Was this Epstein big trick: networking really well; or was Chomsky also a giant dirtbag?

Both. Epstein’s big trick was networking really well with other dirt bags.

On mobile the side menu partially obscures the main content:

Other than that, cool design!

Yes.

China is obvious, but our US comrades need to realize they wanna do the same with the US also. You are not safe in the imperial core. Those times have ended.

Yeah, great essay.

Keep coping that, however bad you have it your country, China must be worse, so it’s fine that you and your fellow citizens won’t do anything about the deteriorating conditions.

Classic western resistance: “people taking hopeful actions that go against the grain.”

Who needs actually achieving environmental goals, it’s the purity that matters.

All labor unions must belong to the state-sanctioned All-China Federation of Trade Unions. Independent strikes and labor organizing are illegal and strictly suppressed. There are strong anti-union sentiments in the US, but independent unionizing is still very much legally permitted.

Westerners can stay mad forever that China won’t allow CIA and NED to set up “independent” “labor unions”.

Not OP, but I highly recommend the “Primitive Accumulation” mini-series (Part 1: The collapse of Feudalism and Part 2: The Great European Witch Hunts)

Ah the British colonizer disease of transcribing long/open vowels with r. That’s also how you get the Korean name Park, which in reality is more like Paak.

Call me skeptical, but back in Trump 1 times EU was very loud about a need for “independent alternative financial transaction system” too. They even created it, performed 1 (one) transaction and then quietly shut it down after a year.

I’ve been watching some modern Chinese “Red” shows and they mention Edgar Snows’s Red Star over China multiple times, and I’ve heard it mentioned before, so I decided it’s time to read it. Overall very informative and enjoyable account of China’s revolutionary years and Mao’s personal development from a run of the mill liberal to the Mao we all know and love.

As a teaser here’s Snow talking to some random Chinese on a train when he was about to reach the Communist controlled territories:

“But in Szechuan don’t people fear the Reds as much as the bandits?”

“Well, that depends. The rich men fear them, and the landlords, and the officials and tax-collectors, yes. But the peasants do not fear them. Sometimes they welcome them.” Then he glanced apprehensively at the old man, who sat listening intently, and yet seeming not to listen. “You see,” he continued, “the peasants are too ignorant to understand that the Reds only want to use them. They think the Reds really mean what they say.”

“But they don’t mean it?”

“My father wrote to me that they did abolish usury and opium in the Sungpan [Szechuan], and that they redistributed the land there. So you see they are not exactly bandits. They have principles all right. But they are wicked men. They kill too many people.”

Then surprisingly the greybeard lifted his gentle face and with perfect composure he made an astonishing remark. “Sha pu kou!” he said. “They don’t kill enough!” We both looked at him flabbergasted.

Funny how all the “it’s not a real socialism” guys always ignore the communes.

What, are we a bunch of ASIANS?

Actually it’s worse than that. The third world countries never got to develop their infrastructure, whereas the US got theirs early and just let it rot because maintaining it is not profitable.

New York being the international capital of the Capital and running its metro system on 18th century technology is fitting.

APL does not to my knowledge uphold any current socialist projects, but it does not uphold “Western Marxist” traditions.

That is a Western Marxist tradition in itself.

could trigger a humanitarian crisis

Yeah, that’s the point of the blockade.

Surely this couldn’t possibly have anything to do with a certain country using its control over financial institutions to prevent processing payments from “bad” countries.

Many such cases