BuT hE’s A sElF mAdE mAn !
Even if we tax Jeff bezos 30% realistically it won’t make any difference because Trump and his cronies will just blow it on an even more ridiculous ICE budget or build more concentration camps or bomb Iran again.
That’s why we need a national wealth cap. Forget the tax. We need a maximum wealth. You simply are not allowed to have more than a certain amount of money. We need bounded capitalism. Capitalism can be a very useful system. It has a lot of merits over central planning. But in any kind of machine or system that humans devise, when is it ever beneficial to let any parameter increase to infinity? Let an engine spin too fast, and it will tear itself to pieces. Build an irrigation system that delivers an unbounded amount of water, and your crops drown. A well insulated house heated by a powerful furnace can bring comfort. Let it burn an arbitrarily large amount of fuel, and you will be cooked alive in your own bed. No system that humans design for our needs and comforts works when one of its core values is allowed to increase without bound. Inevitably this throws the whole system out of balance and leads to disaster.
And what is our economy and society if not an elaborate machine? A way of distributing resources, assigning work, etc? Allowing people to earn different amounts of money is a very useful thing. It encourages people to produce useful goods and services. It encourages innovation. It incentivizes getting an education and contributing to society. We’re not perfect at any of these. Market mechanisms have many flaws. But our system does have a lot of merit over simply assigning everyone the same flat wage for all work done. It is useful to allow people to accrue modest fortunes. But that useful mechanism, completely unbounded? It unbalances society and tears us apart.
1000x the median household income. We set that as the maximum allowable fortune. 1000 times the average family wage. That I believe is the place to set such a cap. This would be approximately $80 million. This is so much money, that even the highest paid wage workers - people like brain surgeons - if they work a long career, choose to live in a literal cardboard box on the sidewalk, and invest every penny they make? They would struggle to reach that cap before they die of old age, even if they live very long lives. The only way to earn more money than this is to earn your wealth primarily by taking advantage of the labor of others.
Any money earned beyond this? Taxed at 100%. And at some point above this cap? Simply having that amount of money becomes a criminal offense. I want to make it a felony for someone to have a fortune over $1 billion. Mandatory minimum 20 year sentence for secretly amassing a fortune over $1 billion. Make Bezos and Musk give all their money away, flee the country, or blow their fortunes on the single greatest party in the history of the human race. Frankly I would be OK with any of these outcomes. But they cannot be allowed to retain these strategically dangerous fortunes. They have declared war on the rest of us. And it’s time we started responding in kind. We must wipe out the billionaires as an economic class entirely.
“There should be no billionaires” is not just a slogan. It is a concrete policy we could choose to enact.
The Big Beautiful Bill isn’t really a tax cut. It is mostly comprised of deferred taxes. They only slashed a trillion from the budget. The rest is financed through increased debt.
The BBB will add over 3 trillion to the deficit which the public will pay one way or another.
Either higher taxes down the road, increased inflation or through higher interest rates… Most likely a combination of all three. But it will be paid.
true, plus he would still cut programs just to give himself, or the defense budget more money, and his personal SS force.
Can the “leftists” in the room start pushing actionable rhetoric?
I agree that we should do something about the oligarchy too.
Maybe the liberal leaders that keep hogging the mic every local protest should give directions to the largest group of protesters in American history.
National wealth cap set at 1000x the median household income. Anything over this is taxed at 100%. This would be about $80 million today.
But for people who cheat on their taxes or try to amass a secret fortune well beyond the cap? Secretly amassing a fortune over $1 billion will be a felony with a mandatory minimum 20 year prison sentence.
I dont know, I think there is nothing but dead air from the liberal side. Its gross. More messaging for the DNC comes from nobodies like me then from the party itself. Sure I might be more authentic but ffs Im just one dude.
I watch the news cycle and you can basically tell when the GOP are gearing up because its just dead silence on the platforms I visit. Now, not “dead silence”. There are your typical memes, news articles, and reposts but never anything from the dnc itself. No top down messaging; no platforming small creators; no baiting of the right. What the DNC has done is made these strile online environments where the right can constantly come in and, basically, disturb the peace.
It has become so insane that now the far left is doing it too. Show me one leftist who will get in the same beat down brawls they do on this site, do that on Facebook, Twitter, or Truth. They cant because they’ve been expelled from those places.
Im ranting too much and getting to in my own head. This is just what I see.
The DNC is rudderless and has no media strategy. Their only media guys think they need to turn right wingers into left wingers and it just doesn’t work. If trump didnt flip you, youre never leaving the right.
We need to take the DNC over from the inside. We need to primary all of them.
Primary elections in general have a ridiculously low turnout rate, and that’s the first place the battle must be waged.
When you say “we” have you charged through the walls like the Kool Aid Man? Cuz’ I was just looking up my state and county offices to possibly run for something. It’s a pain in the ass, but it’s important. I’m tired of calling my House representative and getting ChatGPT-generated Republican talking points emailed back to me.
I’ll be honest, I’ve been giving it some thought, but feel a bit lost on how to get started.
FWIW, I was there when GWB Jr. handed himself a 2nd term.
I was caught in the sudden fray when SWAT hanging off a mil-spec troop vehicle shot a 70+ yr old Vietnam vet in the crotch point-blank for the crime of sitting down at an otherwise non-violent protest.
I was there when four of those fascist pig-fuckers beat, zip-tied, and hoisted (by those ties, while she screamed that they were breaking her wrists) a 14yr-old, 80lb girl named “Zen” who was happily passing out handmade “Students For Peace” buttons from a wicker basket. (one that I’d handed her mere minutes before, when she told me it was her first protest and she wanted to help)
I’ve been ardently, passionately politically active for decades in a wide array of impactful, intentional efforts, and I’m genuinely surprised they haven’t black-bagged me yet —even before the Turd Reich seized power.
Yes. I’ve stepped up. Countless times, without fail, and with careful forethought as a change-oriented group. I’ve been shot at, chased, tazed, maced, arrested w/o cause or explanation or repercussions (for them, ofc), assaulted, gleefully threatened with suicide-by-cop, etc.
Thafuq do I expect any of us to do, if after all that I’ve been through, and this is still where we are?
I don’t wish any of that on my fellow thinking, caring citizens. Something’s gotta give, though. Before the only ones left are those fucksticks blithely gulping down the fetid cum-slurry of this regime.
luigishauntedmansion.jpg
Now, on a lighter note, I was working security when that random sparrow alighted on Bernie’s podium in Portland what seems like forever and a dream ago. That was the last time I felt a profound shred of hope for this country —and, by extension, human civilization’s future. 🥲
I am also weary of Bernie’s endless calls to do this or that while not specifying any way of doing it. I certainly don’t expect him to do anything more, he’s already made a much larger impact than most individuals ever can or will. But that entire tour with AoC kind of felt like only half of a useful thing. We all know it’s a problem. We all want to put a stop to it. But nobody knows how, that’s what’s missing. What do you want us to do, Bernie?!? Vote in the primaries, I guess? Would be nice if the next steps were included in the message to take action. Like an instant macaroni box whose instructions just say “You must make the macaroni!”, it feels a bit silly.
If he said what needs to be done, he’d be imprisoned immediately for inciting violence against the president, and for planning a coup. Until he has troops on his side, he can not tell you what actually has to happen.
Someone with power has to say it or nothing will happen.
Then it is doomed to fail. Power has to come from the bottom up. People need to learn how to take power back for themselves and their local community
I get this feeling when I watch Jon Oliver. Jon’s really good at identifying the problem, demonstrating why its a problem, and making you kind of upset about it.
God forbid you ever watched Jon Oliver back to back because you’d go mad with the immediate understanding that you live in bizzaro world.
So, it would be nice if HBO had a second show which was more like myth busters where people championed each of the problems Jon pointed out and left the viewer with a clear understanding what they can do or at the least, what can be done.
He does try to give a solution. It’s just that there is little to nothing the average viewer can do to make it happen. Sadly, that is just the way it is. Same with Bernie. We actually can’t make the solutions happen. But both are raising public awareness, which “can” impact policy. So I guess watching and listening is what we can do.
…and if nothing else, documenting what is being done, if it will ever come to a point where it can be turned around.
There’s a reason the Nazis paved over and planted fucking trees on as many concentration camps they possibly could before they got overrun.
Yeah I love it when he provides solutions.
I do think that “the system” (not any particular person or group of people, but the more abstract social meta-organism) is evolved, all systems are, to integrate and channel possible destabilizing forces into neutralized or even system-reaffirming forces. The system does not “platform” people who would legitimately threaten the system as a general rule. Jon Oliver is a pressure release valve, if he was to propose solutions that threatened to alter the system too much (systems see significant alterations as akin to death), he would be deplatformed organically. Again, I must stress that it is not an actual person or organization explicitly setting out to do this, like some sort of shady Comedy Central Illuminati. It’s just the same as how our body has a bunch of independent organs and cells that all work together without exactly trying to or knowing that they’re doing so.
Unfortunately Bernie is largely the same sort of thing. We can be assured of this by the fact that he is influential. Almost without exception, the more influential someone wants to be, the more pro-systemic they must be. In Bernie’s case he may not even realize how pro-systemic he is, he likely sees himself as more anti-systemic. But he is anti-systemic in the same way as a white blood cell is anti-systemic - that is, not at all, and only in appearance without inspection of the bigger picture. I suspect this is why he ends up not proposing any clear course of action. His role, although again I think he is unaware of this, is to create the sense that establishment dissent exists and is possible, that change and reform is possible. I say this without taking a stance on whether it is actually possible or not. Both in a system where it is possible and in a system where it is not possible, there would still be a flag bearer for that possibility regardless of its actual existence.
What I mean to say is that the system self-selects for the type of people who acknowledge problems but not the type of people who make proposals to fix them. It wants to appear to be investigating the desires of its constituents while not actually doing so - the system only cares about its constituents in so far as its constituents lead to the system’s well-being as a whole. The system does not intrinsically care for its constituents well-being. So while systems do indeed evolve and legitimately investigate ways to improve their own well-being, they will only appear to investigate ways to approve the well-being of their constituents, if they can help it.
All just my impressions of course, I hate talking in an authoritative voice about my ideas, but it’s better than prefacing every sentence with “I think”, “it seems like”, etc.
I don’t know how anyone can watch John Oliver for over 5 minutes. I like his points but man is he irritating. He sounds like a turkey when he gets excited
Lol. I like him, hes funny and I like his self deprecating comedy style. Not everything is for everyone, I know.
His energy is a bit much for me
Unfortunate, he’s my favorite celebrity of all time. His humor is 11/10 for me. Maybe he’ll grow on you eventually.
Hear hear. When I look at the state of American democracy from outside, what I find really distressing is that it’s not just Bernie; no mainstream person or organization with national reach is giving concrete advice and/or instructions on how to depose the oligarchy, so you have people’s energy going to angry tweets and meaningless parades.
what I find really distressing is that it’s not just Bernie; no mainstream person or organization with national reach is giving concrete advice and/or instructions on how to depose the oligarchy
What instructions are you looking for, exactly? Like, what are the instructions that ‘should’ be handed out at this point?
There’s no simple, easy, or quick solution to this, and since the election, things have gotten considerably worse on the ‘possible solutions’ front. Calls to organize and seek alternatives to oligarch-controlled resources are the groundwork which orgs constantly call for but no one fucking heeds. So what’re the instructions that will provide the solution that those calls haven’t?
There’s no simple, easy, or quick solution to this, and since the election, things have gotten considerably worse on the ‘possible solutions’ front.
Yeah of course, which is why someone needs to be out there convincing people to do the things that aren’t simple, easy or quick.
Calls to organize and seek alternatives to oligarch-controlled resources are the groundwork which orgs constantly call for but no one fucking heeds.
That’s why I qualified my remark with “mainstream”. I’m talking Bernie-like figures who are widely known and respected by liberals. Unless I’m mistaken that segment of the population still thinks elections and phone calls to Congressmen are going to fix this.
So what’re the instructions that will provide the solution that those calls haven’t?
As I said above the problem is that the right people aren’t providing those instructions, but also: strike, strike, strike. I’m getting past the point where I can make authoritative-sounding statements, but I find it really weird that what is arguably the strongest weapon in the working class’s arsenal is barely being talked about. Yes I know groundwork is necessary for that (though I’d argue it’s not nearly as much as commonly thought), but still someone needs to get the conversation from “strike? But my job/insurance/whatever!” to “how do we make it possible,” and at least from my position outside America I haven’t heard of anything on this front.
That’s why I qualified my remark with “mainstream”. I’m talking Bernie-like figures who are widely known and respected by liberals.
But Bernie constantly calls for people to organize at the grassroots level, to join unions, to seek alternatives to oligarch resources?
As I said above the problem is that the right people aren’t providing those instructions, but also: strike, strike, strike. I’m getting past the point where I can make authoritative-sounding statements, but I find it really weird that what is arguably the strongest weapon in the working class’s arsenal is barely being talked about. Yes I know groundwork is necessary for that (though I’d argue it’s not nearly as much as commonly thought), but still someone needs to get the conversation from “strike? But my job/insurance/whatever!” to “how do we make it possible,” and at least from my position outside America I haven’t heard of anything on this front.
Bernie has spoken in support of strikes as a tool for pressuring not just employers but the oligarchy more broadly numerous times. If you’re talking a general strike, that’s a nice idea, but as you yourself note, there is a problem of needing groundwork (and support) for that. Groundwork which people seem disinterested in.
We already know what needs to be done, we just aren’t allowed to talk about it.
The Tree of Liberty is thirsty.
Damn it, now I am going to put on a Bernie voice and shout “you must make the macaroni!” next time I’m making some mac and cheese.
That’s always been my issue with sanders. Also as much as people hate to hear it, he couldn’t even win the support of the Democrats, there’s just no way he would win a general election.
Another thing, im tired of hearing leftists say “we want old white men out of politics” while asking for Bernie. He should be an advisor to a younger candidate, not the candidate himself
Edit: Lemmy is wild, you could give the most inoffensive criticism or point about Bernie sanders and you get downvoted. There is zero tolerance for dissenting views when it comes to Bernie, he’s become a god to some people, like the opposite end of the cult of Trump
That chick should be mad. 3-months salary for him would be like $27 billion.
That’s a DeBeers diamond cartel propaganda rule of thumb.
If you assume 7% annual rate of return on that $230 billion, then 3 months “salary” would be a little over $4 billion.
That being said, as others have pointed out, the “3 months salary” guideline is just propaganda from DeBeers and no one in their right mind should ever spend that type of money on a piece of jewelry.
He should’ve used antimatter as a ring
Not to defend this thug or any other billionaire, but it isn’t about salaries but fortune.
5 million dollar ring for that wife?
Sir Mix Alot would be ashamed. Silicone parts are made for toys
This roast is criminally underrated.
THIS IS SPARTA!!!
Bernie needs to set up an alt account on Twitter where he pretends to be a Republican but reposts all these same messages.
The issue is left wing agenda gets de-prioritized (buried) or outright blocked since all social media is owned by billionaires and they want to maintain the current status quo.
We need to set up an indefatigable bot army to do all that and similar…
Bets on how likely that is? We haven’t even shown the ability to start anything simpler, so far…
I genuinely don’t understand how the ass backwards, Nazi right has random ass politicians with bot armies and the tech edge left can’t be bothered to actually talk to other people. Bot army should be our bread and butter!
Honestly? We’re so collectively tuned-in and on top of so much of the non-stop fuckery everywhere that we’re simply scared witless and sapped into a state of flotsam in the roaring deluge, for starters.
Hard to get a bead on anything in the churn, fellow sentient. 😭
So he only spends 0,0087 % of his wealth for the wedding? Sounds pathetic. Most normal people even go in debt for it.
I like this comment even though I can’t actually confirm it’s sarcasm. I think it’s be great if we all spent 0,0087% of our wealth on engagement rings.
I could afford the finest plastic ring in all of Poundland. It’s a shame the founders didn’t opt to name their venture Poundtown, though.
“Damn, why isn’t Bernie ramboing his way through the billionaires on his own??? Doesn’t he know that all of us bitching about him are too lazy to do it ourselves???”
I’m sorry 5 million? For a ring? I’d feel insane amounts of guilt wearing a ring that cost that much
I imagine if these people were capable of feeling guilt, much of their behavior would be different
For me I think the guilt would be overshadowed by fear. Fear that somebody might shoot me in the face for that ring.
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But does the armed militia get paid $5 mil? Sorry, that’s just the fear talking
That’s difference
They don’t have guilt
The richest people in world don’t feel guilt.
im surprised he dint go there in his super yacht which was around 750million-1billion.
The thought of running around with a 5 million dollar ring gives me heart palpitations.
The fact that a ring can be worth more then it would cost to provide financial independence for hunderds of people, is kinda jarring.
I know, I know, pretty rock and metal worth paper value notes.
So really that ring is pure loss.
No one owned that gem when it was just sitting in the ground. It took millions of years to create.
Some capitalism claimed it when one of his workers mined it. Calculated how much energy and labor it has costs to obtain it.
Then sold it for a massive markup compared to their own costs.
The machines have spend energy to get it (loss)
The workers spend life time and life energy to get it (loss)
Bezos his works spend their life time and energy to make him the money he now loses on this ring. (Loss)
The planet lost one of its rare gems. (Loss)
No lives are going to be saved using that rock, its not going to be used for breakthrough science, its not in a museum where we the people can admire our planet and learn from the its amazing processes. (No profit)
Instead its to decorate a hand so one person can be perceived as having value. Ironic.
depends if they got a lab created diamond, and the manufacturer /jewelry stores just gouged the price.
Do you HAVE to be so unromantic? It obviously proved his NEVER-ENDING LOVE for his wife! Does that count for NOTHING?! /s
That’s literally every wedding ring regardless of value
All materials obtained just to turn it into jewellery is loss yes.
Mine is a gold alloy rather then pure and i am very fond of it. I derive pleasure from it everyday while the total loss was significantly less than the one in Bezos marriage.
We also had an engagement ring which has an industrial rock because no way where we going to waste our limited money on a real diamond.
All rings combined costs less than having a birth in a US hospital.
Both rings were still a loss to the planet, just like almost every novelty i own and many things i consume. Staying alive is a destructive action and all humans cause loss. That is normal and ok. What is not ok is not being aware/inconsiderate of it.
We should all strive to create the least amount of loss we are aware off and my older self having grown significantly then when i married would love a ring made from recycled computer metals which now often end up on a landfill.
Hundreds?
That’s enough for like 1.5 households to retire on. That’s it. A million is not as much as it used to be.
im actually surprised he went super cheap on his wedding which was on 20mil, cheap for a billionaire that want to flaunt his welath. unless he bought that yacht before his wedding.
I think you could get a good amount of people out of debt. Maybe less so in america but elsewhere for sure.
Sure. But being out of debt is different from being financially independent.
Its a start. My point was, generally, 5 million could do a lot to help people and you wouldn’t see me keeping people’s lives tied to my finger.
Ehh. If you divide it into 10 chunks of $500k, and each of those invest it in a middling risk thing like vanguard and get a 10% return, that’s like $50k/year without doing any work. That’s well above the poverty line.
Side note: Rich people sort of have basic income because of stuff like this, and that’s fucked up.
The problem is that’s not a sustainable withdrawal rate. Also it’s 10% average before factoring in inflation, so I’m real dollars it’s close to 7% on average, but some years are a negative return, where you’re eating into the principle, and require a portion of the up years to make up for those.
An indefinitely sustainable withdrawal rate is closer to 3.5%.
Also the federal poverty line is horrendously out of touch.
And that’s literally how retirement accounts work, so it’s not really that fucked up a concept
Sure, it wouldn’t be an easy live starting with $500k, but I think with strict budgeting and low costs you could stay in the black and grow your principle. And if you get any job at all on top of it, it’s even easier.
Anyway, yeah, was just spit balling how much a difference the money could make.
Well, it depends on where you are. It doesn’t go as far in the US as it would in many other places
That’s enough budget for a whole ass R&D project and team. Can this ring shoot lasers or steer a helicopter or something?
No, but it can checks notes impress other rich people.
I doubt they’re impressed, just disdainful if you don’t have one.
Keen observation
So, while I agree with the “vote away Fascism” being bull shit I do still think that working class momentum can be built through wins like Mamdani.
I see so many comments saying “voting won’t work”, “protesting won’t work” etc. Anything that has any visible result, works. Because the majority of people follow the herd to a greater or lesser extent. You need to mobilise that majority in order to make a difference. The more you have a movement, the bigger, louder and more visible that is, the more people will join you. People need to feel which way the wind is blowing.
“that doesn’t work” people are just better educated versions of the my-anecdote-disproves-science types. Those people usually need more local engagement because of fuckin-course you can’t tell if voting is working when the gap between the individual voter and federal level reps is so huge. Anyone who’s paying attention to their local elections knows votes matter.
I forget who I was listening to or reading that said something like “political doomerism is the last stage of your liberalism before it dies”
Essentially, the point was that as people become radicalized they will learn all of the problems of capitalism and gain class consciousness and then conclude that any action is pointless.
They’ll essentially sit at home, talk about activism, but judge both people working within the system as well as people protesting or demanding change from the system. It’s a way in which a radicalized class conscious person is held in a state of inaction. Essentially making them useless.
It was a good little one sentence summary of those people. I’ll try to remember who said it.
If he doesn’t plan to create a new party he better be silent. Democrat made it clear what they stand for, and their voter also happy with it. So unless he create a new party then nothing will change.
Democrat made it clear what they stand for
Their meltdown over Mamdani is pretty damning
New parties are useless at the federal level so long as elections are First-Past-The-Post. Even the Ross Perot’s Reform Party in 1992 and 1996 only served as a spoiler for the Republican party, and his was an immensely strong attempt at forming a new party, featuring a reasoned platform which Perot showcased with charts every night on television.
This is why Musk’s America party is laughable, even if he really, really meant it, and offered a platform of sound governance.
While Sanders caucuses with the Democratic party, and they make him sit at the kids’ table with AOC and the other Socialist Democrats, he has been able to get a lot of legislation in or blocked with skilled use of Senate procedure.
But the current situation is well beyond even his powers of procedural mischief. We can’t rely on officials or left-wing news media to save the US from oligarchy and eventually monarchy.
Violent or non-violent, we’ll have to do it ourselves, and it’s almost certain that if we pressure them nonviolently (say with massive demonstrations or with a general strike), then Trump will try to do January 6th once again, probably with more guns and explosives. He’ll certainly bring out his ICE Stormtroopers (now in fancy armor) and try to invoke the military.
So we need to expect a fight, and preferably do what the lords did with John of England, make it super clear that he is out-manned and out-armed and will be given no quarter, if it comes down to violence. (Even the Magna Carta took a few tries)
27+ dead little girls at Camp Mystic has shown us it’s ugly already, but non-violence makes it more difficult for bystanders to dismiss the resistance as terrorists. (FOX News, etc. will paint us as terrorists anyway.)
I don’t know how we get to an organized general strike at speed (usually it takes years, and we don’t have years), and there are groups like indivisible that are trying. I don’t know if it’s enough, especially once ICE gets its massive infusion of equipment, manpower and fancy trenchcoats.
