Tag Archives: capitalism

How Deep in Dictatorship Are We?

August 6, 2026

civil rights, democracy, economy, history, politics, Uncategorized

How Deep in Dictatorship Have We Sunk? Can we still get out of this?

Why Are the Billionaires Choosing Dictatorship?

Wouldn’t they rather continue the way they did things 1945-present? The fact is that they can’t. Economic pressures have become too strong. Their competitors, who were devastated in World War II, are back in serious competition. Nations that were never competitors, especially China and India, are a big problem for America’s billionaires now. Nations who have oil or other important resources are trying to hold on to them. Worst of all for the billionaires, the U.S. dollar is being undermined.

The capitalists of each nation have to keep their profits up, and the only way to do that is to expand. They reached a similar situation in 1914 and again in 1939. Both of those situations resulted in world wars. The billionaires prefer another world war, even with nuclear weapons, rather than continuing to see their power diminish.

There are really only two choices before us: destructive wars and ecological suicide on the one hand and a new cooperative spirit among people. The wealthy people who are on top today don’t like that “cooperative spirit” idea at all. So the Trumpsters are taking the only road they consider open to them: fascism.

FASCISM IS INTERNATIONAL

This week, Trump strengthened ties with kings in Sandi Arabia and Morocco while his relationships with western democracies withers. Secy of state Marco Rubio gathered 60 countries for an anti-communist convention. Elon Musk dishes out money and encouragement to fascist parties around the world.

THE AMERICAN PEOPLE: OBSTACLE TO FASCISM

Judge Barbara Lynn wrote an excellent op-ed in the Dallas newspaper. Her title was “Beware of how President Trump is gathering power.” The Supreme Court gave Trump unprecedented power and unprecedented immunity. He’s also taken a lot of power with various Executive Orders such as “National Security Presidential Memorandum 7” which intends to give him the power to arrest anybody who disagrees with him.

Lynn also talks about Presidential Emergency Action Documents (PEADS) which can be written in advance and implemented quickly. Neither Congress nor anybody outside the Trumpsters knows what’s in the current PEADS. Lynn says, “They are widely thought to include the authority to detail dangerous persons, impose martial law, seize property, censor the news, suspend the writ of habeas corpus and establish areas for confinement of persons by the military.”

Impose martial law? Isn’t that exactly what the Trumpsters are likely to do if they lose the November elections? Is there any other possibility?

I wrote a letter to the editor, even though I have no expectation that it will be published: “Thanks to Judge Lynn for summarizing some of the ways that the Trumpsters are imposing dictatorship on America. If they lose the November elections, as is widely expected, then it is a certainty that they will try to overthrow whatever restraints are left on them. The people will beat them by organizing, and we have no better opportunity than by joining the protest organizations when the Trumpsters are in Dallas September 9-10.”

If Judge Lynn had wanted to write book-length, she could have also talked about the way that the Trumpsters are taking over information sources. How they have undermined elections and are undermining them still. She could talk about the obvious comparisons between the legions of ICE operatives on our street and state police from earlier fascist governments. She could talk about the way that resistance in the upper echelons of the military have been removed. She could possibly write two books on the Trumpster’s wars and hostile takeovers around the world.

At least several chapters could be devoted to the way that the Trumpsters have restored the racism, homophobia, Islamophobia, and other divisive techniques from earlier centuries and other fascist regimes.

Unprecedented Surveillance

And Judge Lynn could talk about surveillance of American citizens. This brings me to the scandal of this week. We are just beginning to find out about Automated License Plate Readers, ALPRs. Mostly, people call them Flock cameras because a corporation misnamed Flock Safety has produced and sold the biggest bunch of the more than 125,000 of them operating in our cities today.

I probably wouldn’t have even thought about them if the Dallas newspaper hadn’t run an article about somebody who apparently used a pipe cutter to bring 6 or 7 of them down. I immediately thought of the 1960s movie hero “Cool Hand Luke.” In the beginning scene of the film, Luke used a pipe cutter to cut the heads off a series of parking meters. Parking meters were a symbol of government oppression back in those days. How I wish they were all we had to deal with now.

Most of the cameras are on poles strategically placed in high-traffic areas. They read license plates and distinguishing features of automobiles. The excuse given is that they help deter crimes, but the information they gather is shared with any number of government agencies, including the dreaded ICE.

Old timers from the Vietnam war days can tell you that FBI agents regularly walked around in parking lots near anti-war meetings. They were jotting down the license numbers. That’s how important a few license numbers are to the government’s repressive forces.

The cameras aren’t restricted to poles. They mount them on drones so they can snoop around everywhere. And what do they do with the information? Well, individual police can use the info for personal vendettas. According to the Dallas newspaper, they tracked a woman to the Colorado border in order to charge her with leaving Texas to get an abortion. When the scandal broke, they didn’t file the charges, but they could have because they had the information.

The Dallas paper said, “Dallas police conducted more than 800,000 searches of its Flock Safety data in 2025…. In 2025, almost 5,000 other agencies nationwide tapped into Dallas’ network of Flock cameras 10.3 million times… There are 670 Flock cameras across the city.”

The makers of surveillance cameras assert that they are not using facial recognition. But it is obvious that they could. Some of them already detect any Bluetooth activity that passes by them, and Bluetooth devices such as hearing aids or cell phones have personal identifiers.

Deflock.org says there are over 125,000 surveillance cameras operating in the nation. Their web site can show you where. In my area, deflockdfw.org lists city council and other local government meetings where people can protest against government surveillance.

How Deep?

We are very deep in dictatorship indeed. Assuming that the Trumpsters lose the November, 2026, elections, then unprecedented things will happen in American politics. One can understand what will happen, but not from American history. You have to look at Nazi Germany.

–gene lantz

I’m on KNON radio 89.3FM at 9AM Central Time every Saturday. If you are interested in my more personal observations, you might look at https://lilleskole.us

Who, What, is “Working Class?”

July 20, 2026

democracy, economy, history, politics, strategy

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I wouldn’t have thought there was any confusion about the working class had it not been for a headline I saw today from the VOX news service, “Who Counts as Working Class?” You have to subscribe to read it, but just knowing that a news service has to ask tips us off about the confusion.

I also recently attended a class on “Marxism” by one of the leaders of the Democratic Socialists of America. He said “working class” is “anybody who works.” I suppose his definition was okay for his presentation, but it could lead to a lot of trouble.

For example, Donald Trump works. He has to get up in the morning, go to meetings, talk to people, practice speeches, sign stuff and all manner of “work.” But could you by any stretch of the imagination call him “working class?”

Farmers are famous for working harder than anybody. Sun to sun, they are plowing, seeding, harvesting, repairing and everything else. Under “everything else” they also administrate their farms, do accounting, banking, and supervise whatever “hired hands” or farm workers they may have at any given time of the year. Are they in the “working class?”

What about Jalen Brunson, the star basketballer of the Champion New York Knicks? I understand that he makes $37 million/year. Is he working class?

It Was a Trick Question

Brunson fits the definition of “working class” because he makes his living primarily from selling his labor power. Trump doesn’t because he piles up the money from sources other than his daily labors. (Probably not best to go into where he actually does get his money). Farmers own their farms, and that’s the main way they make their living. Some farmers and ranchers don’t work at all, they just hire a foreman or a bunch of forepersons and go live in cities.

The working class is defined by their primary source of existence — selling their labor power. The bosses get their living by owning stuff. That’s all the definitions you need, but you could split hairs all day arguing over whether lawyers, professors, small businesspersons, police, union officers, union staffers, and many others are “working class,” “capitalist class,” or just in the uncertain area of “middle class.”

I put a pretty good treatment of the theoretical side of this “class” business on line, if you really want to get into it.

Why Does It Matter?

The reason it matters is that being determines consciousness. We like to think that we’re independent examiners of everything in life and that we decide what’s “right” or “wrong” based on evidence. But it isn’t so. Our attitudes about this or that come mostly from our material situation.

For example, almost all workers are for increasing the minimum wage. Almost all bosses are against it. Almost all workers are for health care. Almost all bosses are against it. Etc.

Another good way to understand it is to look at promotions in your shop. Your good buddy who agreed with you about everything has a real change when he makes foreman. He puts on that necktie and suddenly realizes that his old friends are a bunch of lazy bums that have to be forced to do the “right thing” and work harder for the company.

Cops are another great example. Before joining the force, they related closely to their families and communities. Afterward, they have few reservations about clubbing or even shooting them.

What About the Middle Class?

In politics, the middle class barely matters. It’s just a place for leftovers who don’t fit into “bosses” or “workers.” As a group, they can’t make up their minds about anything and are liable to jump either way on any given question. Usually, they “decide” to ally with whatever class is in power.

I don’t mean to denigrate them as individuals. Some of our greatest thinkers and leaders came from the middle class. Fidel was a lawyer, so was Lincoln, and so was Lenin. W.E.B. DuBois was a professor. Trotsky came from prosperous farmers. MLK was a preacher. But it wasn’t coming from the middle class that made them great. It was their commitment, later on, to the working class.

Which Side Are You On?

The words of the great labor song explain everything and why it all matters. There are only two sides in the modern world: workers and bosses. Pick one.

–Gene Lantz

I’m on KNON.org and 89.3 FM every Saturday at noon in Dallas. I reach out everywhere possible on the internet. My background and most personal opinions are on https://lilleskole.us

Multilateralism vs Constant War

July 18, 2026

democracy, economy, history, politics, strategy

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I was inspired by an article about China’s views on the United Nations and restoring multilateralism in all international relations. They encourage the United Nations to stand up for it.

https://www.telesurenglish.net/china-un-commitment/?utm_source=planisys&utm_medium=NewsletterIngles&utm_campaign=NewsletterIngles&utm_content=13

The opposite of multilateralism is intense competition, including wars between states. I think most of us would agree with what the Chinese say in the article, but is multilateralism even possible? Maybe we need some clarification.

What’s a State? What’s a Nation?

Let’s do the easy one first. A nation is a group of people sharing some things such as history, language, religion, and culture. A good example that we often use is the Cherokee nation. Lots of them live in Oklahoma because they were forced to move there when their state was subjugated.

A state is an administrative body through which a ruling class carries out its affairs, including the subjugation of any other economic class that might get in their way. Our modern state is not run by the Cherokees, even in Oklahoma. It is run by rich capitalists who command police, armies, prisons, and border agents to control or kill anybody penetrating their turf.

Borders Are Central to Capitalism

When capitalism began, around the middle of the 16th century in England, they tightly defined their borders. They defend those borders with every kind of armament. They don’t let anybody in or out without their permission. This fixation with borders was fairly new in history and doesn’t always make sense to working people.

Mexican Americans, for example, often say that they didn’t cross any borders but “the border crossed us.” Most of the Western United States was taken from Mexico, so it’s understandable that Mexican Americans believe they should be able to cross back and forth over the imaginary lines that capitalism established.

The way to understand capitalism’s borders is to think of gangster movies where the various criminals get together and define their “turf.” If a gangster is selling drugs on the wrong street corner, he/she is punished by the gang bosses. Similarly, capitalists established their borders by force of arms.

Borders Change, Or Get Changed

Long ago, what people called “China” was considerably bigger than what is pictured above.

“China,” or the “Mongol Empire” extended well into Europe, as you can see on this old map. The Mongols conquered a lot of territory, but subsequent dynasties lost it to other aggressors.

Plenty of modern borders weren’t drawn by the capitalists who lived there. They were drawn by the great imperialist powers. In World War I, for example, the Austrian Empire and the Ottoman Empire were on the losing side. Here’s a map from before the Great War:

Their former territories, along with a lot of Africa, were carved up by the victorious imperialists. Here’s a map of the Middle East from after WWI:

The joke goes that one of the squiggly lines on the border of Iraq was caused when somebody jostled Winston Churchill’s pencil.

Keep in mind that “nation” and “state” are entirely two different things, but nothing in this world is absolute and ideal. The Cherokee nation may not have its own state, but they have some administrative powers. There are nations that were able to win their own state. Pakistan is a good example.

Are We Going to Get the Multilateralism We Deserve?

No, we’re not. The modern state, with its defined borders and defending armies, is a capitalist creation. Capitalists have to expand. That’s why they had World War I, to settle who gets to expand where.

Remember the gangsters and their turf? Do you think the gangsters actually respect each other’s “territory” for any length of time?

We may long for socialism and the eventual “withering away” of states, but right now what we have is a world full of capitalist states and a few places where socialism is trying to defend itself from them.

After World War II, when the United States was firmly in control of most of the world’s economy, they were happy to allow the United Nations to exist. They talked about “multilateralism” all the time, just as long as they were the ones in charge.

But their hold on the world economy is slipping, and that’s exactly why they have started attacking other people’s borders. No border is safe.

Just Look At What We Have Done!

May 18, 2026

civil rights, democracy, economy, elections, history, politics, strategy, unions

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If everything looks bad, it’s only because our enemies are flooding the world with lies. In truth, they are cornered rats. I’m not saying that cornered rats are not dangerous, but they can be stomped!

Take a look at what we have already accomplished in 2026:

Crowds at No Kings events have surpassed all previous American protests!

Our labor movement broke 70 years of precedent by condemning Trump’s wars

Our labor movement broke even longer precedent by promoting May 1, International Workers Day

The Alliance for Retired Americans, which has never gone beyond immediate retiree issues, unanimously passed a hot resolution against the war in Iran. It’s a very long and detailed resolution. You can read it on http://retiredamericans.org. Here’s just one paragraph:

”Whereas the price of oil has already risen dramatically and will lead to sharp increases in the prices of many products that are daily necessities for American families, and the cost of this war will fall squarely on the working people of our country, and on our military service members who are being asked to wage a war and sacrifice their well-being, perhaps their lives, with no clear reason or end plan.”

Let me mention a few other items from today’s news:

Today, Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (CT-03) and 28 co-sponsors introduced the Fair Trade for Working Families Resolution, which outlines new principles for international trade that would prioritize the interests of working people over the profits of multinational corporations.… The resolution is endorsed by the United Steelworkers (USW), United Auto Workers (UAW), AFL-CIO, International Association of Machinists (IAM), Citizens Trade Campaign (CTC), Rethink Trade, Public Citizen, Sierra Club, NETWORK Lobby for Catholic Social Justice, the National Family Farm Coalition, and BlueGreen Alliance.

This seems like a good time to note that critical alliances are being formed in the progressive movement!

Here’s more from today’s news:

NYT asked “Do you think Donald Trumps decision to go to war with Iran was the right decision or the wrong decision?” Democrats said yes by 5%, Republians by 22%. And the general population by 30%.

Thousands rallied in Montgomery for voting rights. Ap in Dallas newspaper. It’s important to show that the fight goes on.

The Democratic nominee for Senate in Maine says he wants to change the system. NYT

Editors who usually choose to endorse candidates on the basis that they are probably going to win have chosen labor-endorsed Colin Allred on CD33, Venton Jones on TX100 and Nathan Johnson for Attorney General. Texas primary runoffs are May 26.

Mexican Government Reaffirms Support for Michelle Bachelet’s UN Secretary-General Candidacy Telesur This one is important because we might get a very progressive Secretary-General, but it also matters considerably that the President of Mexico does not cringe before Trump!

Unions are winning some big victories:

United Airlines Flight Attendants have new contract: The five-year contract includes a 31% base pay rate increase this summer; boarding pay (which averages an 7% to 8% increase to compensation); $741 million in retroactive pay; expanded job security; restrictions on red-eye flying; sit pay for scheduled and rescheduled sits over 2.5 hours; per diem and 401(k) contribution increases; 10 weeks’ paid maternity and two weeks’ paid parental and adoption leaves; elimination of 24 hour on-call reserve and more. Aflcio

Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Texas workers at George R. Brown Convention Center and Houston Entertainment Center just won massive 46% raises! TX AFL-CIO

I’m not positive how to evaluate this, but I think it’s big news:

Trump went to China, but came back empty handed. One interpretation of Trump’s war in Iran is that it was caused by the undermining of the “petrodollar” by the BRICS countries. Brazil, Russia, India, China and their 25 or so new partners have been trading for everything, including oil, in their own currencies instead of bowing to the United States and using dollars. If this is the reason for the war, and I think it is, then don’t expect it to be over soon. I’ll go so far as to say that the war in Iran will not really be over before the end of November.

–Gene Lantz. I’m on KNON radio at 9AM every Saturday. They podcast it on knon.org. They podcast my “Workers Beat Extra” podcasts on Soundcloud. I podcast them on Spotify under my own name. If you were curious about what I really think, you might look at https://lilleskole.us.

Buckle Seat Belts for 2026

December 26, 2025

democracy, economy, history, politics, strategy

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By Gene Lantz

“Expect the worst and hope for the best.” – Accountant’s credo

The Worst

The world economic system will continue to tremble and quake

American manufacturing and the stock market will rise without improving the jobs situation

Artificial intelligence will gobble up jobs and tremendously worsen the jobs crisis that is already underway

Income disparity, juiced up by Trump policies, will drastically worsen

Communications, especially cell phone communications, may end healthy competition and become even more of an oligopoly

In the electoral arena, candidates will be straining to find a “middle” in an increasingly divided electorate

Mister Trump, who has already shown that he will stop at nothing to maintain and extend his power, will likely start a war and implement martial law as his continuing drive toward fascism continues

Unions will refuse to recognize the new situation and continue the exact policies that have so far lost nearly ¾ of our peak density

Millions will not be able to afford decent health care. Emergency rooms will be overrun

The Best

In the electoral arena, candidates will be forced to clarify their intentions during 2026. Where I live in Dallas, labor will pressure all candidates to reveal their stand on Gaza

Unions will be more aggressive in the electoral arena. Where I live, we are working on two union members running in the January 31 special election. Two Steelworkers have filed for statewide races in the coming primaries.

A growing but unguided mass movement against dictatorship has exploded

More and more people are figuring out the dangers and what to do about it

Some unions are discarding old ways and implementing a larger reliance on our magnificent popularity in the general population of workers

Youth and retirees, two sectors recently encouraged by the labor movement, are growing and adding muscle

The Starbucks workers, using a combination of strike and boycott simultaneously, are showing all workers how use labor’s popularity against the bosses. On December 22 alone, 19 Starbucks stores signed up for union elections.

The Indicators

Nearly all of this analysis comes from information gathered during the past week, and especially on Christmas Day when the Washington Post published ten charts describing the current U.S. economic situation.

Gold and silver prices set new records. The usual “gold bug” speculators are buying precious metals of course, but major investors and some governments are also buying them. Precious metals pay no dividends, but they are a haven of safety for those who think a worldwide financial crisis is imminent.

Two major financial indicators, a soaring stock market and an expected increase in manufacturing, are both rooted in investment in artificial intelligence. Investors are buying into it and energy-gobbling data center building way up and projected to be gigantic. At the same time, the labor movement is “cool.” Although Trump’s anti-labor policies explain some of the labor market problems, the main problem now and in the future is job-killing artificial intelligence. The same thing lifting the stock market and manufacturing in America is driving down the jobs market.

The union response, so far, is to try to contain artificial intelligence through union contracts. Even if this were possible, it wouldn’t solve the problem because most workers, more than 90%, have no union contracts. As the bosses without unions implement artificial intelligence to lower their production costs, they will undermine all workers, including those with union contracts.

Income disparity is the illness afflicting all workers worldwide. Among the many alarming reports comes this sentence from the current week by Politico: “Bank of America says its top account holders saw take-home pay climb 4 percent over the last year, while income growth for poorer households grew just 1.4 percent.” Even though inflation held at 3% during the past year and dropped to 2.7% for November, it’s still a lot higher than income growth for poorer households.

All of the major tech companies have hitched themselves to the Trump agenda, and for good reason. They produce artificial intelligence, and they all know that artificial intelligence is Trump’s main hope to lower production costs enough to outperform China and other worldwide economic competitors. “Lower production costs” is a euphemism for fewer jobs.

Elon Musk, in many ways the master tech investor, has practically cornered the market in communications satellites. He has already bought the software and established the partnership with T-Mobile that he needs to change all cell phone communications to satellite. Everybody who currently works in cell phone tech is in danger. The Communications Workers of America have a vital boycott against T-Mobile, but it hasn’t yet achieved nationwide participation.

Just two recent election results are sufficient to show the strain in the electoral arena. Mister Trump successfully used the power of the United States government to overcome the progressive government of Honduras. He failed to do the same in the New York Mayoral race. Candidates in 2026 will find it difficult to dodge the issues important to working people. For example, the Dallas Central Labor Council voted to pressure all candidates who apply for endorsement to reveal their positions on the genocide in Gaza.

War in Latin America is imminent. The Trump Administration has already discarded every aspect of international law and human decency in its attacks against Venezuela. So far, they have managed to resist the provocations, but Trump isn’t finished. He needs the popularity of a wartime presidency and, if it becomes necessary to maintain power, he needs an excuse to implement martial law and end democracy once and for all.

Our unions have taken hardly any positions on the coming war nor on any of the pressing international questions. Domestically, we continue to try to organize more workplaces under the rules set in the early Roosevelt Administration. We continue to try to use our diminishing membership base to affect legislative change, just as we have since around 1947 when we had 35% of the American workforce organized. Today, we have closer to 9%.

So… Why Are We Smiling?

Clearly, the Trump Administration and the billionaires it leads are flailing around in desperation. They aren’t acting out of strength nor confidence, but like boat wreck survivors trying anything and everything to cling to life. They have very little thought of what they are doing, and they are being led by an unstable person.

Democracy has taken hits, but is a long way from disappearing in a country convinced, for 250 years, that democracy is best. The worldwide system of governance is very weak against a super power, but it has the credibility of all caring people.

Our anti-war movement may seem small, but the structures created in earlier upsurges still exist and are ours to use. Our unions may seem small and timid, but we still have the power to shut down the major intersections of economic and social life. Organizations close to the unions, especially the youth and senior movements, are growing stronger.

Candidates in 2026 will be pressured to take our side, and more of them will

People are catching on. We have the communications ability for accelerated strategic progress. We haven’t yet agreed on a plan of coordinated mass resistance, but we are clearly headed that way.

The Billionaires Must Be Removed from Power

April 23, 2025

democracy, economy, history, politics, strategy

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The for-profit economic system must be ended. Today’s unprecedented political activity must be turned toward ending this system and birthing a new system of cooperation and democracy. The opportunity is now and may soon pass by, just as two great opportunities were missed in 20th century history.

Great hordes of protesters are springing up like grass on the Earth. They are fearless and strong, but not united in purpose. In America, many of them believe that they need only to replace Musk and Trump with Democrats. They are mistaken, and, if they don’t achieve a better understanding, will probably fail even in their modest hopes. Even if they succeed, they will have solved nothing except, perhaps, a delay in fascism.

Look behind the Musk/Trump fascist spokespersons at the underlying economic situation and our place in material history.

Musk and Trump are powerful figureheads, but figureheads still. The other politicians, newspersons, judges, and law firms kneeling before Musk/Trump give a clue to the breadth of the fascist trend. The power behind it all is the billionaire class.

The billionaire class would not have chosen comic madmen and unpopular ideology if they weren’t desperate. In fact, the capitalists are aware that they are drowning in a thrashing sea. Musk/Trump and fascism, they hope, will at least keep them afloat until they can find a way to restore the profit streams that keep them alive as a class. In their desperation, and because they have no conscience, they are willing to bring about a third world war – this time against China.

Armchair socialists who believe that world war is impossible and that capitalism will die of self-inflicted wounds, aren’t helping.

Capitalism will not die of its own internal contradictions, as some bookish “Marxists” choose to believe. Like flatworms cut in half, capitalism can regenerate its missing parts.

This was demonstrated after World War I and again after World War II. In those wars, hundreds of millions died, many more suffered lifelong debilitations, and the wealth of ages was destroyed or converted into military equipment that was either blown to smithereens or discarded as useless later on. Afterward, the capitalists who had won picked up and went on to create a new phase of prosperity for themselves.

In 1914 and again in 1939, capitalism’s internal contradictions brought the system to the precipice of extinction just as Marx and Engels had predicted. But nineteenth century Marx and Engels had no experience with mechanized world war. The twentieth century bosses didn’t step aside in acknowledgement of the fact that history had already outlived them and they had nothing progressive to offer the human race. Instead, they set themselves at each other like cannibals and came close to destroying everything.

After the populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were evaporated, it was commonly thought that a third world war was impossible, since the existence of the planet was at stake. Bookish “Marxists” took comfort in believing that world war had become simply impossible and that the internal contradictions explained by Marx, usually described as the tendency of the profit rate to decline, was still operating to bring the bosses to their eventual knees.

Past bosses had no qualms about ordering millions of automated deaths nor of destroying civilization’s wealth. In fact, a lot of them did quite well in the wartime economy. The bosses on the winning side also reaped a bonanza in post-war prosperity.

Even though the corporate-owned newspersons describe the Musk/Trump regime as chaotic and senseless shenanigans, they have a clear purpose that is completely in line with the wishes of the billionaire class that sponsors them. They intend to bring everyone possible under their control and to direct them, like a collective battering ram of nations, corporations and individuals, against their economic adversary — China. A trade war is hardly the beginning, because only the mighty U.S. military might be able to overcome China’s commercial advantages.

If the billionaires are not stopped and removed from power, they will sooner or later carry out a third world war at immeasurable cost to the people and the planet. That’s how they handled their inevitable internal crises before; that’s how they will handle them again, unless they are stopped.

‘Tis the Final Conflict

March 3, 2025

democracy, economy, history, politics, strategy

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“Tis the final conflict / Let each stand in their place…”

“Agrupemos todos, en la lucha final…”

The words to “l’Internacional” are ringing in my ears. The first 100 days of the Musk/Trump administration are only chaos to most people, but I think I have figured out a correct analysis, characterization, and prescription. I’ve been asking people individually if they agreed or disagreed over the past week or so. Nobody has outright agreed with me, but nobody has contradicted me, either. More importantly, nobody else has any kind of description other than “chaos.”

Here’s what I think: capitalism is in its death throes.

The ruling class, the owning class, the billionaire class, or the boss class as I like to call them, is thrashing about. Although the fascists achieved a majority in the Republican Party, they haven’t completely taken over all the bosses in both boss parties. And they are a long way from having convinced the majority of the American people. The bosses are clutching at fascism the way a drowning man clings to anything that he thinks will float.

Fascism, by the way, doesn’t float. It isn’t a viable way to run an economy. Slaves don’t make good employees. They tend to let the machines break and spit in the bosses’ food. If they try to run the American economy under fascism, they won’t last long. The only reason Hitler was able to hang on for 12 years was his early success in war.

So even if they manage to impose fascism, as they are clearly trying to do, they won’t have solved their problem. Their problem is world competition. Musk and Trump are offering to solve the problem by bringing all their so-called allies to heel (thus the crazy tariffs) and getting everybody to focus on defeating China (thus the effort to change Russia into an ally). Defeating China will require a nuclear war, and they know that. At the same time and for the same reason, they are offering to continue destroying the planet ecologically. To carry all this out, they need the absolute cooperation of all the boss class (thus the tax giveaway) and the total subservience of the working class (thus the moves to starve us into giving up). The result, if it worked, would be a temporary period of unstable fascism.

Long term, there are two possible outcomes: 1) America’s working class unites and puts an end to boss rule, which would effectively end capitalism worldwide 2) Not an alternative.

Either way, the system just doesn’t work any more. It is up to us to work for understanding, for unity, and for action to bring a bright new dawn for humanity. We need to hurry!

–Gene Lantz

I’m on KNON.org and 89.3FM in Dallas every Saturday at 9. My personal web site has been bothered by adware but seems to be working OK at last: https://lilleskole.us.

What Did You Expect?

February 9, 2025

democracy, economy, education, elections, environment, history, politics, strategy

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I think I like “what did you expect?” better than all the political phrases being bandied around today.

Let me point out why these times we are in have promise that is far more important than the misery that is being put onto working families. The promise won’t be seen by any but those who are genuine change agents who are in it for the long haul, but that’s including more and more people as the veils fall from everybody’s eyes.

The thing that is wrong with the world, you probably have figured out, is the profit system. A small group of legal “owners” profits while everybody else is exploited more and more. When you realize the truth, you should see, almost immediately, that it can’t go on forever. Sooner or later capitalism must capsize just because of its own internal workings.

Long ago, capitalism was a good thing. It freed the slaves and the serfs. It lowered the price of commodities. It provided education to the masses so that they could work its machines. It did good things, but the price was high.

One of the main prices was world war. In 1914, by my own estimation, capitalism started to produce more misery than good. I think a lot of people caught on then, and that’s why we began to see a serious socialist movement worldwide. Another really good example is the degradation of our planet. Capitalism is making it unlivable and more and more people are realizing it.

Capitalism could kill or intimidate many socialists, but they could never extinguish its flame.

People continue to catch on, and new capitalist technology, especially personal smart phones, helped us tremendously. Here in the United States, we began to see the system, including the two-capitalist-party electoral system, for what it is. That caused us to cast about for some other approach, or some other system, or for some other leadership. Predictably, we tend to opt for what seems the easiest route. But what we want is a better world for ourselves and our offspring, and none of the easy ways will provide it.

So here we are. Fires and floods threaten everybody. More war is on the agenda. The entire world monetary system is being rocked. The American dollar, secure and reliable since the destruction of World War II, is being abandoned piecemeal. The owning class, now largely billionaires, is desperately trying to maintain their rule by turning to fascism. In other words, capitalist rule is shuddering toward its death agony.

It might be the end of the world, but it might be only the end of the profit system. Did you think it would be pretty? What did you expect?

–genelantz19@gmail.com

It’s not Biden, it’s the System!

December 17, 2023

democracy, economy, elections, history, politics, strategy

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Last week’s Pew Poll revealed that President Biden’s approval rating has continued to fall and has reached a dismal 33%! If we put some perspective around that figure, we can discover something really worth knowing. Think about it, how could Biden’s approval ratings keep falling while the economy keeps improving?

Compare Biden to Other World Leaders

The Los Angeles Times checked approval ratings of other world leaders of industrialized nations.

Canada’s Justin Trudeau 31%

Britain’s Rishi Sunak 21%

Germany’s Olaf Sholz 17%

Japan’s Fumio Kishida 17%

They added in several more observations. Donald Trump’s approval is harder to measure but they give him a measly 42%. While President Biden started his term with well over 50%, Trump never had over 49%.

Compare Approval Ratings over Time

The Los Angeles newspaper also checked back a few decades and concluded that President Eisenhower (1952-1960) was the last one to keep decent approval ratings all the way. That was in the days of the “American Century” when unions demanded and received 3% raises every year, plus cost-of-living raises, plus pensions, plus free health care. After Eisenhower, every American president started out with over 50% and then fell steadily to the end of their term.

The evidence shows clearly that declining approval ratings can’t be blamed on any of the simple things. It’s not the person’s age, not the state of the economy, not war, not peace, not scandal, not any of the issues of any particular period. It has to be something big, something powerful, and something consistent.

Once You See It, Things Make Sense

People in America and other industrialized countries do not like the system they live under. It’s that simple.

Want to know why Trump won in 2016 in spite of every possible prediction? Voters thought he represented some kind of new system. What they got was tax cuts for the rich and an intensification of everything that was wrong with the old system, but many of them are still desperate for some kind of positive change, and many of them, incredible as it may seem, will continue to hang those hopes on Donald Trump.

The system we live under produces the worst kind of inequality. We could call it the “rich get richer and poor get poorer” system. Just last week, in the same newspapers, we read that the stock market had peaked and, that same week, homelessness in American also reached an all-time historical high! If you read carefully, you would also have seen that the number of young Americans who expect to vote in the 2024 Presidential race is tanking!

It isn’t just Biden, Trump, Trudeau and the rest of them that can’t get high approval ratings. It wouldn’t help much to substitute other Democrats for Biden or other Republicans for Trump. We would still have the same system and approval ratings would continue falling!

Change Will Come, Because It Must

My recent blogs and podcasts have been about the outlook for fascism, for a general strike, and a viable workers’ party. Those are the trends underway, and we’d better be working hard for one of the last two.

–Gene Lantz

I’m on KNON’s “Workers Beat” radio talk show every Saturday at 9AM Central Time. On Wednesdays, they post my “Workers Beat Extra” podcasts on Soundcloud.com. If you are curious about what I really think, try my personal web site at http://lilleskole.us.