholders.

Then came neoliberalism. Milton Friedman came along and preached that their sole duty was to shareholders. And this is apparently now at least a quasi-legal requirement.

There are so-called "B-corps," which I have not looked into and distrust on the same level with "carbon credits" (which I also haven't looked into). But supposedly, these recognize a duty to workers, customers, shareholders, and the environment.

What I saw, when looking into, the so-called "Theory X"-"Theory Y" management style dichotomy, were a few things:

@Radical_EgoCom

"Communist anarchism?"

Um, that's redundant. The other things claiming to be anarchist flatly aren't.

@duckwhistle @Radical_EgoCom

Except that when you say 'communism,' most people think of authoritarian socialism, so no, it doesn't actually help with understanding.

@GhostOnTheHalfShell @duckwhistle @Radical_EgoCom

I'm going to have to bow out on how the Soviet Union or various People's Republics should be categorized.

A part of the issue is that there is no pure system. Authoritarian socialist regimes had or have capitalist elements. Capitalist regimes have socialist elements.

So while I can see the argument that so-called "communist" regimes were in fact "state capitalist," I can neither endorse nor refute it. Ultimately, it hinges on how much of each you can have to categorize as either, and I haven't the first idea how to decide that.

@GhostOnTheHalfShell @duckwhistle @Radical_EgoCom

Properly understood, communism cannot be authoritarian. As Emma Goldman explains in https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/emma-goldman-there-is-no-communism-in-russia , communism is egalitarian. We might disagree with Karl Marx about means to the end, but we agree on the end, which is why, for all the suffering that resulted from his ideas, I'm inclined to allow him a little grace--I think he meant well, and by the time we had the proof that Michael Bakunin was right, it was too late.

Accordingly, I label these regimes "authoritarian socialist," specifically to distinguish from libertarian socialism, which along with anarchism, recognizes that both political and economic power over others is a problem (anarchists would say it's illegitimate).

As to democracy, I'm not clear on why we even still talk about it. You ask, "Are the people doing the work deciding who, what, how much and why?" In any country I'm aware of, the answer is flatly no--the rich and powerful make those decisions.